by S M Mala
‘We’re not friends,’ Sylvie said sharply. ‘So what’s wrong with the plan and, frankly, it’s not something we should be discussing without the rest of the team.’
‘I’ve found other ways where it will be beneficial for all.’
‘Like closing us down at the end of next year? Sure that’s beneficial when we all become unemployed. Will you have ways to make it better for us then?’ she replied and he knew Sylvie wasn’t going to play ball. ‘We micro manage this place and I’ll find ways to get these guys trained and qualified so when you sell this building, the retail value is very high I believe, they will have a fighting chance to get another job.’
There was a heavy silence in the room.
‘I, from today, will have equal sign off on everything,’ he said deeply, seeing her angry eyes. ‘With you. When you’re not here then they will come to me.’
‘Until Piers better then you can top up tan Finlay. You look pale,’ muttered Samina as she frowned. ‘You need good curry. I make for Friday.’
‘Who said?’ butted in Stephen. ‘When Piers and Sylvie are away then I’m left to run the place.’
‘In your dream,’ sniggered Samina and he noticed Marianne, Elizbieta and Gillian try to hide their smiles.
‘Why don’t you discuss whatever you have to discuss and tell us later on today,’ said Della, shaking her head.
He knew he’d pissed her off by not calling her over the weekend as he promised.
‘I’ve really got to go,’ said Wanda getting up. ‘Toby needs me. Can I get a box of those to take home?’
‘Me too!’ said Samina standing up and screeching the chair. ‘Bad boy black is the flavour for now!’
‘I think it is,’ Sylvie said and put on a fake smile.
‘Sylvie, can you stay?’ he asked gently as she sat still and they both waited for the rest to leave the room.
Soon as the door was shut he went to say something.
‘We keep this about business, nothing else,’ Sylvie said and sat up straight. ‘What’s wrong with the structure and why do you have equal say?’
‘I want to help.’
‘Help by going home to your wife.’
‘If I help you, without any cost to your company, then your staff outlay reduces and you make more profit,’ he said gently, wanting to touch her.
‘You’re only going to close us down!’
‘No harm in making money before then is there?’ he sighed. ‘It’s not certain about closing you down.’
‘You’re the one making the decisions along with your mother. You know what the score is,’ she said and closed down her laptop. ‘I want everything in writing from now on.’
‘Fine!’ Finlay shrugged as she stood up.
‘And who gave you the right to buy and rearrange the furniture if we have equal anything? And who said you could come back and work here after what you did!’
‘No personal conversations in work, remember,’ he smirked, knowing that would wind her up. ‘Strictly business! You are going to have to meet with me every day for an hour, either we’ll speak on email, phone or meet for coffee. I’ll make sure you’ll be reimbursed.’
‘Well I look forward to receiving an extra fiver,’ she said walking towards the door.
He watched her storm out and sat there trying to compose himself for a few seconds. His mind kept racing back to when he was on top of her, kissing and stroking her skin, before they made love and it went terribly wrong.
Finlay hated to admit it but he wanted her even more than before. This confused him as it was pretty obvious he had less of a chance.
He took the opportunity to ring Juliette.
‘Hello,’ she said sounding a little breathless. ‘I was just doing prenatal yoga.’
‘How are you?’
‘Feeling really good,’ she said before hesitating. ‘Your mother isn’t backing off. She wants to see everything. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she was double checking your work.’
‘I don’t mind if she does,’ he shrugged knowing the woman wanted to cause trouble.
‘Do you want to know the baby’s due date?’
‘Is it worth me knowing?’ he said realising how cruel it sounded. ‘Sorry, tell me.’
‘They say around the middle of April which means it is yours. Finlay, I need you back. It’s been nearly three months since you left me and I am sorry. You have to take some responsibility as you’re always travelling and I have needs.’
‘Did Marc-Philippe facilitate them for you? Is he doing it now?’
‘There’s no point talking to you when you’re like this,’ she said as he closed his eyes.
‘Have you told your parents you’re fucking another man and have been doing so since the beginning of the year?’
His heart started to beat faster and he felt angry as well as hurt.
‘How do-.’
‘It’s a major boost for the confidence to know you’re not even sure if your wife is having your baby!’
‘It will be my baby and if you love me, you will stay by my side,’ she said harshly and he knew he was in a no win situation. ‘You still love me I take it?’
‘Do you love me?’
‘How many times do I have to say?’
‘As many times as it takes.’
‘I have to go but please tell your mother to back off with the interrogation and I bet it’s her who told you about … anyway that’s the past. It’s not good for her grandchild’s health.’
She hung up.
Sylvie was only going to go back in to refuse to meet him every day when she overheard why his life was in utter turmoil.
His wife was pregnant and he didn’t know if he was the father.
And Sylvie hastened a thought that the baby could either be white or black. That made her want to laugh, given what he said, then realised her ego was dented but his heart was more than certainly breaking.
Sylvie turned and walked to her desk. Then she saw the coffee man and literally ran down the stairs just to get a caffeine fix.
Sipping her latte she wondered if his racist revenge fuck was more than that. The man was hurting and, though she didn’t like him, she thought it was a horrible thing to go through.
The perfect life of Finlay wasn’t perfect at all.
‘Oh no!’ she said out loudly, putting her hand to her mouth thinking about all the black sex toys and Finlay’s emotionless face.
She had mentally tried to shove it up his arse by flaunting the various shaped dicks.
Running up the stairs, she got back to her office and found him sitting at his desk. He looked sad and she realised, since becoming a mother, she was a soft touch. Finlay darted a glance at her before typing away on his laptop and looking at his tablet. She sipped her coffee and looked at his handsome face, all dressed up in his perfect attire. The man was nice eye candy and, other than the twenty second sex thing, he wasn’t so bad at the petting side. His penis wasn’t that bad a size either.
She laughed and shook her head, knowing it had been so long since she did the flirting sex game stuff, she was acting like a teenager, much as she did at the beginning of all her long term relationships. Closing her eyes for a moment she knew she should be flattered and take it on the chin.
‘Finlay,’ she said and waited to see if he’d look at her.
He didn’t.
‘I accept your apology about what happened. I think I too was using you in my own sort of way, which I feel bad about. You were honest and I forget about the WMCs not being really up to speed on the ethnic front.’
‘Pardon me?’
‘I just did,’ she smiled and noticed his confused expression.
‘What’s ‘WMCs’?’
‘White middle classes,’ she said sincerely. ‘I did, unfortunately, try to explain my abbreviation to my daughter and said ‘WCs’ explaining they were full of shit and basically got told off by an eight year old.’
Finlay shook his head from side to side as
if he was very disappointed with her and Sylvie felt put out by his reaction.
‘Don’t talk to me for the rest of the day especially about anything personal,’ he said solemnly and Sylvie realised he meant it when he didn’t utter a word to her for the next few hours.
As she stood up at noon, he had his head down and hadn’t spoken to anyone. She’d counted that every twenty minutes someone would walk in. Sitting back down, she typed a message.
‘When I was at school, boys used to say that they fancied me but they could never ask me out because I wasn’t white (they’d say things like that in those days). Then as they got older, like when they were rebelling against their parents or trying to be cool, they’d ask me out. It always felt odd.’
He read it and then looked at her before replying.
‘What did you say to them when they did ask?’
She smiled on the answer.
‘Always said ‘no’ because I hated the fact they thought they were doing me a favour and I’d be grateful. Very much like you thought you did for me in that 20 seconds.’
Again he glanced up and frowned.
‘I’m going through a really bad time right now and I don’t want to talk or have these email conversations, so do you mind stopping them?’ he said quietly and Sylvie felt cut by the comment.
She put her laptop away and left the office realising her flirting days with Finlay were truly over.
And it hurt harder than she ever anticipated.
Thirty
If ever he wished he could stop, it was Tuesday morning when he practically kept shouting at Sylvie in the meeting room. She sat there passively and accepted his barrage of abuse which made him angrier as all he wanted to do was fight with her.
Finlay hadn’t slept properly and his mind ticked over about Juliette.
She hadn’t flown out to see him or even tried to really stop him from walking out on the marriage.
The woman had let him go as if it was a done deal.
Something didn’t add up and he knew, deep in his heart, the woman didn’t love him the way he loved her and this hurt more than he could handle.
He kept questioning why she didn’t fight for him to stay.
And he knew the answer was because by telling him about the baby, she’d suspect he’d leave.
That was the plan and it worked.
He now assumed when she was doing prenatal yoga the time he called, Juliette was more than likely fucking the chef.
‘Can’t you see you can negotiate better on the individual cost price of the item with this company?’ he said literally tearing his hair out.
‘But the quality of the product isn’t good and this company has been known to rip us off, that’s why I don’t use them,’ she said quietly.
‘Then put a proper mark up on the products.’
‘But they’ll be too expensive and-.’
‘For fuck’s sake Sylvie, don’t you know anything? Are you that stupid?’
As he said it, he knew he’d stepped over the line as she sat there and swallowed hard.
‘I’m not stupid,’ she said and he could see her face contort into anger.
‘Are you going to go off into one of your moods because it’s the 27th and what would that make it? Three years and three months of being alone? And we have to feel sorry for you, is that it? Should I get you a bar of chocolate so you can choke on it?’
‘I better go because you’re having some sort of a mental and emotional seizure,’ she said calmly and stood up, walking to her office as Finlay sunk in his chair and realised he’d taken it too far trying to get a rise out of her.
‘What you shouting about? World war four?’ said Samina marching in followed by Stephen. ‘You not speak to people like that! They can hear you from other side of Brentford! Sylvie off now!’
‘She won’t listen to me!’ he groaned seeing Sylvie walk down the steps and out of the building. ‘Oh fuck!’
‘If you shout, no one listen as they go deaf,’ shrugged Samina and stepped closer to Finlay before raising her eyebrows at the name of the company he wanted them to use on his screen. ‘They a bad lot.’
‘Who?’ Stephen said stepping in and Finlay noticed he went a little red when seeing what Samina was pointing at. ‘They’re okay, it was a mistake and we don’t use them anymore.’
Samina turned, gave Stephen a filthy look, and shook her head.
‘You accountant, you know why we not use them,’ she said quietly, before walking out of the meeting room.
‘Any news on the restructure?’ Stephen asked eagerly as Finlay realised he’d have to apologise to Sylvie.
‘I was going to speak to her about it but… it’s not even nine! She can’t leave now.’
‘Hey bro,’ said Toby with a serious scowl. ‘What’ve you done to Sylvie? She looked really upset just a minute ago.’
‘I just mentioned about her getting in a strop as it’s the 27th, the same day her husband died,’ he said realising how cruel his comment was and that she’d confided in him.
‘That was just plain nasty! Poor Sylvie! God, you’re really being a shit at the moment!’
Toby turned and rushed out the building.
Just as Finlay was going to follow, he got a phone call from the head accountants.
‘Hey Josh,’ Finlay said walking into the office and shutting the door. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘It’s what I can do for you,’ he said quietly. ‘It seems there have been monthly payments to another account for eighteen months and it doesn’t seem to have a trail. All we know, once a month, two hundred and fifty pounds is transferred out by direct debit to a company we’ve never heard of. It stopped when you came over to London but it doesn’t add up. Also the numbers are confusing. Somewhere money was taken out then put back into the company but we’re not clear how. There’s no invoice so I’m not sure what they’ve been up to. It’s nothing major as it’s a small monthly amount but you need to find out what’s going on.’
‘Are you saying money’s being ciphered out of the company?’ he said starting to worry.
‘If this is one thing we’ve found then I’m sure there are more discrepancies. We’ll need to come in and audit the place.’
‘Can you trace the account the money’s going to?’
‘I can try. We might have to get the police involved if it’s theft.’
‘Then get them.’
She hadn’t heard from Finlay on Wednesday. Sylvie was still furious with his comment. His car was parked outside as well as another car she didn’t recognise on Thursday morning. As she walked in and up the stairs, ready to give him a piece of her mind, she noticed Stephen and Finlay were in the office with two other people.
They all looked at her then she noticed Finlay seemed more upset as Stephen flashed a look of disgust, then annoyance.
‘Can I help you?’ she asked and noticed an older woman sitting on the chair with a younger man standing.
There were no smiles.
‘Sylvie,’ Finlay said very gently. ‘We’ve got a bit of a problem.’
‘Is everyone okay? Has there been an accident?’ she asked worriedly, looking at Finlay then at Stephen, who wasn’t making eye contact.
‘Everyone’s fine,’ the woman replied. ‘We’re here over a reported case of theft.’
‘Theft?’ Sylvie repeated and noticed Finlay looked away, then she realised they thought she was involved in some way.
‘Sums of money have been taken from the company over the last eighteen months valuing to the amount of four and a half thousand pounds. Since Mr Chambers started it has stopped.’
‘I got the accountants to look at the books, when Stephen mentioned money was sometimes paid out from the company in direct debits, and he had no idea what they were for. There wasn’t any documentation to say why the payments were for,’ Finlay said, biting his lip, sounding more apologetic than accusing. ‘The account name is DMH and it has something to do with you.’
Syl
vie walked to her desk, opened her lap top and plugged it in. She took off her jacket and sat down, realising he had thought the worse but she would let them stew for a few moments before dropping her bombshell.
This isn’t what she wanted to happen, knowing it would change everything.
‘I’m listening,’ she said and waited to see what he was going to say next.
‘Also a sum of money was taken from the company, in the region of forty thousand pounds in a one off payment which isn’t traceable then it was returned.’
‘You think that’s down to me?’ Sylvie asked knowing the truth. ‘I borrowed this money then paid it back?’
She looked at all four of them and then focussed on Finlay, who had his head down and shook it from side to side.
‘Right so in a nutshell, you have linked an account to me that’s had payments of two hundred and fifty pounds a month plus forty thousand pounds went missing and then was put back in after some time, is that correct?’
‘I had to tell them,’ Stephen sheepishly said. ‘It sort of went out and back in.’
‘And you said it was me?’
‘It’s the most logical considering it’s linked to DMH and-.’
‘Oh no!’ she said smiling at all four of them as Finlay turned his back. ‘Who else have you spoken to this about? And Stephen? Where did the money go to and who put it back in? Can’t you remember any discrepancies from over one and a half years ago?’ She noticed the colour drained from his face. ‘Did you not mention your so called friends who wanted to do business with us then ripped us off that same amount?’
‘That was a genuine mistake!’ he snapped back.
‘Are you denying it Ms Mather?’ the younger police office said. ‘You know theft is a criminal offence?’
‘Really, and I just thought it was a game,’ she replied sharply. ‘And where’s the proof of theft?’
‘Sylvie don’t be like that,’ Finlay said turning to look at her. ‘If you needed the money you should have-.’
‘And you believe this too, when you know what I said about Piers being kind to me. You think I’d steal from him? Well thanks a lot Finlay, you really have shown me your true colours over the past few weeks or was it all about mine!’ she snapped angrily. ‘If I needed the money I would have written a cheque to myself!’
