“This way,” he answered. I headed toward his voice. It was coming from the north side of the building near the windows.
I saw him standing there, silhouetted by the outside sunlight, Cox by his side. I felt anger flare up inside of me. I couldn’t believe Cox would be here, willing to show his face, that traitorous piece of shit. He had to have some measure of shame left inside of him, but apparently not. Apparently he was okay just standing there, his face flat and normal as always, not showing a single emotion.
I stopped in front of the two men and crossed my arms, waiting for them to speak.
The arrogant bastards watched me for a minute or two, staring me down. Cox had no expression on his face, neither happiness nor embarrassment, just his normal cold blankness. The man had worked for me for years and he should feel like a snake, but he wasn’t showing it. I hoped he was stewing on the inside, that piece of shit rat bastard.
“So, you’re here,” Bruce said finally. “I wasn’t sure you’d show.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“You know what we have on you.”
I shrugged, “One more scandal won’t matter.”
Bruce laughed, shaking his head. “You’re insane, Carter. This isn’t just some small scandal. This is you fucking your stepdaughter. You’ll be destroyed. Nobody will touch you after this.”
“Maybe,” I said.
“We have more than what we showed you, much more. Clearly, Cox here has been working for me, and you know how efficient he can be.”
My eyes flashed to him, anger boiling up to the surface despite my trying to remain calm. “You’re a piece of shit snake, Cox,” I said. “I thought you were a good man. I paid you well and treated you right. I guess I was wrong.”
“A better offer came along,” he said simply.
“Scumbag. I never pegged you as a rat traitor. How can anyone trust you or work with you now?”
“Enough,” Bruce said, cutting in. “Enough. I don’t need to hear you two squabbling like an old married couple.”
I spit on the ground, staring at Cox. I hoped he understood that he was less than dirt to me now, and he had been diminished in the world. Maybe he was getting a lot of money from this, but that would never replace his lost honor.
I turned my attention back to Bruce and the matter at hand. “What do you want?” I asked him.
“Finally getting down to business.” He smiled at me serenely. “It’s simple, actually. I want you to resign from the company and to leave the country.”
I laughed. “Very simple.”
“I will accept nothing less.”
“Actually, you’ll accept much less. Because I’m not going anywhere.”
“Are you sure about that? You’re not in a position to negotiate.”
“Actually, I think I am. You see, you won’t release that information. As much as you hate it, Valor Tech is attached to my name and my reputation. I founded the company and built the company, and public perception is on my side here. If you come after me, you come after Valor.”
“Ah,” Bruce said, the smile never leaving his face. “I wondered if you’d make that connection.”
“You can’t destroy me without destroying the company.”
“There’s one big mistake you’re making, Carter. You assume that I don’t want to destroy Valor.”
“What? What’s the point of this then? Without the company, you’ll have nothing.”
“There are powers in this world much larger than companies,” he said with a sly smile. “Some men would be very happy to see your company destroyed.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Insider trading,” he said. “I’d tell a few close friends that the stock of Valor was about to drop in exchange for small portions of their profit. I’d also sell off what I had, of course.”
“That would never work. There are too many regulatory agencies watching the market for that exact thing.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Are you willing to gamble your life on it? Because I am.”
I stared at Bruce as I slowly realized something that I had never noticed before: he was insane.
Not actually crazy, of course. Bruce was an intelligent man and clearly still had control of himself. But he was willing to take serious and intense risks, the sort I never would have guessed he was willing to take. That, combined with his willingness to blackmail, suggested that he had some serious instability issues.
This wasn’t a fully rational man standing before me, as I had been assuming. All of my calculations so far had been around the assumed fact that Bruce was a normal, self-regulating human. Instead, he was clearly unstable and verging on madness.
For a second, I felt afraid.
My mind worked through my options. Part of me wanted to pull my gun and kill them both, but I suspected Cox would pull his faster. He knew I kept a weapon in my office and was probably prepared for something like that. No, I had to do something else, probably something equally drastic.