Success, Opulence and Power by Hebru Young (best novel books to read .TXT) 📗

flight attendant had served some lime to go with the soda. Once the he had finished serving, I gave him the nod, and he left us to enjoy our meal.

“All refreshed?” Joe asked.

“Yeah, who’s the new guy, Joe?” I said.

“Who, the flight attendant? Don’t worry about him, we put him through the six-week vetting process, you know how that goes,” Joe replied.

“Good, I’m sure that I don’t need to explain why we need to be even more vigilant from now on,” I said.

I am meticulous when it comes to secrecy, and considering everything that had just transpired, it made sense to be a bit paranoid. Joe was right though. Everyone that we employed, especially those that worked in close proximity to me, had to undergo a rigorous vetting process. This included various forms of education and criminal background checks. We acquired as much information as possible. We knew everyone’s family, and if they had no family, we knew their friends; and if they didn’t have any friends, we knew about their pets. We rarely employed people that had no family ties. It’s difficult to persuade people to cooperate by threatening to harm their loved ones if they don’t have any. Of course, such a drastic measure was used only as a final resort.

The houses, offices, cars, boats, helicopters, and planes were regularly swept for bugs. The sweeps were performed using the most advanced signal sniffers that money could buy. I was sure that no one would be listening to the conversation Joe and I were about to have. I picked up a bruschetta, dipped it in the olive oil, and took a bite. It was delicious.

“So, do we have a real chance of winning this trial?” I asked.

“I have to be honest with you, Dom, this isn’t going to be easy. We have been very careful over the years, which is how we’ve managed to keep you clean and made it difficult for anyone to pin charges on you. Whatever they’ve got on you, it must be solid. We will have to wait till I get the list of evidence from the prosecution before I can put a strategy in place. With that said, I will fight hard for you and do everything I can to win.” replied Joe.

“Okay, let’s talk worst-case scenario. If I’m found guilty and sentenced to prison, will I lose everything?” I asked.

“We will need to clarify with Julian after your meeting with the Assembly. I believe everything has been organized in a way that ensures that Laura and the kids are set up for life. UNEA law requires that in order to seize assets, the courts must be able to prove that those assets were acquired by illegal means. As far as I know, Julian has always made sure that company accounts appear legit. I am pretty sure all the assets are safe. It is not the financial crimes that we need to focus on, but the other charges will definitely require our full effort,” replied Joe.

Julian Seawall is my chief accountant, and boy, was he a magician—the way he cooked the books was magic. I was still struggling to come to terms with the arrest though. I couldn’t figure out who had chirped.

“This is really messed up, Joe. I am sure someone from the inside is talking. Have you spoken to Alex and Chris?” I asked.

“Yes.” Joe replied.

“Do they have anything yet? Have they started the internal inquiry?” I asked.

“No. I think it’s going to take some time to get everything in place,” Joe responded.

“Not good enough, Joe, this is not good enough. I am the head of this organization, it’s my neck on the line here. They need to understand there is too much at stake. What’s taking so long?”

“I completely understand your frustration, Dom, but the CSOs know what to do, and everything is being handled.”

“We really need to find out who is behind this,” I said.

“I know. The way I see it, there is more than one person involved. The organization is structured in such a way that no one can single-handedly bring you down. The people behind this will have to be from both sides of the Nations to be able to pull this off,” said Joe.

“We need to find out if any of our employees have shown inconsistencies in their work patterns. I think that there is a good chance that they might be responsible for this,” I said.

“You’re right, Dom—we should flag this with the CSOs.”

Alex and Chris also served as the organization’s CSOs, which meant they were in charge of all aspects of security. They not only had to do everything in their power to protect company information, it was also their job to acquire any information that was considered beneficial to the company. So, any information relating to my trial was high priority. Alex and Chris would need to get our guys on the hunt for every bit of information about everyone involved in the trial.

“What do Alex and Chris have lined up so far?” I asked.

“I had a secure conference call with them this morning, and their strategy is to do surveillance on members of the Assembly. They’ll be keeping an eye on all other senior employees as well. It is unlikely that anyone outside these ranks would have been close enough to you to gain any information that would harm you. However, we can’t rule anyone out, so we should get the CSOs on the case. They would need to immediately set up surveillance on anyone suspicious. We shouldn’t take any chances. Once all the evidence has been presented, we can start narrowing things down to a more specific group of individuals,” Joe replied.

Joe was making sense, but we wouldn’t be able to do too much until the prosecution presented their evidence. I just needed to be patient. I