71
A little after ten o’clock PM, the security guard at the entrance to the Thorntree’s underground parking lot stops our rented minivan. Deke’s fake driving license gets us into the giant concrete corkscrew, and he deftly guides us downward.
Audis and Rolls-Royces and Lamborghinis occupy half the spaces on the top three loops, because what’s the point of making the big bucks—sorry, the pretty pounds—if you don’t spend it all displaying your status? A few of those cars probably belong to obsessive billionaires campaigning for comic book supervillain status, but most of them are probably high-level flunkies scrabbling for the next rung on the Ladder of Servitude. Why settle for being a mere vice president when a few more years of twenty-hour days can make you an executive vice president a
