The Law of Motion (Law Series) (65 page)

             
“How exactly would you like to give back Miss Marshall?” Fletcher asked her, his voice monotone. The thing was, you would never know if it was because of his distaste, or not. He was always monotone.

             
I could hear her sigh, and I wish I could see her face as she spoke instead of the face of everyone else in that conference room. “We’re renovating the Boys and Girls Club on Good Hope and Fifteenth.”

             
“Good Hope? You mean Anacostia?” A lady in her mid-forties questioned when she heard the location.

             
My dad looked up from the contracts he was reviewing for Alyssa, to look at the reaction of the board. He smirked shaking his head, “You would think that Alyssa was asking her to go to Beirut.”

             
I chuckled at him, “Cut her some slack dad, I’m sure none of those board members have been in South East D.C. What were you thinking?”

             
“It was Alyssa’s idea. She asked me what I thought, but you know Chance. What I thought wouldn’t matter if she were set on it.” He shrugged still smirking, but going back to his work. “She said that she might as well do some good while she was stuck here.”

             
I looked back at the monitors, and watched the reactions of the board members. “Yeah, that’s her alright.”             

             
“I don’t really see what’s hard to grasp, Mrs. Trelawney.” Alyssa continued facing a different woman with blonde hair. “Neil Industries is renovating the youth center. When it is finished at the end of next month, we are holding a benefit. Every dollar that is raised that night from outside investors, Neil Industries will match and it will all go into rebuilding the neighborhood in some way.”

             
“End of the month? How are you going to renovate an entire building in a little over five weeks?” Fletcher asked.

             
Kristen spoke up, “Miss Marshall gave the go ahead three days ago for the contractors to begin.”

             
“With the right price tag, I’m sure you can find anyone to meet your time limit.” Alyssa added, and I could hear that wicked grin in her voice.

             
Stevens, a middle aged man with red hair almost choked on his tongue. “How much is this going to cost?”

             
By the way the camera moved, Alyssa must have shrugged and turned to Kristen because, she spoke up. “Seven point three million dollars, including equipment.”

             
“Seven million dollars?” Mrs. Trelawney gasped. “That will exhaust our contribution allowance for the year.”

             
“I’m sorry?” Alyssa questioned as if she didn’t hear her. “Since when do we put a cap on how much we help people?”

             
Mr. Maxwell, brought order to the talking board members before voicing his concern. “Miss Marshall, are you sure that you want to invest that much money in that type of neighborhood? With the crime rate, it most likely won’t be standing in another year or two.”

             
“We don’t want to look foolish.” Fletcher agreed.

             
“No we don’t, but we want to look like a corporation that
cares
.” She clarified, her voice holding an odd patience. “We shut down C&K less than a year ago, and over forty percent of the workers
lived
in that neighborhood you’re all so afraid to go to. I wasn’t here, and I can’t change what happened, but I won’t ignore it. We
owe
that neighborhood, and we are going to give back. I appreciate your concern Mr. Maxwell, but my mind is made up. I expect participation from every one of you.”

             
“How are we going to pay for it? We can’t match every donation with a depleted contribution fund.”  Steven’s argued and ten other faces nodded in agreement.

             
“We’re not taking it from the contribution fund. I am cutting our bonus pool and adjusting the expense account limits for upper level execs.” She had really thought this out.

             
That didn’t stop six different audible objections, and if they weren’t all middle to late age people I would have feared for her safety. “You can’t do that!”

             
“All changes of that magnitude need to be voted on.” Someone else said.

             
Even Roman had a say. “This is something we should have talked about.”

             
“I’ve already
done
it.” She repeated over the noise. “Board members and upper level execs get
two
more bonuses each year than the normal quarterly bonuses the lower employees receive. Heaven forbid you have to be like everyone else for a year and get
four
bonuses.” She was standing now, and her hands were moving in front of her driving each of her points home. She was telling these assholes, this wasn’t a democracy.

             
“And are you getting these cuts as well?” Stevens snarked, and I wanted to smack him in his mouth. Hell I probably would have if I were in the room.

             
“Shut up Stevens.” Alyssa snapped.

             
“Did she just tell him to,
shut up
?”

             
“Did you just tell me to shut up?” My dad and Stevens seemed to ask at the same time, one voice shocked, but my dad was about to wet himself laughing.

             
Alyssa unknowingly answered them both, “Yes, shut up. Your expense account is ridiculous. Five hundred thousand dollars on a two night business trip for a meeting in the L.A. office? You are lucky that you are even still
on
this board and
with
this company with receipts like that. So do not tempt me.”

             
His face was beet read, but he shut the hell up.

Alyssa sighed but remained standing. “Now if you all
must
know, the money that would act as my salary has already been transferred into the fund making all of this happen. Like I told the press before, I am not
doing
this for the money. I have a business, and make my own money. I am your CEO because Paul Neil needs my help.” She let out an exhausted small sigh, giving up and started folding up her things. Kristen took her hint and started packing them up for her. “The meeting is over, anyone with a complaint take it up with HR like the entire lower level staff does.” With that she left them speechless.

“My money is on Stevens,” Kristen rushed, as she altered her strides to keep up with Alyssa’s frustrated stalk. “Did you see his reaction to the expense account budgets?”

Dad tapped his earpiece on still looking over some projections. “He was rather unnerved, but I still bet Paul’s lawyer is on some end of things.”

“Who says it can’t be both?” Tink butted in, she was in the security room thirty floors down with Dario and Jackson, she was looking thorough old video footage from other Neil owned properties.

I nodded at my dad agreeing with her sentiment. Just as I was about to order her back to her office an in that apartment at once, Hunter beeped in on the com line. “Babes, don’t forget, we have that thing in ten minutes.”

“What thing? She doesn’t  have an earpiece in Hunt?” I sighed trying not to growl.

Kristen looked down at her PDA and scrolled through. “Lunch with Mrs. Evelyn, on the twenty-second floor.”

A hint of a smile played in the corner of her mouth when she turned around to face Kristen. She loved the twenty-third floor. The employees in payroll and accounting loved having her as a boss; her favorite amongst them was Mrs. Evelyn, who had been begging her to join them for lunch since her first week.

“Well it seems I am not going into my office after all. Feel free to join us guys, she cooks in the masses.” Alyssa joked before she entered the elevators.

“Well I’m heading down,” I groaned stretching as I stood. “You coming dad?”

My dad looked over his at me and shook his head. “I have lunch with Joanne in a few. Have a nice lunch, son.”

———————

I navigated around empty cubicles, aiming towards the sound of chatter and laughter that seemed to be coming from the back of the large room. I found them all congregated around a little break area. Apparently, Mrs. Evelyn was so happy Alyssa was coming to see her that she'd arranged for some sort of potluck lunch for her entire department.

I came around the last cubicle to see three younger women, Mrs. Evelyn, and one older man sitting with Alyssa and Kristen at the tables. Dario was leaning back against the wall, overflowing plate in hand. He just smiled and shrugged at me as he took a huge bite of what looked like lasagna.

"Adrian," Mrs. Evelyn gushed, "fix yourself a plate. There's plenty!" She started to get up, but I stopped her.

"I can get it. Sit, please," I said with a smile walking over to the food.

I piled my plate up, feeling starved for the first time in days, and took a place next to Dario.

"Mrs. Evelyn apparently grew up in an Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn, God bless her," Dario chuckled, stuffing another bite into his mouth. "Tastes like my grandmother's cookin'," he mumbled happily.

I snorted, shaking my head, and took my own bite. It was fantastic. The woman could cook, which made me miss cooking.

"I should make something tonight before we head to Quantico to question Myles again." I muttered low enough so that only Dario could hear me over the den of chattering ladies.

"Oh, we're not going tonight," Dario said,
turning towards me, but shot a look across the room to make sure we weren't heard. "Your dad just called. So we have a free night."

I smiled and took another bite. "Did he say if the rest were back yet?"

"Yeah, they were on their way. Should be back by the time we're done in here," he said, glancing over at the table, and then back to me. "You sure do make an entrance, kid," he chuckled, shaking his head. "Between you, Macon, Hunt and Jackson, every woman in this whole building has gone into heat."

I glanced over at the table, and while Mrs. Evelyn was telling Alyssa a story about the comings and goings of security, the three younger women at the table, and a few others in the surrounding tables were looking our way. We weren't the only ones that noticed, either. Alyssa was nodding to whatever Mrs. Evelyn was saying, but her eyes were locked onto the two girls, only to drag her gaze up to me, a sexy ass smirk playing on her face.

The only man at the table besides us chuckled. "I think the last time I’ve seen Scarlett and Rosalia Neil in their offices was their moving into them. Are they helping you with your transition?"

"No, Mr. Harold," she said, shaking her head and smiling warmly. "I have pretty good help though. It’s been quite the transition, nothing like being a P.I. that’s for sure."

"Are the rumors true? That you had to prove Paul was your father in order to stay here?" One of the girls that had been staring at us asked, her head spinning to Alyssa, but Mrs. Evelyn scoffed.

"Helen, that's rude," she chided, setting her fork down. "Goodness, girl, what will I do with you?"

"I was just curious," Helen countered with a shrug and a pouting face.

Alyssa's face ran the gamut of emotions—anger, amusement, sadness—before she took a breath to answer. "I didn’t
have
to do anything," she said with a shrug. "It’s just easier to cooperate than stir up trouble."

Kristen snorted and gave Alyssa a raised eyebrow, but said nothing.

I answered a call from Danny, telling me that he was coming upstairs since he was done, and when the call was finished, I looked up at the table when my name was called.

"Adrian, you’re the one in charge of the new security team correct?" Miss Evelyn asked, her face beaming a smile. I could tell she was trying to include our table, since most of the security crew had gone silent eating.

"Yes, ma'am," I chuckled with a nod.

Tink looked up from her salad and added more for good measure. “He also implemented the new check-in system downstairs.”

"Smart too? Why are you in security?" Jessica scoffed, but her eyes looked me over.

I tried my damnedest not to roll my eyes, but Alyssa answered for me. "Adrian is former military, as are all the guys, and they're just helping me out for a bit."

"Military? Is something that bad, Miss Marshall?" Harold asked her.

Kristen looked up, “It’s all precaution really.”

"Well, kick his ass out," Dario growled into the phone, drawing everyone's attention his way.

"You know that little shit is working his way on pissing everyone off.” Danny whispered to Alyssa and Kristen when Harold and Mrs. Evelyn were occupied in another conversation. “Macon and Adrian both have a bet on who gets to smack him around."

Alyssa and Kristen glanced up at me, laughing out loud when all I did was shrug. I wouldn't confirm or deny that statement, but I did shoot Alyssa a wink.