Page 82 of Man Vs. Woman
“Enter one Hiram Hooskins,” I say. “He recognizes the power that the Condo Board President could have if he’s living in Clarendon Tower. So he approaches Seymour and pays him a retainer. They start a business together called JobSavers LLC. All Seymour has to do is stay on the lookout for a spot in the building when it opens up. And it does a week later, whenPen & Inkhas their inventory purchased in entirety.”
“People would commend me for being a part of something so noble,” Seymour says but I can tell it’s a last-ditch effort. There are people in the audience who clearly don’t like that Seymour didn’t disclose this.
“That might be,” I agree. “Except is it so noble?”
Now there is silence.
I clear my throat.
“JobSavers LLC—according to the Securities and Exchange Commission actually has one other major silent partner. Can you guess who it is?” I ask. When there’s silence I continue. “How about the Communist Party of the People’s Republic of China?”
Now there’s shock and awe. Gasps all around.
Heads in the crowd whip from one side to the other in shock. People turn to their neighbors, hands flying up to cover their mouth, and I even hear a scream. Oh, the theatrics. I fucking love it.
Now, for Hiram.
I scan the crowd, finding him in the front row next to Serena. Fuck, I should’ve seen him there earlier, she must’ve distracted me.
Squaring my shoulders at him, I face him head on with my eyes never straying from his. And, I clear my throat, preparing to project my voice loudly and forcefully.
“This ‘lighthouse for poor souls’ bullshit is actually a front. In the past five weeks, JobSavers LLC has inked contracts with three different multinational corporations to actually outsource jobs out of America and to China,” I say with flourish.
Hiram stands up, inches away from my face. “This is unfounded. You have no proof. You don’t know what you’re talking.” He winds around to the crowd. “He’s a fucking lunatic, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Don’t listen to him.”
“You’d have a point if all I had was my word. And the filings with the regulators,” I say to him. “But I have one other thing that you don’t know about.”
Now Hiram hangs on my word.
“I have the fucking contracts,” I say to the room. People look at me in shock as I turn to Hiram.
“Next time you ink a deal, don’t stiff the law firm that spent countless hours on your contract,” I tell him. “Ashley Carlson’s lawyers found several law firms that worked the contracts and then pull out after they found out what you were up to that you then refused to pay.”
“They’ll pay for this betrayal!” Hiram snarls. I can see his face become a deep shade of red.
The crowd becomes restless. Someone in the back screams, “Is it true?” Another man yells, “You won’t get away with this! You won’t take our jobs.”
Seymour bangs his gavel. “This is ridiculous. How can you believe such asinine accusations? Me? In cahoots with the Chinese? How absurd!” He pleads to the crowd.
But they’re not having it.
Especially not when I take out the contracts and wave them around.
“Papers don’t lie, folks!” I yell and now the crowd starts to get real rowdy. Just the way I like it.
They start to grow rowdy; the whispers turn into shouts and the rustling of chairs and footsteps escalate into a stampede. I wish I could say there were pitchforks, but we are in Clarendon Tower; so it’s more likely there are Hermes wallets. But it’d be fucking cool.
“Please, settle down!” Seymour shouts, flapping his arms up and down. No one listens to his directions because as soon as the words fall out of his mouth, they all start to ‘boo’ him.
“Fuck you!”
“You traitor! How could you do this to us?”
“Clarendon Tower is not going to work with fucking China! USA! USA! USA!”
I laugh.
This is fucking awesome. I lean back on the podium, crossing my arms as I take in the scene before me. The once refined crowd turns into a chaotic mob, and I have to give it to them, they know how to create mass hysteria well.
