Mr. CEO You Are Dumped

Episode 22

Mr. CEO – You’re Dumped

Chapter 22 – We Had a Deal

Richard’s P.O.V

A few days after Elizabeth’s return, I decided to meet her uncle, Mr. Constantine, to know what the future holds for my company in their hands.

I accepted the deal only because Elizabeth was the CEO of the company and she was very persistent about buying out my company from bankruptcy.

With the way the last board meeting ended, I knew things would not be easy on me as Constantine didn’t care even by the slightest about what happened to my company and I won’t just sit down and watch them ruin what was left of my company just because they held the greatest share.

With resolve in my heart, I walked into the Rose Corp. Building and proceeded to Constantine’s office, but I was intercepted by security a few inches away from his office door.

“Who are you and where are you going?” inquired the security man with his deep masculine voice and his question infuriated me.

First, how dare he ask me who I am. Didn’t he see my face a few days ago when I attended the meeting of the board directors and second, how could he possibly ask me where I was going, the only door in this hallway was that of Constantine’s office. Even a schooled fish would know that I was heading to Constantine’s office.

I ignored his disrespectful question and shoved him aside so that I could continue my movement to Constantine’s office, but he mumbled some words which I didn’t quite understand and, out of nowhere, two more security personnel blocked the door.

“Okay boys, there’s no need to get rough,” I uttered boldly, but they didn’t bother.

I stood my ground, holding my head high and making my face look as mean as I could but they didn’t let that intimidate them. It made them feel superior to me as they could sense me panicking inside.

“I asked you politely, but you refused to answer. Now I’m afraid we’ll have to kick you out of this hallway. This office is out of bounds for everyone aside from the Boss,” said the guy I met earlier when I arrived.

He snapped his fingers and the two guards at the door grabbed my hands roughly and dragged me out of the hallway.

“How dare you treat a member of the board this way? I could have you all fired from your jobs!” I yelled at them, but it was of no use at the moment.

“We are just following the orders given to us by the Boss. If you want to see him, go about it the right way,” one guard said as they forced me out to the reception room of the company.

They said a few words to the Receptionist before returning to their various duty posts and I sat there in silence, thinking of what to do in order for me to meet Constantine.

A crazy idea came to my mind, a temple run related idea.

I imagined dashing through the hallway and knocking the security personnel down, bash the door and run in to confront Mr. Constantine, but I knew I wasn’t that strong to face a professional security officer.

“Excuse me, Mr. Richard?”

I noticed that the receptionist was standing right in front of me and in the process of raising my head up, the first sight I saw was that of her thighs.

She wore a black skimpy skirt and her glass hour shape was perfect and attractive.

“Um... hello, how may I help you?” I asked, and she giggled.

“I believe I would be of more help to you than you would be to me” she smiled as she offered me a hand and I took it, kissing the back of her gently and she giggled again.

“I gave you my hand so I could help you up, but I guess that can be appreciated as well,” she teased as she helped me stand on my feet.

We walked over to her desk together and she brought out a pass card and handed it over to me.

She scribbled something down on a little note and handed it to me after she gave me the pass card.

“What are these for?” I asked her with a frown, but her smile was just too charming for me to keep a rude face while talking with her.

“The pass card is to get you a meeting with the CEO in the next thirty minutes. While the paper has my number written on it, call me sometime,” she smiled as she sat back at her desk, saying nothing further.

I waited out the thirty minutes in the reception room with her, but we didn’t say a word to each other after that until I got up to proceed to Mr. Constantine’s office.

“Good luck Mr. Richie,” she blew a kiss at me and I smiled warmly before walking towards the hallway that led to Mr. Constantine’s office.

The security personnel saw me approaching, and he frowned as he made movements to intercept once more, but I quickly pulled out the pass card the receptionist had given me and he let his guard down, smiling as I proceeded closer to the door.

I opened the door and walked into the office. Constantine seemed busy without a bunch of papers on his desk and for a slight second, I felt guilty for having to bug him with more work, but this was my company at stake and I needed to be sure I still had a future with them.

“Mr. Richard, you shouldn’t be in here,” Constantine announced, barely lifting his head from the pile of work on his desk.

I took a seat opposite his and stared at the documents on his table, hoping to get a glimpse of what he was working on but I couldn’t see anything from my position so I gave it up and waited for him to finally drop the files and pay attention to me.

He smiles at me widely. “How may I help you?”

“You know exactly what I need, Constantine. What the hell are you and your niece planning to do for my company” I demanded, hoping my tune would enforce some bit of authority, but it seemed no one was intimidated by me over here in Puerto Rico.

“Was I supposed to be intimidated by that statement?” Constantine asked in a mocking tone, and I was boiling up with anger.

“Let’s try that again but this time around, say it like someone who has lived in Puerto Rico for a long time and I’ll try to act scared,” he laughed mischievously as he stood to his feet from his chair.

“Get out of my office, Mr. Richard!”

Things escalated way faster than I had hoped, but there was no way I was going to let him scare me off out of his office without giving me the positive answers I needed from him.

“Don’t you dare order me out of your office, Mr. Constantine,” I shot back at him without backing down and he laughed so hard it felt like I was making a deal with the devil in hell.

“Looks like you finally found the respect button in your tone,” he smiled as I finally called me Mr.

“Rose Corp. is the biggest tech company in the world and not just Puerto Rico and you actually think we would give a damn about your sardine company,” he added, and my heart was filled with rage.

I never knew Rose Corp. was a tech company. As a matter of fact, I never knew what Rose Corp actually did as a company.

Elizabeth had mentioned nothing about her company to me and as foolish as I was, I never bothered to ask her any question about it and now things didn’t look so good for me and my company with her uncle in charge.

“You and my niece have a history, don’t you?”

“Huh? What are you talking about?” I responded, unsure of what he meant.

“Mu niece, I guess you were her boyfriend or f**k buddy or something and things didn’t end well between the both of you,” Constantine said again and the thoughts of how my marriage with Elizabeth came to an end replayed in my head

I figured out that he implied Elizabeth must have bought my company in order to put an unexpected end to my business as revenge for what transpired between us but the Elizabeth I know would never do that to me, even if she hated me with all her being.

“She would never do that to me!” I said aloud and Constantine smiled widely at me.

“You put the pieces together, didn’t you? Take it as advice from someone who has known her all her life. My niece isn’t the nice little lady you think she is. And with that, you may leave my office or I’ll have security move you out!” He said, stressing on the last part of his sentence like a command given to a soldier.

I stood to my feet, still in shock with what Constantine had just revealed to me and although I didn’t want to believe it, it all just made sense that way and I knew what I had to do if I was going to make things right again for my company.

Majority of my top investor’s did not know where I had been for almost a month ever since I rushed my mum to the hospital and those who knew were against my decision to sell out the company to my ex-wife.

According to Lillian, most of them had threatened to pull out their shares while others had threatened to sue me to court.

“Mr. Richard, right this way, please. I don’t want this to end like the last time. "

I was snapped out of my thoughts by the voice of the security personnel outside Constantine’s office as I hadn’t noticed him enter with more security men than the last time he kicked me out.

Not having the macho to fight with five highly trained security persons, I obliged to their request and followed them outside the company building as Constantine had ordered that they ensure I went home.

I stopped the taxi and asked him to drop me off at the Mondragon estate, which he did.

We got there after thirty minutes and I alighted from the vehicle and walked to the door of the Grand Estate house and knocked gently and the heavens granted me salvation as Luke opened the door for me.

“I was expecting the door to be answered by a maid or so,” I teased, and he ushered me into the house.

We didn’t talk to each other on the way to wherever he was leading me and I was bothered because he didn’t ask why I was here, at their house, informing no one.

He led me to a small study room and spoke to me for the first time since answering the door.

“Elizabeth will be with you shortly,” he said as he left me in the study room.

After a few moments of waiting, Elizabeth walked into the room, wearing a red transparent night gown and by the look on her face, she had been sleeping until I arrived.

“What do you want, Richard?”

She spoke so coldly and I recalled that when we were still married, the one thing that she hated was being woken from her sleep because of a visitor.

“I wanted to talk about the future of Lim Sardines. We had a Deal, Elizabeth,”

“Yeah well news flash, for as long as my uncle is the CEO of rose Corp, there’s nothing more I can do for Richard and I truly am sorry for that,” she responded and turned to walk out of the room but I grabbed her by her wrist and pulled her back to me.

“We are not done talking, Elizabeth,” I said in a terrifying voice, but she simply yawned.

“Look, Richard, I’m tired and I need to get some shuteye. Go talk to my uncle in the office and please don’t you ever pull me by my wrist again."

“I already spoke to your uncle, and he refused to be of any help to me. He said this was all part of your scheme, to buy my company and put us out of business because of what happened between us,” I informed her and she sighed dramatically.

“Richard Lom Sardines was in debt and this close to bankruptcy,” she uttered as she showed with her hands.

“If I wanted you out of business, I would have stood by and done nothing while you crumbled to the ground, so please, spare me the innocent lecture and get out of my house,” she said, her eyes sparkling with anger.

She rescued her wrist from my grip and walked out of the study room, clapping her fingers as she left, and two soldiers walked in to escort me out of the house.

I had never seen her so angry right after waking up from a nap and it was very clear that what happened at the board meeting was still weighing her down as the outcome of the meeting wasn’t what she had hoped and honestly I have got to stop getting kicked out of places today.

The soldiers escorted me outside the house and went as far as stopping a cab to take me home and also paid the expenses.

I got home, and all I wanted to do was soak myself in hot water and let my anger and sadness drown in it.

I left this morning all fired up and determined to get through to either Constantine or Elizabeth, but I had failed on both of them and now, I was basically jobless in Puerto Rico.

Lillian walked into me in the bedroom and she saw the anger that clouded my heart and the sadness that filled my soul.

She hugged me so tight and I hoped she would never let go of me for any reason whatsoever.

“I failed Lillian. Lim Sardines is over!” I sobbed, and she kissed me to keep me silent.

“I could get a loan for you if you want. Elizabeth had already secured land for the construction of a new branch here in Puerto Rico. I’m sure we would start something even without their help,” Lillian suggested, and I declined the idea.

We couldn’t afford to get ourselves involved in loans at the time like this, especially since we weren’t citizens of Puerto Rico. It would be nearly impossible to convince the bank.

“There’s no need for that Lillian” I sighed as I stood from the bed, but she dragged me back down and cuddled me.

She sang lullabies to calm me and help me relax, and planted soft kisses on my neck as she ran her hands through my hair.

“As much as I hate her, Elizabeth won’t leave you like this. She cares too much about you, otherwise she wouldn’t have bought the company. "

Those were the very last words I expected to hear from Lillian and they made my heart smile.

“I hope she comes through.”