There were certainly plenty of skeptical people out there who held serious doubts as to who and exactly what Konstantin and his video were actually supposed to represent. These same people would start to investigate the supposedly dead man and his story. Yet for many others they had heard and seen all they needed to unequivocally make up their minds.
But Russia and the rest of the world would never discover that Konstantin was actually a fledgling actor from Latvia, his “wounds,” and “emaciation” the result of clever makeup and professional lighting. After shooting his piece he’d washed up, removed all elements of his disguise, and had a nice lunch at, of all places, the Russian Tea Room on 57th Street in New York, spending part of the $50,000 he’d been paid to do the shoot. Since he also spoke Spanish and possessed dark good looks and a chiseled body, his chief ambition now was to win a major role in a Latino soap opera.
Meanwhile, the world would never be the same.
CHAPTER 2
NICOLAS CREEL LEISURELY FINISHED his Bombay Sapphire and tonic and put on his jacket. He was going for a walk. Actually, normal people went for walks. Billionaire corporate chieftains traveled high above the rabble. As he looked out the chopper window on the short ride across the Hudson to Jersey the skyscrapers below reminded him of how far he’d come. Creel had been born in West Texas, an area so big and barren with a seemingly endless flatness that it was said many who called it home were unaware there was any other place to live, or at least any way to get there.
Creel had spent exactly one year of his life in the Lone Star State before moving to the Philippines along with his army sergeant daddy. From there seven other countries had followed bang-bang-bang until Creel’s father was deployed to Korea and promptly blown to ash in what the army later described as an unfortunate logistical snafu. His widowed mother had remarried, and, years later, college followed for Creel, where he earned an engineering degree. After that, he cobbled together enough funds for an MBA run, but petered out after six months, choosing instead to learn the ropes in the real world.