No Relation (37 page)

“Sarah called me and asked me to stop by.”

“I think I may know why. Come on in.”

When we made it to the living room, Sarah grabbed the manila envelope that was resting on the coffee table and jerked her head toward Dad’s study. The others were mapping out the announcement based on Sarah’s proposed approach. Carlos and I followed Sarah into the study. I closed the door behind me and sat down next to Carlos in front of Dad’s desk. Sarah stood, but leaned against the desk. She pulled out the photos of Carlos taken at the MaxWorldCorp
AGM
.

“Carlos, what were you doing at the annual meeting of our principal competitor?”

“How did you get these? Are you having me followed?” Carlos asked.

“Of course we’re not having you followed. We think Henderson Watt had the photos taken and then passed them along to me in a plain brown wrapper, like it was a porn video,” Sarah replied. “Carlos, what were you doing at their
AGM
?”

“Know thine enemy,” replied Carlos.

Then he paused before continuing.

“I was trying to get a sense of them, how they think, how they might have gotten the inside info that allowed them to screw us on the multi-pack launch.”

“So you walked right into their
AGM
?” Sarah asked.

“It’s an open meeting. You don’t have to be a shareholder to be in the room. You can’t vote of course, but you can go. I went.”

“What’s going on in the photos?” I asked.

“I was recognized and asked to leave. This shot is when I was attempting the charm offensive to avoid being ejected. And this one is when I realized it was failing. I know it looks like we’re pretty chummy in that one, but if they’d sent you a shot taken about five seconds later, they had me in an arm lock and were hustling me out to the parking lot.”

“Well, that’s a relief,” Sarah said.

“Wait a second. Did you think that I might be passing stuff to them?” he asked, incredulous. “Give me some credit, guys. I’ve spent my life here. I could barely stand to be in an auditorium with a MaxWorldCorp logo on the front screen. I felt queasy.”

“We’ve had to be very cautious and make sure we know who our friends are,” Sarah explained.

Satisfied that Carlos was an unwitting pawn in Henderson’s attempt to throw us off his scent, she then spent the next ten minutes bringing Carlos into the fold. He was livid. Borrowing a phrase from my mother, Carlos was ready to rip Henderson’s arm off at the shoulder and beat him over the head with it. I did little to discourage him.

The five of us then huddled for an hour to finalize our plan for the media briefing. The butterflies in my stomach were no longer flying in formation but were locked in an all-out dogfight. By ten that morning, I thought we were ready. Sarah and I decided we’d zip back to her place to change our clothes for the media briefing. Dad walked us to the front door. He was still wearing his pyjamas and silk robe, but he wasn’t heading for bed. And there was an extra spring in his step as the three of us walked out onto the front porch.

“For the first time in, well, ever, it feels like a family business again,” Dad said. “Thank you for caring enough about it to stop me from making what would have been a catastrophic decision.”

It seemed he was making heavier eye contact with Sarah as he said this. I was fine with that. In fact, I was feeling lighter on my feet than I had in a very long time, perhaps ever. As he spoke, Sarah’s eyes glistened.

We climbed into the car. Sarah drove.

“So, um, did Dad talk to you about anything other than …”

She put up her hand to stop me from finishing my question.

“Yes, he told me. Thanks for the heads-up on that,” she said, little bits of sarcasm flying from her words.

“Sarah, I’m sorry, but he gave me explicit instructions not to say a word to you. He insisted on telling you himself. And I guess I decided that was his right. I thought I owed him that.”

She had a faraway look in her eyes as tears made a fleeting appearance until she wiped them away.

“Yes, I know.” She sighed, taking her right hand off the wheel and holding it out to me. I slipped mine in hers and she squeezed. “We’ll worry about that tomorrow. But right now, we have to focus on the media briefing. We at least have some control over the outcome of that.”

“Right. I don’t know what’s more satisfying, stopping Dad from selling off the company or getting to see Henderson Watt take the plunge from his pedestal,” I said.

“Yep. Can’t wait for that. Then we’ll scrape him up off the floor and have security throw him out on his ass,” she replied.

“Well, as you may recall, I know a little something about being thrown out on my ass. It’s no fun, for the ‘throwee,’ but if you’re lucky enough to see it happen to someone else, I gather it can be quite enjoyable.”

“I’m counting on it.”

Dad had called Henderson to explain that he was spending some time with his children that morning and wouldn’t be in until noon. This would have been extraordinarily unusual behaviour for Dad, particularly when the final sale documents still had to be signed before the 1:30 announcement. But Henderson was apparently unperturbed. Dad confirmed the final signing meeting for 12:30 in his office with Henderson Watt and Preston Holdings’
CEO
, Tim Withrow.

When Sarah and I returned to the family home, we joined Dad, Carlos, and Michael Kingsley in the study to put the last touches on our plan for the final signing meeting with Henderson and Withrow and the subsequent media briefing. I was fairly quiet during the meeting and tried to stay on the periphery of the decision-making. I made a few comments and helped wordsmith a few lines when it was required, but I let the business grown-ups deal with most of it.

Although I could feel myself getting caught up in the drama of it all, I was never inclined, not for an instant, to rethink my chosen career path. I still had no interest in making a career at Hemmingwear. In fact, I was thrilled that in the last twenty-four hours, Dad’s view of his daughter seemed to have changed, and changed completely. I could tell by the way he looked at her when she spoke. I could tell by the way he held his hand up to silence others when she held the floor. I could tell by the way he focused and changed his mind to support her view when divergent ideas were on the table. It also seemed clear that he wasn’t siding with her because she was his own flesh and blood, but rather because she consistently advanced thoughtful and compelling positions with which the opposing arguments simply could not compete. She was winning him over with her brain and her toughness. It was just a coincidence that she was his daughter, and my younger sister. I could feel the family noose that I’d worn since birth loosening around my neck. A warm surge of pride in Sarah germinated in my chest and grew.

I took a minute to fire off an email to Marie to bring her up to date and let her know that I expected to be home that evening. I was missing her.

“Look who I found in the parking lot,” Henderson said as he walked into Dad’s office with Tim Withrow in tow. It was 12:30.

Dad was sitting at the head of the board table. Sarah, Michael Kingsley, Carlos, and I sat along the side to Dad’s left.

“Gentlemen, right on time. Sit down, please,” Dad said, waving them into the two chairs on the side of the table to his right.

If Henderson was surprised or concerned by the lineup facing him across the table, he didn’t let on. Because I was farthest away from him, it was easiest for me to observe him closely without him really noticing. So I did. There were no telltale beads of sweat on Henderson’s forehead, no furrows in his brow. He was one cool customer.

Tim Withrow opened his big, rectangular lawyer’s briefing case with the pull handle and wheels and lifted out about ten inches of documents, all nicely cerloxed. The multicoloured plastic tabs presumably marked the pages to be signed to turn The Hemmingwear Company over to Preston Holdings and, ultimately, to Phillip Gainsford and MaxWorldCorp.

“All right, here are the docs,” he said as he dropped them on the table with a thud. “Earnest, I believe the protocol is for you to sign first, and then I’ll sign on behalf of Preston. Michael, you can witness them, and then it’s official.”

Dad shoved the documents to our side of the table and turned to Henderson Watt and Tim Withrow.

“Thanks for these. They’ll become interesting souvenirs of this little adventure. I won’t be signing them. We will not be announcing the sale at 1:30 this afternoon, because we do not have a deal.”

Henderson looked momentarily shocked, but then chuckled.

“Good one, EH3,” he said before turning to Tim Withrow.
“Just a little eleventh-hour humour. He’s just kidding. We’re all good. Right, EH3? Tell him we’re good.”

Dad was not joking. Dad was not smiling. But I do think Dad was enjoying himself, perhaps for the first time in a long while.

“Have you ever seen me kid before, Mr. Watt?” Dad asked. “And all is most decidedly not ‘good,’ as you so colloquially put it.”

“What’s going on?” Withrow said, alarmed. “You signed an agreement in principle two weeks ago. You shook my hand on it.”

“Yes, I did, but the acquisition is not complete until the final documents are signed. And I’m not signing. There is no deal. Further, that handshake was based on a malevolent and Machiavellian premise that has only just come to light.”

“EH3, I don’t understand, we’ve been working on this for months.” Now Henderson was whining. “It’s natural to have some last-minute misgivings, but this is a fair deal, it’s a good deal. It will save Hemmingwear.”

The next words out of my father’s mouth were delivered in a low, even, almost sinister tone.

“Henderson, I would be very grateful if you would just shut your mouth. Do not say another word until you’re invited to speak.”

Tim Withrow looked as if he’d been shot. The look on Henderson’s face suggested he was in the midst of a prostate examination, which, in my father’s eyes, would probably have seemed fitting. Dad then leaned back in his chair, laced his fingers, and rested his hands on the table in front of him. When
the silence became almost excruciating, he raised his eyes to the two men.

“Henderson, we now know that you have direct financial ties to MaxWorldCorp, starting with the lease for your ostentatious new car that is parked just outside.”

“You fucking idiot!” Tim Withrow snapped at Henderson, drawing away from him.

“We now know that your insidious infiltration here at Hemmingwear has been carefully orchestrated to result in the sale of my family’s company as outlined in these documents. We also now know that you, Mr. Withrow, also have a connection to MaxWorldCorp.”

On cue, Sarah pulled the mysterious MaxWorldCorp
AGM
photos from their envelope and pushed them across to Tim Withrow, pointing out his partially obscured face in the shots. She then turned to Henderson Watt.

“You should have taken a closer look at these pictures before trying to impugn Carlos’s motives,” Sarah said. “Not very smart. But thank you very much for getting them to us.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Henderson replied.

“Yeah, right,” Sarah said.

“I’m not listening to any more of this bullshit,” Withrow said as he pushed back his chair and stood.

“Oh, I think it is in your own personal legal interests to stay just a little longer before you slink away,” Michael Kingsley interjected.

Withrow’s eyes narrowed, but he sank back into his chair.

“Thank you, Michael,” Dad said before continuing. “Where was I? Oh yes, we now know that Preston Holdings, despite great efforts to obscure the trail, is actually owned and controlled by Phillip Gainsford and MaxWorldCorp.”

Sarah then stood and spread out her hand-drawn diagram showing the complex but unmistakable link between Preston and MaxWorldCorp. Both men went white.

“I’m almost done, so bear with me,” Dad continued. “We also now know that the two of you just met for lunch in New York, in contravention of my directive that I be involved in all discussions with Preston. Now I know what you’re thinking. Having lunch is not against the law. You’re right. But the photos and the audio recordings we have secured certainly help to establish the basis, the opportunity, and some compelling evidence for a charge of corporate espionage.”

As planned, I slid my cellphone across the table with the photo of them both on the screen.

“EH3, please, this is ridic –” Henderson said.

“Shut up, Henderson. It’s still not yet your turn to speak,” my father replied, holding his hand up. “The depths to which you stooped to put yourself in this position leave me feeling physically ill.”

Henderson followed Dad’s eyes as they both glanced at Sarah.

“Clearly you abandoned your moral compass a long time ago, if you ever had one. Mr. Kingsley here will now explain the legal ramifications of your predicament.”

Michael Kingsley pulled two documents from a file folder and slid them over to Tim Withrow and Henderson Watt. They both picked them up and started reading. They were obviously worried, though both tried to hide it. It’s hard not to look scared when all the colour has drained from your face and there are legal papers in your hands.