Obey had taken ten years to accumulate fifteen thousand acres of contiguous lots and had spent millions to rid the earth of toxic waste left behind by a long-defunct county power depot. Unlike other empire-builders, he’d considered the environmental impact of his projects from the beginning, was out to crown his career with something culturally significant.

The new city was to be named Esperanza—Spanish for “hope.”

I combined “Esperanza” with each of the Cossack brothers’ names and the Larners but came up with nothing. Tossing John G. Broussard into the mix proved no more fruitful. I tried “Advent Properties” and “Advent.” Still nothing on the Cossacks and the Larners, but a back-page construction journal article informed me that L.A.’s police chief had been hired as a security consultant to the Esperanza project. Broussard, hamstrung by city regulations, was working for free, but private shares in Advent had been gifted to the chief’s wife and his only child, daughter, Joelle, a corporate attorney with a white-shoe downtown firm.

Broussard hadn’t shown up at the private dinner but Milo’s hunch was right on: The chief’s hand was in everything.

The bitter aftertaste of my bad behavior with Robin kept rising like vomitus as I worked hard at concentrating on Obey and Broussard and the others and wondering what it could possibly mean.

“Comprehensive recreational facilities,” could mean playgrounds for kids, or it was a buzzword for bringing pro football back to the L.A. environs.

Billionaire with a big dream—I could see that being the crowning glory of Obey’s long career. And it made good sense to place the top cop on your masthead.

But if the PR about Obey’s righteous mien and the size of his personal fortune was accurate, why would he waste time with the Cossacks, who alienated their neighbors and couldn’t seem to get any projects off the ground? And in the case of the Larners, the association would be even more hazardous—they were outright hustlers tainted by the Playa del Sol debacle.

Unless Obey’s balance sheets weren’t as glowing as the press believed, and he needed financial backup for his dream. Even billionaires could lose sight of assets and debits, and Obey had spent a decade buying up land and financing and detoxifying his holdings without a single spadeful of Esperanza dirt dug.

Big dreams often meant cataclysmic problems.

I switched to several financial databases and probed for thorns in Obey’s numerous gardens. At least seven separate corporations were listed under his leadership, including Advent. But only one outfit was publicly traded, a commercial leasing company named BWO Financing.

BWO. Probably stood for Barbara and Walt Obey. Homey. From everything I could tell, the company was doing great, with common stock trading at 95 percent of its high, preferred units paying consistent dividends, and solid ratings from Standard & Poor.