Chapter 29: A World Crumbling Down
Ms. Patterson was a mid aged lady with silver rimmed glasses and salt and pepper hair neatly tied up in a bun. She had on a dark plaited suit and didn’t let out any hint from her expression, which all together reminded Mei of the principle from the Harry Potter movies. She politely shook Mei’s hand and asked her to take a seat across from her desk.
“Ms Li, welcome back. I hope everything worked out all right with your family.”She said it as a statement, leaving Mei no room for explanations. So she just nodded slightly, anxiously waiting to hear what she had to say next.
“As you have probably noticed, a lot had happened during the time you were absent. The project your team had been working on – CMCS was defunded due to legal issues. As a direct result, the employment of all the people involved had been terminated starting from Mr. Carson. I am sorry to inform you that effective immediately, you will continue to receive 2 more weeks of compensation from D&W but you will have to clear out your desk today.”
Mei thought this could not possibly be real; she found Ms. Patterson’s story completely outrageous. It wasn’t until she walked into her apartment with a box filled with her belongings from work that she started to recognize the fact that for the first time in her professional career, that she was unemployed.
Mei sat on her couch for a while trying to gather her thoughts. What happened? Was this why she hadn’t heard from Jesse for a while? She took out her phone and dialed his number and listened to it went directly to voice mail. She hung up without leaving a message and called her office mate Roy instead. That’s when all the missing pieces started to come together and she finally found out what had happened.
Apparently CMCS was awarded to D&W just like Jesse told her. However, before anyone had a chance to celebrate, things started rolling downhill like on a spiral. First, two people from the Inspector General’s office came and paid Troy a visit; then shortly after Jesse was called in for an interview. There were different versions of the story floating around office and the most reliable one was that Troy and Jesse were involved in some kind of backdoor deals with one of the top IRS officials, who was currently under investigation for the charge of accepting bribes. Then it wasn’t until long before funds for CMCS was pulled back. D&W did not want to get involved in any legal battles due to its on-going contracts with Department of Education, so it took the easy way out and fired everyone that was involved to clear the company name.
Mei knew the story had to be real, she knew who the official was but she was shocked and found it hard to believe Jesse was involved: “So what happened to Mr. B?” She carefully asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.
“Broderick? Well, this is why you need a powerful father in-law.” Roy said almost in a jealous tone, “I heard while Mr. Carson was charged with bribing and scrambling to put together a defense team; Mr. B on the other end had NADA to worry about. Do you know that he’s related to James Steele, one of the rich and powerful in DC? Obviously they either paid to get him clean or hired some really expensive attorneys that he didn’t even have to go under the investigation. I heard he moved back to DC and while you and I are without a job, he is probably enjoying the view from the corner office in his father in-law’s company right now…”
Mei didn’t hear anything else that Roy said after that; she was relieved to know Jesse was OK, at the same time completely overwhelmed by what had happened. She could not convince herself to believe everything Roy told her, she needed to talk to Jesse herself and hear from him directly.
She kept calling and calling all day long, finally by dinner time she heard the ring tone and it was picked up: “Hello?”
Mei froze; she heard Elaina’s voice on the other end.
“Hello?” Elaina sounded like she was about to hang up.
“Hi, this is Mei Li; I use to work with Mr. Broderick. Could I speak with him?” Mei finally spoke up.
“Oh Ms Li, I remember you. This is Elaina, Jesse’s fiancée.” Elaina’s voice sounded cold and unfriendly.
“Hi, Elaina. I just got back and heard about what happened with CMCS. Could I speak with Jesse please?” Mei was not in the mood to be offended or to chat, she needed to talk to Jesse right away.
“Look, JESSE does not work for D&W anymore; he had nothing to do with that huge mess. Whatever it is, you can contact his attorney directly. I advice you mind your own business from this point on and not calling his personal number again.” And the line was cut.
Mei slowly put down the phone, and stared blankly into her living room. It was completely dark outside right now and she had not gotten a chance to turn on any lights. Her apartment looked cold and gloomy. She suddenly had never felt so lonely in her life and wondered if there would be a bright tomorrow ever again.
Jesse walked downstairs dressed in jeans and asked: “Was that my phone?”
Elaina gave him a big bright smile: “Nah. Hey where do you want to go for dinner? After that whole day in the attorney general’s office you must be starving right now.”
“I am not hungry, actually.” Jesse went over and sat down by the computer desk and started typing: “You know I just hope this case could be over soon.”
Elaina walked over behind him and gave him a kiss on the cheek, “Baby, it will be fine. Troy was the stupid one to be so clumsy, literally handing the evidence over to the cops on a silver platter…” Jesse’s body froze at her kiss; he hesitated for a little but finally said: “Elaina, I appreciate everything you and James are doing for me, but we talked about this… I need to take a break… we need to take a break.”
Elaina didn’t respond, she stepped over in front of Jesse and sat on the desk next to his computer screen. After looking at him for a few seconds she asked: “Baby, are you still worried about CMCS? Look, my Dad had assured us that everything was pinned down on Troy and Andy, you are completely safe. I promise that this will all soon be over and you will be the new VP heading our Router replacement contract…”
Jesse’s body suddenly straightened up as he heard her words, he looked up right into Elaina’s eyes and asked: “Router replacement? I thought James lost that contract?”
“Well we did under Andy Lopez, now with his replacement in office, things changed…”Before she finished her sentence, Elaina realized what she was telling him and quickly tried to take her words back: “Baby, listen, this has nothing to do with…”
It was too late. Jesse stood up and took one step closer so he now was only inches away from her face, his voice came out frozen and sharp: “Elaina, tell me, was Michael Medley the new Acquisition Director?”
