SWNOVELS : Chapter 56
Alexander
I opted not to use any of my Crescent Ventures contacts or resources as I searched for information, not wanting word to get back to Fiona that I had been digging into Scarlet’s company. I needed to help her
in her war against my stepmother, but it would be tricky to let her in on my plans without revealing the ways in which I was already involved with everything.
A private investigator I’d worked with years ago was happy to help me out, hardly asking for any information once I gave him the name of that odd, seemingly imaginary company that I had seen on Fiona’s copies of the competitor’s expense reports.
“Anything strange at all about this business, I’ll find it out,” he said. “I’ll update you asap.”
And I did not have to wait long on an update. I started some work in my office, but hardly got anything done before my phone rang and I saw it was the PI calling me back already.
“I just texted you an address,” he told me. “Meet me there now.”
The investigator pulled into a nearby parking spot seconds after I got out of my car.
“What is this place?” I asked, approaching him.
We were standing in a square parking lot in the middle of a motel property. The building was in a U-shape around the parking lot, with a small lobby at one end. The room doors were painted in mismatched shades of red, with sun-bleached plastic numbers nailed over the peepholes. And there was graffiti on everything, including the filthy, reeking dumpsters located in the center of the parking lot.
“Let’s go and meet our new friend.” The investigator, an unassuming man in his fifties with a quiet voice but decisive manner, nodded in the direction of a rusty metal staircase on my left. “She can explain. Number twenty seven.”
Up the creaking stairs we went, and just as I held my fist up to knock on the brick-red door to room twenty seven, it flew open, revealing a short brunette woman in her 40s with one finger pressed to her lips, saying
“SHH!!!” She waved us in frantically, then closed the door behind us quickly once we were inside.
“My apologies, ma’am. I was given to understand that you were expecting us.”
“No, no, it’s alright.” The woman shook her head at me and gestured to a small table, around which she had arranged three mismatched chairs. The only other furniture in the room was a twin-size bed, a small bedside table, and a narrow bookcase packed with piles of folded clothing. The PI sat in one of the chairs.
“Thank you, but I’ll stand,” I told the woman politely,
moving to a place in the room where I could keep my body facing the door.
“You can just never be too careful around here,” the woman continued. She peeked through a tiny gap between the curtains on the room’s sole window, which looked directly out over the parking lot.
Apparently satisfied that we had not been followed, she finally relaxed, changing her tone when she addressed me again. “Alpha Alexander, it is a great honor to meet you.”
“That’s very kind of you. My associate tells me that you have some information you want to share with me?”
“Yes.” She swallowed heavily and cleared her throat as she took a seat. “I just don’t know what will happen to me if I am caught talking to you. I signed a contract, you see. An NDA. And if you think I’m bad off now—”
she waved her hand around the motel room slowly—
“Oh, it would be even worse to be on the street.”
“Someone is threatening to put you out on the street?”
I asked. “Whatever you signed, it sounds exploitative at the least. Or it may not even be legal.”
The woman nodded again. “Oh, I’ve thought about this so much. I’m afraid I really have no legal recourse. The only way I can tell you what you want to know, and survive, is if you promise you will not tell them that I blabbed. Never make me go to court. They will ruin me if they find out. Please – tell me you won’t reveal me as your source.”
“I promise.” I looked the woman in the eye. “And I keep my promises. I will make sure that you are safe.”
“Alright.” She poured some water from a plastic pitcher into a paper cup and took a sip. “Are you sure
you don’t want to sit down?” she asked, looking me up and down. “It’s a long story.”
Fiona
“What?” Conrad barked into the intercom on his desk.
“I told you to hold all my calls.”
He and I had been in his office strategizing for hours, trying to find a way to negotiate with the vendors that were still refusing to sell us materials for our construction sites.
“Sorry to interrupt,” his assistant replied, his voice sounding urgent. “But there’s something you should see on the news, Sir.”
Conrad slid open a drawer and grabbed a TV remote, aimed it over my shoulder and pressed a button. I turned around and saw what I always thought was
just a wall opening up to reveal a huge flat-screen TV.
The TV powered on while the apparatus continued pushing it forward into the room.
“More information,” an anchor was saying, “about this shocking scandal and how it all started. If you’re just joining us, we’re sharing breaking news about a property management company that allegedly bribed code enforcement officials to certify buildings with outdated electrical wiring. One of these buildings caught fire last year, and while no residents were killed in the blaze, eleven were injured and hundreds were left homeless.”
Conrad got up and crossed the room, folding his arms across his chest as he stood before the TV, watching.
I went over and stood beside him.
“Now, a former resident has broken their silence,” the reporter continued. “The resident, who chooses to
remain anonymous, is speaking through a class-action attorney, claiming that after the fire, they were forced to sign non-disclosure agreements swearing to secrecy about the cause of the fire, which was an electrical short in one of the units. The attorney also claims that the property owners have failed to provide adequate housing for those who were displaced after the tragedy…”
I knew Conrad was listening intently, taking all the information in, but also had his mind going a million miles an hour already, deeply considering what it all meant. He was still as a statue, eyes glued to the TV.
“In a shocking twist,” the news report went on, “the owner and CEO of the company responsible is none other than the Luna Queen herself. A legend in the industry, Scarlet is a well-known investor in the real estate market. But this story could be changing things for our royal Luna, as more evidence comes to
Conrad sent me away, telling me we’d reconvene the next morning. He was on the phone with someone and yelling at them already before I could close his office door behind me.
The story was everywhere. TV, news websites, social media. I started reading press reports and articles while streaming a live news feed in a second browser window. Soon, more breaking news was announced: victims were coming forward, emboldened by the pending lawsuit, breaking their silence and speaking out. One after another, they told their stories about losing everything in the fire and then being intimidated by the property managers into signing the exploitative NDAs.
I shook my head, thinking how easy it would be to simply update the electrical equipment in an old
building before leasing it out to residents in the first place. Sure, electrical work was pricey, but it was necessary for safety.
What was even worse, though, was how the company responded after the fire. The non-disclosure agreements were given to the residents with the promise that if they signed, they would be set up with free housing the next five years. But when it came time to hold up their end of the bargain, they moved the residents into cheap motel rooms in an unsafe part of the city instead of proper, permanent homes.
I started packing up to head home and realized something. I had been very focused at first on catching up with the details of this story. But now I started thinking about the timing of it being revealed just as I was up against this problem with Scarlet and my project.
The secret about the fire had been kept quiet for so long. Why was the truth coming out today?
Conrad had nothing to do with it. He had been just as shocked as I was when he saw the news.
If it was a coincidence, it was a very lucky break for me indeed.
A lucky break, or something else going on that I was not yet privy to.