Who is Mark Rollins?
My name is Mark Rollins. I am a senior citizen. My driver’s license lists my height as five feet nine inches, my eyes as blue, and my hair as brown. I’m a cancer survivor with a military-style buzz cut—a concession to chemo, which I continue to keep. I work out regularly in an effort to stay younger than my years. Years ago I gave up fads for style. Then with the growing trend to casual attire, I eventually adopted my trademark uniform—khaki trousers, black cotton polo, and Cole Haan driving shoes.
I drink martinis, straight up with an olive, and prefer Skyy or Belvedere vodka. I am also in the fortunate position of having access to people in high places and of being rather wealthy. In fact, money just keeps rolling in. What I don’t spend or invest in pet projects, I turn over to the people at Goldman Sachs where it becomes little more than numbers on a computer screen.
My personal wealth came from the business side of my life. My investments during the early years of the computer industry paid off in a big way. In 1986 I founded Themis Legal Software. Within twenty years a third of US law firms were using Themis software, and I was considered an expert on how to run a profitable modern law firm. In 2007 I sold the company to a large international corporation and retired—at least, I intended to retire. It didn’t quite work out that way.
My access to influential people and a penchant for adventure began in the early 1990s when the US government asked me to help fledgling technology enterprises in Eastern Europe. Our government had decided it was in our national interest to encourage emerging technology in that part of the world. Unfortunately, governments outside the West feared technology—especially the Internet—in private hands. Start-up businesses were also at risk from infiltration by criminal gangs. (More than once, my wife, Sarah, and I became the targets of villainous people.) It took more than my know-how and courageous Eastern European entrepreneurs to advance global technology in that part of the world. It also required access to powerful US government forces to crush those who would prevent or preempt its advance.
My retirement plans were derailed when, for inexplicable reasons, I became the owner of the Women’s Health Club located in the Brentwood suburb of Nashville, Tennessee. The WH Club, as most people call it, is an elite ladies-only facility for the socially prominent and wealthy. The members work hard to maintain youthful, seductive figures. But there is more to the club than its glitterati clientele. The club provides cover for a highly profitable, clandestine high-tech operation—useful to any number of government agencies because of its ability to operate beyond congressional oversight. Let’s just say, we are not limited by the same rules, but we never seriously break the law.
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