Painful Consequences
A notification pinged on my PC right in the middle of a conversation with an investor. Curiosity or down rights women’s’ nosiness made my hand hover over the keyboard. I pressed the key and an Email popped up from my boss. I looked over my shoulder and I could see him lounging in his office playing some simple game on his laptop. His crooked smile gave it away. My finger automatically hit play as I was still chatting to my client friend on my mobile. The message stated come and see me when you have a minute. Why didn’t he just get off his fat arse and come over as usual, lean over the wall of my cubicle, gazing down my cleavage and ask? I finished my conversation and checked my already perfect appearance in my compact, stood up, straightened my skirt, looked around to gather attention of my colleagues and clicked noisily across the floor in my heels to his office leant against the door frame.
He looked up, slammed shut his laptop, changed his crooked smile to a more welcoming look and said, “Hi Liv, come in, close the door and have a seat for a quick chat.”
I looked at him sternly and said loudly so my colleagues could hear, “Don’t call me Liv. My name is Olivia, Mr. Sketchley or you can call me by my full name, Dr. Olivia Martin PhD, from Cambridge University, England and my dissertation was on Investment Fraud from Mobsters. The paper couldn’t be published for obvious reasons. I didn’t come into your office for a quick chat. We do that in the breakroom.”
“Please, please come in, close the door and take a seat. We need to talk about your workload.”
I stepped in, not closing the door on purpose and said, “I’d prefer to stand. I sit on my ass all day. Now what’s the problem with my workload?”
“Well, you have so many client investors that you should divest a few.”
“You mean you want to take them over from me to increase your personal bonus?”
“No, no, I want to spread them amongst your office colleagues to ease your load. Maybe just move the Strathen, Maigret and Collet accounts to others in the office?”
“So, you want me to divest my three largest bonus yielding accounts? For what reason?”
“Olivia, you will still be the highest bonus earner and it would be nice to share your largesse with your team, don’t you think?”
“This is the first time I’ve heard you discussing the wellbeing of your team. You are a useless manager, spending all of your time sitting on your fat arse, playing simple games on your laptop. You haven’t come up with one prospect investor in my three years here. We only tolerate you here because you keep to yourself and don’t disrupt the office karma.”
“You can’t talk to me like that!” he shouted. “People have been fired for less.”
“You can’t fire me because I would take more than half of the investors with me. You would lose your team bonus and probably your job. Another thing, don’t you poach any more investors as you did two weeks ago. I suggested a new prospect to Gail and as per the process she brought the subject to you and you took over the account to boost your bonus. This is not on!” I stated, “The next time you do that there will be consequences, painful consequences, since you wouldn’t understand a passive approach.”
“Are you threatening me?” he shouted and finally stood up.
“Take it anyway you like but poaching new investors will not be tolerated,” I said looking straight into his eyes, spun on my heels and stomped off noisily to my desk. All my colleagues look on with smiles and quiet clapping.
Standing in my cubicle, I faced my team and said, “You heard all that, I hope. Three of my accounts will be distributed amongst you. Come and see me and I’ll give you all the contact details and company history and I’ll willingly help you with the transition.”
“Olivia,” said Clarence rather coyly, “Won’t that damage your personal bonus?”
“Probably, but it will only be temporarily. I don’t mind sharing my largess, but I’m not having that dickhead poaching our clients.” I sat down and with a knowing smile, I opened my Email and started typing a note to the three investors I had divested.
Three years ago, I had joined Cyrox Investments as a junior Sales Agent and was accepted without experience by the CEO, Howard Tyler by promising to bring in many investors based on my husband’s various companies. I also got agreement in my contract that my workday would be from 9am to 5pm since I had a second job as Financial Officer for my husband’s business. This was reluctantly accepted and within a year I was upgraded to senior sales manager with all the business I brought in.
My husband Carlos ran a large number of nefarious businesses comprising, Pharmaceutical (drugs), Entertainment (gambling dens and brothels), Property (collecting protection tythes), Banking (money laundering) and many more of this ilk. These companies had lots of spare cash and needed a safe haven for it. I had researched the investment companies in St. Louis and come up with Cyrox as the most appropriate. Small with a good reputation, great returns record and too small to carry out due diligence on their clients. They were least likely to be investigated by the Authorities, having a collection of happy clients. That’s why I inserted myself in the company to keep a close eye on our capital.
Every morning, I arrived at precisely 9am, driven in a luxury car, even a limo. I was impeccably dressed in designer clothes, clutching an expensive purse and large sunglasses perched on my immaculately coiffured hair. I explained my attire, more suited to a CEO than a Sales Agent, that at 5pm I was driven to various company meetings followed by dinners, so I had to look my best. Initially the office gossip was that I was dressed in fakes and knockoffs but this eventually dissipated as my colleagues got to know me. Every Friday I brought a tray of expensive cakes to the breakroom. I even bought and had installed an automatic bean to coffee machine so that we could have decent coffee. Even the other departments would come to our breakroom for coffee and cakes. I was very friendly and all my colleagues appreciated the help I gave them in introducing them to investor. I became indispensable to the sales department and company. I often visited the nub of the company, the investment department, where they used various algorithms to make the best investments, to try and understand their methodology and encourage them to greater heights for my personal investors.
The CEO Howard would often come down to our breakroom because he liked our coffee and I often took the opportunity to chat to him about the business and its future plans, just checking that they didn’t conflict with my purpose. He often asked about our Manager but I gave a diplomatic reply.
A week later my three investors were transferred smoothly to my colleagues and I decided on a scam to protect my bonus. The system was based on how much revenue each agent raised in each quarter. Since I controlled all the investment monies from my husband’s businesses, I transferred 126 million dollars from my divested accounts and switched them across my array of personal accounts. That would provide me with a hefty bonus this quarter. I wondered if my dickhead manager would notice and comment. Of course not, so I decided to move around a quantity of money each quarter to boost my quarterly bonus without getting outside revenues. My only issue was that this would boost my manager’s group bonus but I didn’t cry over that.
A month passed after my confrontation with my manager and again he poached an investor that I had introduced to a Carol, ignoring my warning. A few days later he got carjacked on his way home. His BMW was stolen, with his wallet and mobile phone and he was left badly beaten. I visited him in hospital bringing a bunch of grapes and a signed get-well card from his team. He was surprised to see me.
“Hello Mr Sketchley, I hope you are getting better?” I asked in a pleasant way. “Pity you didn’t heed my warning about painful consequences but no doubt this was a lesson. I suggest that when you recover you hand in your resignation notice and don’t bother us anymore.” He looked at me with horror as the full realisation hit him. I smiled, waved and walked off leaving him to ponder his mistakes.
