Chapter 14 014
Jonathan Hale was already at his desk when Jared was shown in at seven sharp. No food this time. No staff moving quietly around the edges. Just two men and a table and whatever Jared had found in Long Beach.
Hale looked at him without preamble. "Tell me."
Jared opened his notebook and set it on the table between them. He did not read from it. He had internalized everything the night before and the notes were there for Hale to examine afterward if he wanted the detail in writing.
"The physical operation is sound," Jared began. "Fleet, facility, logistics infrastructure. All of it is performing at a level that should be generating healthy margins. The problem is not operational. It is behavioral. And the behavior was created deliberately by a system your previous CEO installed eighteen months ago."
Hale's expression did not change. "The performance metric program."
"Yes," Jared said. "The targets were structurally impossible to meet through legitimate means. So your department heads did what people do when they are given impossible targets and their income depends on hitting them. They found ways to appear compliant while quietly compromising the things that actually make the operation work. Procurement quality dropped. Maintenance was deferred. Driver scheduling was pushed past the point of efficiency. None of it was dramatic enough to trigger an alarm. All of it compounded across eighteen months into the margin bleed you are seeing now."
Hale was quiet for a moment. "Both CEOs I replaced identified cost overruns and tried to cut further. They made it worse."
"Because they were treating the symptom," Jared said. "Cutting costs in a system where costs were already being artificially suppressed just increased the pressure on people who had no more room to absorb it."
Hale leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling briefly. The gesture of a man recalibrating.
"What is the fix?" he asked.
Jared turned to the second page of his notebook. "Three stages. The first is immediate. Dismantle the performance metric system entirely within the next ten days. Replace it with a transparent profit sharing structure where every employee from floor staff to management receives a direct percentage of quarterly operational profit. Ownership changes behavior faster than punishment does."
Hale's eyes moved to the notebook. "Continue."
"Stage two runs across the first thirty days. Identify the six to eight middle managers who have the institutional knowledge and the trust of the floor teams. Elevate them into a restructured operations committee that has genuine input into scheduling, procurement standards, and maintenance cycles. The people closest to the work already know what is broken. They have just stopped being asked."
"Carlos Mendez," Hale said quietly, almost to himself.
Jared looked at him. "You know him."
"I met him twice during site visits two years ago. Sharp man. I wondered why he was still a shift supervisor." Hale paused. "I should have asked that question louder."
"Stage three is a ninety day operational reset," Jared continued. "Restore procurement quality standards to the baseline from three years ago before the metric program began. Clear the deferred maintenance backlog on the fleet. It is not as large as the accounting makes it look because some of the deferrals were recorded to manipulate the cost numbers rather than reflecting actual mechanical need."
He closed the notebook.
Hale was quiet for a long moment. Outside the grey morning was starting to thin, pale light beginning to push through the marine layer over the city.
"You did all of this in one day," Hale said.
"The answers were already there," Jared replied. "Nobody had stopped to listen for them."
\[System Notification: Core assessment delivered. Jonathan Hale confidence level — high. Negotiation Mastery recommends allowing silence to work.\]
Jared said nothing further and let the room breathe.
Hale picked up the notebook and read through it slowly for several minutes. His expression as he read was focused and still in the way that indicated genuine engagement rather than polite review.
He set it down.
"I want you on the restructuring," Hale said. "Not as a consultant. As an active partner in the turnaround. I will increase your equity position to twelve percent in exchange for sixty days of direct involvement in implementing what you have just outlined."
\[System Notification: Negotiation Mastery active. Counter position available. Evaluate.\]
Jared considered for three seconds.
Twelve percent of Hale Logistics at current distressed valuation was not the number that mattered. The number that mattered was what twelve percent would be worth at the end of a successful ninety day turnaround when the company was performing at the level its infrastructure suggested it should be.
Hale Logistics at healthy margins with its asset base would value somewhere between eighty and one hundred and ten million dollars.
Twelve percent of one hundred million was twelve million dollars.
"Fifteen percent," Jared said. "And I want a seat on the advisory board after the sixty days regardless of outcome."
Hale looked at him with something that was close to appreciation. "You just increased your ask from seven to fifteen in forty eight hours."
"The value of what I found increased it," Jared said simply.
A pause. Then Hale extended his hand across the table.
"Fifteen percent. Advisory board. Sixty days."
They shook on it.
\[System Notification: Agreement upgraded. Equity position in Hale Logistics confirmed at 15 percent. Side mission parameters updated.\]
\[RING! Side Mission Updated\]
\[Mission: Successfully implement Hale Logistics restructuring — 60 days\]
\[Reward: Level plus 2, plus $2,000,000, plus 35 Emblem Coins, Business Intelligence upgraded to Advanced, New Title Component unlocked\]
Jared left the Hale Pacific building at eight fifteen into a morning that had finally cleared. The marine layer was gone and the city sat sharp and bright under a clean blue sky.
He called Raymond from the car.
"I need to move on the first tranche of the credit facility," Jared said. "Twenty million. I want it deployed within ten days."
"Into what?" Raymond asked.
"Two positions," Jared said. "I want Anita to identify a distressed commercial asset in the ten to twelve million range. Something with the same profile as Culver City. Undervalued, sound bones, motivated seller. The second position I want held liquid for something that is coming that I cannot name yet."
"You cannot name it yet," Raymond repeated carefully.
"Something is moving," Jared said. "I can feel it."
Raymond paused. "Victor says the same thing sometimes. He calls it pattern recognition."
"Tell Victor he is right," Jared said.
He ended the call and opened his status panel at a red light.
\[Name: Jared Knox\]
\[Level: 5 (61/200)\]
\[Title: Rising Dragon\]
\[Total Asset Value: $68,100,000\]
\[Pending Equity: Hale Logistics 15 percent — current distressed value $4,200,000\]
\[Credit Facility Available: $20,000,000 first tranche\]
\[Active Mission: California Top 100 Wealthiest — 152 days remaining\]
Seventy two million in real and pending assets.
One hundred and fifty two days.
Four hundred and eighty million as the finish line.
The gap was still significant. But every week the mathematics shifted and every shift moved in the same direction.
His phone buzzed as he pulled into the penthouse garage.
A message from Claire Mason.
"Helix Bio consortium meeting Friday. All parties confirmed. Bring your signature."
Then a second message ten seconds later.
"Also. Jonathan Hale just called me. He said and I am quoting directly here — that young man is the most expensive cheap favor I have ever done for Victor Harrington. I thought you should know."
Jared read it twice then put his phone in his pocket and rode the elevator up to his floor.
The system chimed as the doors opened.
\[System Notification: Reputation in California business network has crossed a new threshold. You are no longer unknown. Prepare for increased attention from both allies and adversaries.\]
He stepped into his penthouse and walked straight to the window.
The city spread out below him in every direction, enormous and indifferent and full of moving pieces that he was beginning to understand how to read.
Increased attention from adversaries.
He had not thought about adversaries beyond Damien Rothwell in weeks. Damien was finished, buried under an audit and a collapsing project and a reputation that the business press had been quietly dismantling since the gala.
But a man rising this fast in Los Angeles would eventually attract something beyond curiosity.
He stood at the window for a long time after the system's notification faded.
One hundred and fifty two days.
The climb was accelerating.
So was everything around it.