IT WAS FRAUD–Part 5 of 6

IT WAS FRAUD—Part 5 of 6 by Senorlongo

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We walked into the doorway, hesitating just inside until Paul Weber came to greet us. I introduced Scarlett as my fiancée and then we walked in to greet Chuck Evans. I ignored the two underlings, having explained their situation to Scarlett earlier. She ordered a glass of Chardonnay while I ordered a gin and tonic before asking Scarlett if she wanted a few shrimp or a canapé. She declined indicating that she’d had a big lunch and was saving her appetite for dinner. I had just turned away to take a few of the three dozen extra large shrimp when Paul Weber struck up a conversation with Scarlett, moving with her to the other side of the room. When I noticed that his two goons moved between us I knew something was up. I also knew that I wasn’t going to like it.

Chuck had joined me and was talking about the restaurant when it happened. I heard the loud SLAP even as I saw the fury in Scarlett’s face. Her next move was to knee Weber in the balls. He groaned loudly as he fell to the floor in obvious agony and I could see the red hand marks on my fiancee’s breast, her dress torn badly. I put my drink down and walked swiftly toward Scarlett only to find myself screened off by Tweedledee and Tweedledum. “You have two choices,” I said menacingly, “get out of my way or get hurt.” That was when Tweedledumber made the mistake of his life—he tried to push me away.

I had learned a long time ago at my father’s knee that my two arms were likely to be stronger than virtually anyone’s single one. Gripping his wrist with two hands I rolled his wrist down and behind him, leading him into an arm bar, but I had something else in mind for this asshole. Holding his wrist up behind his back at the shoulder with my right hand, I grabbed his belt at his back, lifted and threw him into the air. He fell onto the table that had held the shrimp, the cocktail sauce, and the canapés. They flew into the air as the center of the table collapsed under his weight. I turned then, expecting a similar encounter with his cohort, but he had wisely retreated to the opposite side of the room.

I hurried to Scarlett. Weber had regained his feet and had raised his hand, seemingly to strike Scarlett, but it wasn’t to be. I snaked my arm under his bicep and over his wrist, pulling down and back. His arm was in a painful arm bar, held in place by my strong right arm and hand. My left went to his hair which I gripped tightly, forcing his body down. Once on the floor my knee on his neck held him there. I had to admit that I could have been more careful when I rammed his face into the carpet.

My left hand reached for Scarlett, taking her hand in mine. “Are you okay now, Scarlett?” I continued once she had nodded. “Take out your phone, darling and call 9-1-1. Tell the operator that you’ve been sexually assaulted. Tell them where you are and also that you will need police and EMT’s. Once that’s done call down to the desk and tell them what’s happened.”

“I can do that, Sean. I saw the whole revolting thing. It was disgusting. That man is a pig.” I could see the disgust in Chuck Evans’ face.

“So did I, Sir,” the bartender added to Dr. Evans’ comment.

“Are you going to let him up, Sean?”

“No, Scarlett; I noticed when he turned to greet you that he’s armed. His jacket swung open for just a second. He has a pistol on his right hip. He’s staying right where he is unless one of his minions tries to interfere. Even then he’s not going to go anywhere.” I looked behind me. The one I had thrown was still out and his friend had taken a seat, clearly indicating that he wanted no part of this. I was still in position fifteen minutes later when the first police arrived. I explained what I had done and why. They handcuffed Weber then removed his pistol, a Sig Sauer 9mm. He tried to turn and kick me, but it was a futile effort on his part that resulted in yet other charges against him—felony battery and resisting arrest when his kick struck one of the police officers.

The bruises on Scarlett’s breast had begun to turn black and blue by the time a female officer, the police photographer, and the EMT’s had arrived. I stood back to let the officials do their work, but I did insist that the EMT’s attend to the idiot I had thrown onto the table. I spent more than an hour explaining what I had seen and done—done to defend my fiancée from Weber’s sexual assault. Scarlett also gave a statement, saying that she had accompanied me to a cocktail party and dinner until Weber had for some reason decided to reach out and grab her breasts and rip her dress. Why? Neither of us had any idea.

I went downstairs to get a top and Capri’s for Scarlett so her dress could be taken into evidence. She had just changed and joined me as I thanked Chuck Evans for his help and his support. “I have a wife and two daughters, Sean. I’d probably kill someone who tried what Weber did to your fiancée. Well, I’d try, but I probably wouldn’t be as successful as you were.”

“Did you know that Sean was an All-American wrestler at Penn State, Dr. Evans? He was undefeated in his four years there.”

“Really, Sean?”

“Yeah, guilty as charged. I warned that guy that he had two choices—move or get hurt. That’s why I refer to him as Tweedledum, although that might be giving him credit for too much intelligence. I don’t know about you, Chuck, but I’m sure that Scarlett is as hungry as I am. Care to join us for dinner? I think the steakhouse is out so I’m thinking something fairly quick like barbeque.”

“Thanks for the offer, Sean, but I think I’ll go home and hug my wife and tell her how much I love her.” He shook my hand and Scarlett’s once she held it out to him.

I took her hand and led her out to the elevator. On our way to the door I turned and spoke in a low growl to Weber. “Listen carefully, you asshole. Hell will freeze over before I ever do business with Omni.” Then I led Scarlett away, taking the elevator to the lobby. I was surprised to find the concierge desk manned at this hour by a middle-aged woman. “Excuse me, can you recommend a good barbeque restaurant—one that has beef ribs?”

“I’m sorry, but I only moved here for this position about two weeks ago, but I’ll bet you can get a good recommendation from one of the cab drivers.” That sounded like good advice so I took it.

“Where to, sir?”

“Good question—know of a good barbeque place that has beef ribs?”

He laughed. “I sure do—Roegel’s is the best I’ve ever been to. I try to eat there once a week. Try the brisket, too. It’s usually great.” With that he pulled away from the curb. We stopped in front of Roegel’s restaurant about twenty minutes later. “Here’s my card. Call and ask for Carlos. Monday night is usually slow so I’ll be right out to pick you up. He was smiling as he gave me his company’s card, but he was smiling even broader when he saw his tip.

The restaurant was almost deserted when we were shown to a table. I ordered a pound of beef ribs with sides of barbequed beans and coleslaw. Scarlett ordered the brisket with coleslaw. The waitress told her that the brisket was her favorite, by far.

We drank our Cokes while we waited until she returned carrying a big and obviously heavy tray. I reached out to help her when she had trouble with the stand. She spoke conspiratorially as she placed the dishes on the table. “It’s late so I got you some extra meat and a bigger bowl of beans.”

“Thanks, but we wouldn’t want you to get into trouble.”

“Nah, that won’t happen. My husband is the cook and he owns the place. Enjoy and let me know if you want anything else. I’ll be out with Coke refills in a minute.” I picked up one of the meaty bones and eagerly bit all of the meat off one side. It was delicious. I ate some of the beans, suggesting to Scarlett that she try them. Meanwhile, she was telling me how good the brisket was. We swapped—one rib for a piece of brisket—and we agreed that the meal was great. We’d been given a huge amount of food, but we finished all of it. I phoned for the cab, asking for Carlos, before I had even paid the bill. He was waiting for us as we walked out the door. We were in our room less than a half hour later where Scarlett energetically thanked me for protecting her—three times–before we fell asleep from exhaustion.

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We had just stepped off the elevator en route to the restaurant for breakfast the next morning when I noticed two elderly men, one in a seersucker suit that I thought at the time was more than a bit odd. Even odder, one held up a photograph as if to check us against it. I was hardly surprised to find them following us into the restaurant.

We had just been seated when they approached our table. “Mr. Sloan…Ms. Davies, we apologize for intruding. I’m Caleb Oates, the CEO of Omni Manufacturing and this gentleman to my right is Bill Preston, our founder and Chairman of the Board. We came here this morning to make Hell freeze over.”

“Pardon me?”

“Didn’t you tell that idiot Weber that you wouldn’t do business with Omni until Hell freezes over? Well, we’re here to make sure that happens, but first I need to tell you what happened after you left the Omni suite last night. One of Weber’s aides is my wife’s nephew. Weber’s been on a sort of probation with us because, unfortunately, his impulsive conduct in the past has left a lot to be desired. I put Chad onto his team as my spy. He phoned me once everyone had gone and I was livid when he told me what Weber had done in your meetings. When he told me that he had attacked Ms. Davies I’d had more than enough.

“Might we sit down?” I waved my hand dismissively. “I phoned Bill as soon as I heard what happened and we decided we needed to come here and speak with you personally. We used our company plane and got in around six this morning.”

“Yes, Mr. Sloan,” Mr. Preston added, “That’s just how important you are to us. We went to the hospital first to see Ted Wellcome. He’s the stupid man who got into your way last night. We’ll stick by him while he’s hospitalized, but the minute he’s released he’ll be fired. We have a big factory out near Midland with more than a thousand employees. We have people from every almost every nationality and every religion and we treat everyone, even the lowest paid employee, with the highest respect and we expect our executives to do the same. After the hospital we stopped off at the city jail to see Mr. Weber. He wanted us to bail him out, but we fired him instead.”

“I’m surprised you could even get in to see him at that hour.”

Oates laughed. “It helped that the governor called ahead for us. Our factory puts more than a hundred million into the economy every year and we also pay millions every year in state and local taxes so we do have a little pull.

“We do apologize sincerely to you, Ms. Davies. No woman should ever be treated that way. I understand that your dress was ruined. Do you know what it cost?”

“Yes, I had just bought it yesterday morning so it was new. Sean paid about $1200 for it.” I was astonished to see Preston dig into his pocket and remove a thick roll of hundred dollar bills. He counted out thirteen and passed them across the table to Scarlett.

“Since yesterday was a complete waste of time, perhaps you can tell me what this is all about.”

Caleb Oates reached into his inside jacket pocket and pulled out an item that couldn’t have been more than six inches long and quarter inch in diameter with a round flare at one end and a crosspiece near the other. He handed it to me and I rolled it over in my hand. “Is this a valve,” I asked. Pointing to the crossbar I asked, “And is this for a spring?”

“We were told you had an engineering degree, Mr. Sloan and I see we weren’t misinformed.” Then Mr. Oates gave me the real skinny on what had been a multi-billion dollar project. “We’ve developed a new jet engine that generates much higher temperatures than any other engine yet to be developed. I’m sure you understand that the hotter the gas becomes the greater the thrust. The body of the combustion chamber is made of a ceramic material that’s top secret. We had hoped that we could make the valves from the same material, but they all cracked after roughly a hundred hours. The only material we’ve been able to find was your patented alloy Marciam. What does that mean?”

“I named it after my mother, but yes, I understand that you contracted with Bob Kennedy in Wichita, Kansas to supply them.”

“You’re remarkably well informed. We did, even though Mr. Kennedy told us the alloy was very difficult to work with because of its incredibly high tensile strength and melting point—the exact characteristics we’re looking for. More than half of the valves he supplied were defective. He actually requested that we cancel his contract and try to get the valve from you. That’s what Weber was supposed to discuss with you yesterday. Instead, he wasted the day in an effort to “control the process,” his term, not mine. I doubt that strategy would have worked with you.”

“Not a prayer,” I responded as our waitress delivered coffee, pouring four cups. “All it did was to totally piss me off.”

“Me, too,” commented Mr. Preston.

“”So, I assume you’ll want a quotation from me. How many units do you anticipate needing?”

“The engine is still in the development stage, but we believe it will revolutionize the industry. Our preliminary tests show that our new engine that’s half the size of contemporary engines will produce fifty percent more thrust. Initially, we’ll want about 300,000 a year, but that figure should grow to almost a million.”

“Okay, it will take me at least a month to get back to you. I have a few ideas, but they need to be tested. I’ll also need this in order to make duplicates.”

“How will you do that?”

“Initially, it will be the lost wax process, but eventually we may be able to use others that are more efficient. Just as you have your industrial secrets, I also have mine. I will send this to my factory manager today and I’ll also speak with him on the phone so he’ll get a head start on the process. I recently expanded my casting operation to a furnace that’s twice the capacity of my old one and I may have to add a second shift to meet production requirements, but those problems are for me to solve.”

Mr. Preston rose and Mr. Oates joined him. “We thank you for your time and I hope we have resolved any concerns you may have had about doing business with us.” Mr. Oates also said a few similar words then I rose to shake hands. Preston then dropped two hundred dollar bills onto the table, telling us that breakfast was on him.

We ordered and Scarlett asked me what I was going to do. “I think the first thing is to Fed-Ex this hunk of steel to Angus. I want him to have it as soon as humanly possible. Next I’ll have to speak with him, although…. You know, the more I think about it the more I realize that I have to speak with him first. I’ll do that right after we eat. What do you want to do? I could be at this for hours.”

“If it’s okay with you I’ll call Juanita and go shopping again. What do you think about those two men coming all the way to meet with you?”

“They didn’t get where they are by being fools. They gave away a lot in what they said. They all but told me that the success of their huge project depends on this valve. That could be potentially dangerous because I could charge Omni thousands for a simple piece of metal. Of course, they’ll add it to their final price. If the engine is as good as they claim a buyer would save millions in fuel costs because most jet engines last for twenty years or more with proper maintenance. Shopping is okay, but I don’t have enough cash to pay her fee again.”

“That’s okay. Juanita told me yesterday that she’d go with me again for no fee, but this time she’d take her car. All I have to do is buy lunch. I wouldn’t mind going back to that barbeque place. That brisket just melted in my mouth. Why don’t we have restaurants like that in Pennsylvania?”

“I think barbeque like that is more of a southern/southwestern kind of a thing. We do have Pennsylvania Dutch food in our area. That’s pretty good and don’t forget about cheese steaks. How much did you spend yesterday? Do you know?” I knew I’d have to phone the bank for the information when she gave me a look of total confusion. Taking out my wallet and phone simultaneously I phoned the number on the back of the card. My balance was $88,493 and change so I still had more than $11,000 left that Scarlett and I could spend without asking for a temporary increase. Then I thought about the hotel bills, meals, and some of the recreational things I wanted to do and I dialed the number again.

“What are you doing, Sean?”

“I’m going to ask for a temporary increase so we have more than enough for our trip and whatever incidentals we might need.” I usually hate the automated attendant that answers the phone for so many businesses, but this time I was put right through to a real live representative. I explained the circumstances and she offered a $30,000 extension once I had identified myself to her satisfaction. After thanking her I ended the call just as our breakfast order had arrived. Scarlett spent a few minutes phoning Juanita then we enjoyed our meal, knowing that it was on Omni. I laughed when I pictured the look on the waitress’s face when she realized that her tip would be well more than $100. Even with these prices, I doubted that happened often, if ever.

I kissed Scarlett good-bye at the entrance then watched as she walked quickly to a dark red SUV. I recognized the driver as Juanita. I waved as they drove away then walked quickly to the elevator. Once in our suite I opened the safe for my laptop and connected to the hotel’s wi-fi. Then I phoned Sandra and told her to get Angus into my office for a Skype call I’d place in fifteen minutes.

After our usual pleasantries I held the valve up in front of the camera.”This is what it’s all about, Angus. It’s a valve for a new jet engine. They contracted with Kennedy to make them, but a lot of them were badly flawed.” We spoke for more than ten minutes and I was pleased to see that Angus had the same idea that I’d had.

“We can use the 3D modelers and then we can use the lost wax process to make the molds. We’ll have more than a dozen finished before you even leave Houston,” he told me. I thanked Angus and ended the call. Next I used my cell to call Bob Kennedy—owner of Kennedy Machinists, Inc. I asked him about the problems he’d had with Omni. He explained that no matter what they did they always had at least a sixty percent level of failures. I told him that I’d refund his license fee since I was taking over the contract. The last thing I asked him was what he had charged Omni. I was initially surprised, but later in the day my analysis showed that I couldn’t do it any cheaper. In fact, I had already decided to charge at least ten percent more—first, because of the incident with Weber and, second, because of all of the potentially dangerous hand work that would be required. I also decided that the stress this work could entail would justify a salary increase for those employees.

The concierge told me that a Fed-Ex store was only about three blocks away. I walked out into the hot August day. Neither the temperature nor the humidity could spoil how I felt. I was going to get a huge contract that would bring me multi-million dollar profits for many years to come. Even better, I’d gotten the woman of my dreams. How fucking lucky could I get?

Once back in the suite I used my laptop to analyze the costs of production. The valve was small so the cost of the alloy would be minimal. It was the time associated with making and pouring the molds and overhead that would drive the cost up. The crosspiece meant that each mold would have to be broken once the valve was cast and cooled unless we could add it later on by welding it to the shaft. I developed the price each way, adding a more than ample profit on each unit knowing that our experience over the next month would tell me a lot more than I had now. I was finished around noon so I changed clothes and went to the fitness center where I ran three miles on a treadmill then moved to a Universal weight machine to manhandle some serious iron.

I usually prefer free weights, but there was nobody there to spot me other than the attendant and she looked like she weighed all of 95 pounds. The Universal was the better and safer choice. I began with a pull down, something that can’t be done with free weights, pulling a moderate 150 pounds. After thirty repetitions I moved to bench press.