Part Seventeen
It was a week after the Daae wedding and lunchtime at the home of Stephanie Aronnax; three old friends gathered in the Dining room table. The meal; an expertly plated salad accompanied by Poach chicken breasts in a flavorful ginger, shallot and sesame broth were ignored. The warm garlic parmesan rolls Stephanie had baked earlier had gone ice cold. The expressions on the three women’s faces were serious and thoughtful.
“So, after going over all these files, what are your recommendations?” Stephanie Aronnax asked.
A petite woman with graying red hair looked up from the papers in her hand and carefully placed a stylish pair of reading glasses on top of her head and shaking it in equal parts admiration and trepidation. “The sheer scale of this plot is bold, yet stylishly conceived.” Tina Belknap, a CPA with an international accounting firm said. “I have to hand it to Daae; he’s got nerves of steel plotting a takeover of LexCorp. But if it fails, I wouldn’t want to have Lex Luthor as my enemy.”
“Hmmm, you’ll need a lawyer,” Emma Tremayne, a sophisticated, leggy blonde with a smoky voice broke in, “a damn good one who specializes in walking on the ‘lighter side’ of blackmail.” She rubbed her chin thoughtfully, “Sorry, but it cannot be yours truly.”
Astonished, Stephanie asked her, “Why do I need a lawyer? Who’s to say this whole deal with DMG and LexCorp will get out? Also, why can’t it be you? Nobody knows the movers and the shakers in Metropolis and New York better!”
Emma responded, “Because these guys don’t just bring a gun to a knife fight, they bring a machine gun. When the time comes the IRS, FBI and a host of very good, very thorough forensic accountants are going to be crawling all over the American arm of DMG like a host of locust. Since you are his executive assistant everything in your office – even your Espresso machine and favorite coffee cup - will be confiscated by the Feds and gone over with a microscope. I am a corporate lawyer, unfortunately; this might require the legal skills of an international lawyer.”
“But Mr. Daae …”
Tina broke in, “Is a Swiss national, so the feds can’t touch him, but they can and will go after the American branches of his companies and its employees. There are plenty of executives in your company, who must know about this takeover, which we know by the very nature of these papers is hostile. No one would believe his personal assistant was ignorant of his actions. Stephanie, like it or not you’ve gotta protect yourself. He knew what he was getting into. Only someone extremely arrogant could imagine he wouldn’t get caught.”
In utter disbelief Stephanie was frightened at the conversation’s turn. She licked her suddenly parched lips and tried to defend her employer and snapped back, “But he’s been so good to me over the years …”
“No doubt about it, he has been a great employer, but looking between the lines of these reports a number of people have not been treated quite so well.” Tina said.
“Emma rubbed her thumb and forefinger, a sure sign she was concentrating sharply on every possible angle of the case. “OK, let’s just say for kicks and giggles Daae is innocent and every dirty trick in these files this Templar fellow is doing behind his back. Knowing Gregory Daae as you do, can you honestly believe he would be that foolish? Allowing someone complete access to the empire he’s built from the ground up?”
“This … this corporate takeover is not legal. Everything is being done through insider trading, bribes to high up officials in the SECC, shell companies and who knows what else. The accountant in me is cringing in fear, if any of my bosses found out I even knew these documents existed … !” Tina said shaking her head.
“I would get disbarred and that would only be the beginning! We often talk about using our legal backchannels to get a job done, but these people don’t use backchannels because the people they use are the underworld.” Emma said, her smoky voice had dropped down to nearly a whisper.
Holding up her hands in defeat Stephanie said, “Enough! Where do I go from here?”
Emma said, “From where I sit, out of DMG as fast as possible!”
“Oh, I’m supposed to walk into my office while my boss is on his Honeymoon, type out a resignation letter, hand it over to Jasper Templar and leave? That’s going to look awfully suspicious.”
“Why?” Tina gestured to the files on the table, “No one is aware of your behind-the-scenes knowledge. Look, if quitting suddenly bothers you that much, what’s wrong with taking an early retirement? The kids are out of college and making their own way. Isn’t it time for you to do the same? No one would blame you. Working for Jasper Templar makes you and a lot of other people uncomfortable. With his new young wife Daae is not going to be in Metropolis very often. Without Daae keeping an eye on him means Templar will be in control. Also, if he does pull this off, Daae will not own his company for long. Life at DMG’s executive suite will be decidedly unpleasant.”
Stephanie’s lower lip twitched, her friends were right. Illegal activities abounded and from the looks of things the only way to avoid spending several years as an unwilling guest of the government was to prove she was innocent before anyone decided to make her guilty.
Her shoulders sagged from the tension and stress. This was not how she wanted to leave her company. Daae was a good boss, but she knew in her heart that he had to be aware of most of what was going on.
“OK. How would I go about being a whistleblower? Turn all this stuff over the Feds?”
“No. Give to someone you can trust. Like a reporter.” Emma said.
“What? Forgive me, but this situation is not All the President’s Men. Who would have the nerve to play Woodward and Bernstein?”
Tina’s eye sparkled for the first time that afternoon, “I was thinking of the reporters Lane and Kent.”
Stephanie stood up from the table and started for the kitchen. “Tina, surely you can’t be serious?” She lifted up her cup and asked her guests, “Coffee, anyone?”
Emma got up and looked at last night’s paper on the heavy wood coffee table. The headlines blared:
GOVERNOR MONTGOMERY CONFESSES TO
ABUSE OF POWER!
By Lois Lane and Clark J. Kent
She said, “Yes, I would love another cup! Hmmm, this might just be the ticket. These two work for one of the most reputable papers in the country. They are the best investigative reporters around. Give the material to them. If what Templar and Daae plan hit the fan, you can always tell the Feds you gave them this stuff and demand immunity.”
Stephanie shook her head as she got busy filling the cups. “You are both crazy! Since when does anyone demand immunity from a crime they were not involved in?”
Her friends said in unison, “When they hand over prime evidence.
“But I haven’t done anything!”
Emma, always a straight shooter said, “That’s just the point. Stephanie, it’s time to bail. As soon as Gregory gets back, tell him it’s time you concentrated on something else besides running his office. Arnaud would not have wanted his wife to spend time in a federal prison, because guys like Templar and Daae always find someone on whom to lay the blame.”
Stephanie nodded, reluctant as she was to admit it, Emma and Tina were right. The situation before her was explosive and unless she desired to be in the middle of it all the time had come to retire.
Last edited by Morgana; 10/10/16 06:03 AM.
