Who: Penelope "Alfie" Worth & Thomas Brandon OMG YAY What: First meeting; a financial arrangement. Where: In Musings, for one. New York, New York. When: Backdated a great deal to about ten years or so ago. Warnings: Not a one.
Thomas Brandon showed up early for his appointment. He unnerved the assistant; partly because he sat in the waiting room for twenty minutes and all he did was stare intently at the door, thinking, and partly because he looked like a thug. His hair was cropped very short, making his long features look severe and sharpened. He wore a suit that was the kind the clerks at a suit-shop gave you if you showed up in the door and agreed to the first thing they suggested, a blue-gray affair that ill-fit his broad shoulders and height. His build was a standard military triangle, a round line from thick shoulder to shoulder and a trim waist that not even the slightly wrinkled white dress shirt hid. There was a thin line, the assistant thought, between patient and just plain creepy. He didn’t fidget, he didn’t look around, and he didn’t do more than acknowledge her presence when he walked in (and she was wearing her best perfume). He wasn’t impressed by the grandiose headquarters or the modern architecture, and he didn’t wear a watch, which made her think that he didn’t have anywhere to go or perhaps he couldn’t afford to have one.
Neither assumption was true, of course, but Thomas Brandon was a man of intense discipline, refined from purpose, and all the rough edges he had sanded out himself--or perhaps only turned inward so that no one else would be hurt by them. He liked to think that he was aware of some of his faults, and one of them was that he certainly had absolutely no idea how to assemble the company he wanted to build, much less run it. Having a trust fund was not enough, not for Thomas. All that money had a purpose, and that purpose was not sports cars and pointless fripperies. Thomas thought about all the people that used his father’s name and stared at that door, making calculations, running through scenarios, and hoping.
Penelope, or Alfie as she was more often called, had spent a very boring morning listening to very boring men tell her how she ought to manage their money. She’d listened, of course, with a quiet sort of respect and a deep sense of attention - and she had been paying attention; it was always important to listen to the falsities people put out into the world - and then she’d told them, with the certainty almost 100 years, that they were wrong. Some people took risks, while others liked to tuck their money away in closets and shoeboxes, while others still preferred to spend it on yachts and entertainment. Alfie preferred the latter, if she had a choice; those men let you make a killing and they never even noticed what you did. The former, they were the kind she had no time for. That morning’s appointment had been those kinds of men.
By the time her afternoon appointment arrived, she was almost ready to let her assistant handle it, and she would have had it been anyone else waiting outside the glass doors of the waiting area. Thomas Brandon, who she had researched very well in the course of the past few days, was different than the boring men of the morning - or at least she hoped he’d be. She let her assistant know to let the young man in, and she cut off the woman’s attempts to warn her about his demeanor and behavior. Alfie preferred to make her own decisions, and she’d learned long ago that she looked for very different things in people than most financial advisers - plainly said, it took more than money to hire her. She was hoping this young man would bring something of interest to the table.
Thomas walked into the meeting feeling as if he was charging up a hill. He needed help with his next endeavor, and Penelope Worth was the best. If he couldn't talk her into helping--and yes, he knew it would take some convincing--then he was going to have to start a plan from scratch with someone less qualified. He was not aware of the image he presented as he moved within, not thinking that in business offices you're supposed to make polite noise to announce your presence, or that there was no need to look around the room for potential enemies.
Thomas had just come from a place where you didn't approach new acquaintances farther than a certain radius to give everyone room to bow at each other, so there was a brief hesitation a yard from the desk as she came around it to meet him. He took her hand, however, and since he certainly hadn't been training in kid gloves, he had hands that might as well have been laying brick for the last ten years. "Ms. Worth, thank you for meeting me." He had a grip like iron, but it didn't seem to be intentionally intimidating. He was serious, forthright, and he looked her in the eye.
“Alfie,” she said, and just like that she liked him.
It was something about the grip, too strong to be polite, but definitely not the soft kind of grip that marked a man as weak. Weakness in men was something that Alfie was exceptionally wary of. Getting into business ventures with men who were scared to shake your hand generally resulted in them capitulating to someone other than her along the line, and losing them all money in the process. A strong grip, that was the key to good business. There was the alternative, of course, which was a man who felt like he needed to show you that he was the dominant party in a business venture - also bad, but Alfie still preferred it to the promised ills of a lax handshake.
She motioned to the seat across from the desk, and she took the seat beside him, instead of retreating to the position of power in the room. “Tell me, Mr. Brandon, what brings you to Worth Financials today?” She didn’t assume she knew the answer, because then she’d miss whatever he thought mattered. She hadn’t made it as far as she had by running roughshod over people. She was fifty five, or so she appeared, and she was in a pair of khaki slacks and a sharp shirt that didn’t try too hard; she’d given that up a long time ago too.
“Financials,” he said, without in the least intending to be funny. Thomas Brandon didn’t look like he’d thought anything was funny for a very long time, an odd look on someone so young. He looked at the calm capability in the lines on this woman’s face and doubted very much that he would ever be able to call her “Alfie.” He took his hand back and didn’t think to look around for a chair, he just stood as he spoke, as he’d gotten in the habit of doing. “Mine, to be specific. Well, really my father’s.” He was awkward speaking about his parents, and he almost never did, so he tripped a little over the sentence. Belatedly he caught on that the movement of her hand had meant to indicate a chair, and he sat down the way he did everything else: mechanical. “They’re a mess. Other than my trust fund, everything is spread out over small businesses and real estate, largely ruled over by rock-headed men who seem to think they are feudal lords from a different century.”
She didn’t smile at his initial ignorance of the chair and its function; she listened. She heard the awkwardness in the mention of his father, and she caught the slight trip in the words, as if they were hard things to get past. When he discovered the chair (and its purpose) she just waited for him to take his seat, and she wondered how someone so young could be so stiff; stiffness, she had learned, came with stuffiness and old age. She sat forward then, when he began discussing the finances in earnest. Spreading money around in the way he described was an age-old tactic to evade taxes and law enforcement, and doing anything with those funds would involve clean-up that was not entirely financial. “These rock-headed men, what have you tried with them?” she asked, because she wanted to keep him talking for the time being; there was more listening to be done here.
He smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile. “Anything just short of getting killed. They take the feudal thing fairly seriously, and King Richard has been abroad for a while.” He sat back in the chair, a move that was without slump or laziness, but it still indicated a certain confidence. He wasn’t afraid of these men. They presented an obstacle to him, and that was all. “Are you aware, Ms. Worth, about the hereditary occupation of my family?” He totally missed the nickname she’d indicated to him and he lifted his brows a little in the inquiry.
“Let us hope Leopold isn’t going to capture him on his return,” she said easily, her elbow resting against the arm of the chair in a leisurely pose that conveyed thoughtfulness. “Or, conversely, we could give Leopold other things to worry about, so that King Richard may return safely.” She could tell he wasn’t afraid, and that was important. If he feared these men, these feudal lords, they would leave him completely out of the managing of his own finances, until they ultimately left him out of living. Men like the ones holding the bits and pieces of his wealth weren’t going to allow him to reign from a distance. “I am aware of your family’s illustrious past, yes.” She leaned back in the chair. “I take it you mean to rewrite history?”
“History can’t be rewritten,” he said, bluntly. “I’m only interested in the future.” If he was really only interested in the future, he’d be out enjoying that trust fund. He knew well enough that no one could touch that, and there was more than enough to keep him comfortable. Comfortable, clearly, was not what Thomas Brandon wanted. “I don’t know how to do it, but I want to do it through legal channels. I want my father’s legacy to be legitimate, the way he wanted it to be.” This was not common knowledge; nobody had much of an inkling that Thomas Brandon II had been interested in anything different than his father before him. Thomas knew this and he looked particularly fierce when he said it in case she was in the mood to argue it with him.
She didn’t argue, not about his father. “You’d be amazed how much history you can rewrite by changing the future,” she said. It was just a statement, nothing more, a comment for him to think on. She left it there, didn’t pursue it as she raised her fingers to her lips thoughtfully. “How many businesses and how self-sufficient are they?” she asked, though she knew enough about the businesses to know they were dirty, and that the dirt kept them out of the red. She wanted to know how aware he was, however, and she was already rather certain the answer was going to be considerably aware.
He was definitely aware. Instead of just giving her a round number he gave her specific ones, categorized by business type, and he named their general locations within the boundaries of the city. He also mentioned the last names of those feudal lords he spoke of, various crime bosses that used to work for his father, and whether or not they had interests elsewhere; overseas, for example. He didn’t mention anything illegal outright, but the implication was there, and he was describing a network of loosely- (badly-) organized crime throughout the city, with money going in and out like red tide. It was the remains of an infrastructure that his father had been slowly dismantling from within; right up until he was killed. Thomas’ recitation was clearly the result of long study, and his mental map of the city was more military than financial or economical.
Considerably aware, as expected. She would have ended the conversation right there, if it had turned out to be otherwise. What he was asking was risky, dangerous, and an huge undertaking. It would take the muscle of the entire business to do it, if it was to be done right and without any casualties. “Why not take your money and run?” she asked. This needed to be more than a memento mori to be successful. It needed to be as much about him, as it was about his father’s wishes.
“I’m not interested in running. I want to live here. I want everybody else to be able to live here.” He leaned forward slightly, and it was only a bare inch, but the cool intensity turned up until the ice burned. “And most of all, I want them to realize this is not the middle ages, and they are not untouchable.” No, this wasn’t about money. If it was about revenge, he had turned it into something that had a life beyond revenge, something that couldn’t be won in a day. It was also blatantly clear that there wasn’t anything boring or normal about Thomas Brandon, and if anything, there was something seriously wrong with him.
Wanting everyone to be able to live in a place like Musings, where the death toll was climbing daily, was something for presidents of nations and politicians, and yet this young man felt it was his responsibility? She lowered her fingers from her mouth, where they had been tapping thoughtfully, and she looked at him clearly and directly. She’d read him wrong, she realized; this wasn’t about his father at all. It sounded worryingly like a hero complex, and she took in the stony look of his features a moment longer. “I see,” she finally said, and she did. “So we’re not just looking to give you financial freedom, we’re looking to take them down financially in the process,” They could do that; she could do that, but it wouldn’t achieve his ultimate goal. “What happens after that?”
“I have financial freedom,” he said, solidly. “After that I want to consolidate. Everything needs to be above-board, under a clear name, so people understand where the money is going to. After that, assuming stability--we put the money back into the community.” This is the part he wasn’t sure about--he wanted to make sure the money profited the average person, but he had no real idea how to do that. Charities of some kind, he assumed. He gave her a look that clearly was meant to figure out what she thought about him and his little project. “It will be difficult.”
“It’s going to be near impossible,” she said bluntly, but then she smiled and stood, walking around her desk and pulling a file from it, which she slid across to him. It contained the financial portfolio for every piece of property he had mentioned earlier - where the money came from, what was expended, who was employed, where the cracks were, the weak points that could be exploited to bring each individual entity down. “Ten percent off the top,” she told him, taking a seat in the chair behind the desk. “Worth Financials will invest five back into whatever charity you create, assuming it’s a worthwhile one.” She paused. “This will take years.” She didn’t want to set false expectations, didn’t want him thinking this could happen overnight; it couldn’t, but it could happen.
“Probably,” he said, unconcerned with the timing. Youth in Musings tended to be long depending on the person, but having reached adulthood, Thomas Brandon could clearly care less about time passing. He had his purpose. He took the file and started studying it, not reading every single thing yet moving with speed. He was impressed when she found some things that he had not seen. He should have known she would, of course. “Eight percent,” he said, “and I want clear parameters about what you think is a ‘worthwhile charity.’” The lawyers would get into the grit of it, all he really needed was an agreement, and he thought he already had one.
She considered haggling, but she didn’t. She’d seen his net worth; Eight percent off the top was substantial, and she really didn’t need it. This interested her, this prospect. No, not the prospect, the young man sitting across the desk. “No parameters, Thomas,” she said, using his first name without any additional titles. “I want to know what you consider worthwhile, what matters to you.” It was, very blatantly, a challenge. “One percent added off the top for any additional personnel required,” she threw in at the end. They were going to need muscle for this - legal muscle, but muscle. “Your lawyers, you trust them?” She suspected his trust was very limited, but it was an important question, one worth asking.
“They’re lawyers. Of course I don’t trust them. But to the extent that their prosperity depends on my prosperity--yes, I trust them.” He’d done financial and psychological profiles, of course, along with background checks. If Alfie Worth was anything as good as people said, she’d probably done the same until she’d had a trustworthy base of ops. He finished the file--for the time being--and closed it without giving it back. In the only show of weakness so far, two fingers brushed his temple and the slight ache there from being awake too long. “I’m looking for people I can trust,” he said, seriously. “Take your one percent.”
“You’re going to negatively impact everyone’s financial prosperity initially, or that’s how it’s be perceived. Lawyers, like board members, fear changes in circumstance.” She watched his fingers move to his temple, and she thought he looked terribly young in the moment. “We’ll see,” was all she said on the topic of the one percent. “We might need it to increase your security, given the undertaking we’re about to embark on.” She didn’t make decisions, so much as she made statements; it was her way, and she expected whoever she worked with to be able to meet her halfway. If he got some sleep, she thought Thomas Brandon might be up to the task. “I’ll have my lawyers get in touch,” she said, standing, “and might I recommend some sleep?” It was casually asked, in the tone her father always used with the lord and lady of the house in her childhood; more service than suggestion.
He smiled. It was a real smile, not one of the hard ones of grim humor. “Focus on your security; I don’t go anywhere and I don’t need anyone following me around when I do.” That was the truth. “I’ll be more careful if you will.” There was a pause, and he shook her hand again. Something about her made him more careful about it, and it wasn’t so bone-crunching this time. “First thing on my list,” he said about the sleep, with an actual hint of rebellion in the return. “Thank you again for your time.”
She didn’t believe he was going to do anything she said, this young man who thought he was older than she was. It entertained her, and a smile graced her life-worn lips. “You’re welcome,” she said, and she meant it. “I expect this to be an interesting ride, Mr. Brandon,” she quipped, intentionally moving to a more formal method of addressing him, if only for a moment. “Oh,” she added, almost as if it was an afterthought, “ and you don’t need to worry about my focus or my security. You’ll figure that out as we go.”
Another strange smile from him. “Likewise.” Brushing past the frowning assistant, he left. He had some state-of-the-art armor to inspect.