Options

CHAPTER eighteen

  I picked up the phone and dialled Arthur Graves first because he was the least pushy of the directors and wouldn’t mind being the first on the call and waiting for me to patch in the others. He answered on the first ring and I asked him to hold while I went to work. I was successful getting the next two and then ran into two busy numbers so I thought I might as well get Grace and Oakes on the phone and they could all chat while I got the other three. I dialled Chris’ extension number and Grace answered. Her voice sounded hollow so I knew they were on the speaker phone.

  I punched a button. "Mr. Oakes, I’ve got Mr. Graves, Mr. Frankford and Mr. Williams. Go ahead. I’ll try the other numbers now," I said into the phone.

  I was able to get two more directors and waited for a break in the conversation going on before I announced them and added them to the call. The last number kept giving me a busy signal and after about ten tries I wondered if I should go on the call and tell Oakes I was having trouble reaching the last director, but he’d probably bite my face off for interrupting. Jesus, this was pissing me off. The guy knew the call was scheduled for eight-thirty, I thought to myself. I tried one more time before having to admit defeat to Oakes, and the phone on the other end finally rang.

  "Larry Everly," the voice barked. Ooh, what a charmer. Larry was an investment banker and he never let anyone forget it. He acted as if his participation on our board of directors was the single-most irritating factor in his life. He was impatient and pushy.

  I sugar-coated my voice and said, "Mr. Everly, please hold for the conference call." I hit the button on the console to patch him through and waited for a break in the conversation to announce him but the pace of the conversation I overheard made it difficult to cut in.

  Before I could announce Larry, he did it himself. "Chris, Larry here," he cut in. "What’s up?"

  "Well, we’ve got a serious situation here with Rick Cox," Oakes replied.

  "I take it he’s not on this call," Larry said.

  "No he’s not. There’s just outside directors and myself," Chris continued. "I’ve filled in the other directors on the situation and I don’t think we have any recourse but to fire Rick."

  I realized with a start that I was eavesdropping and thought about hanging up. To hell with them. They don’t pay me enough, so I considered this a bonus. I continued to listen.

  "What’ll that do to the stock price?" Larry asked. My, my, another one with a heart. No one was allowed to express a view on the stock price without bowing to Larry first. He was Mr. Dow Jones. Because it was a rhetorical question, Larry continued. "I’ll tell you what it’ll do to the stock price. It won’t be pretty. And we can’t afford any more dips in the price. The stock closed down a buck on Friday. Overall for the week, it was down one and seven-eighths." That was a dollar and eighty-seven and a half cents. I wasn’t just another pretty face.

  Larry continued. "If it goes down much more it’s going to fuck the deal we’re working on."

  Whit Williams interrupted. "What deal’s that, Larry?" he drawled.

  Oakes’ turn to interrupt. "I’ll call you each individually and fill you in. I had a meeting with Jack Vincent this week. About the stock though, I don’t think this’ll have an adverse affect."

  "Who’re you kidding Chris?" Larry Everly demanded. "When a company fires its chief financial officer, it affects the stock price. When a company fires its chief operating officer, it affects the stock price. Rick is both chief financial officer and chief operating officer." He had yelled for emphasis when he said affects. I moved the receiver away from my ear.

  Larry continued. "If you remember correctly Chris, the analysts like it when a company has a chief financial officer. It gives them a warm and fuzzy feeling," he said sarcastically. "The analysts are not going to feel warm and fuzzy if we fire Rick Cox."

  "Well, then," Whit said. "We’ll just have to get him to resign."

  I was amazed that Larry Everly hadn’t even asked what had gone wrong. But I knew that he and Chris Oakes were on the phone many times during the day and Vee and I sometimes wondered who in fact was running this company. Chris had probably filled Larry in before the conference call.

  Larry must have read my mind because he demanded, "What happened anyway?" I almost laughed out loud and quickly caught myself. Cutting someone off a call would be nothing compared to getting caught eavesdropping on a board of directors meeting. Oakes would definitely have grounds to fire me. I had sat in on several meetings before but in those instances I had been invited to take minutes in Didrickson’s absence. This was a little different.

  "A few things. You know this has been building up for the past while," Oakes said in response to Larry’s question. "The straw that broke the camel’s back was the discovery today that he fiddled with the stock option numbers and granted himself a whole bunch more."

  "He what?" Larry asked incredulously. "How can anyone be so stupid? Have you got proof of this?"

  It was Grace’s turn to speak. "Hi Larry. Grace O’Grady here. Yes, we’ve got proof. I’ve been in the office all of today going over things and my investigation points to Rick being responsible. In fact, our computer logs prove he did it." She sounded a little depressed as she reported this. She was certainly not flying high like Oakes and I could tell Grace was very disappointed in Rick.

  "What else?" Larry demanded.

  "We’ve got an accusation of fraud and a sexual harassment claim," Oakes answered.

  "Sure he didn’t murder the Pope as well?" Whit Williams asked.

  "This all happened today?" Arthur Graves asked. I was impressed because I was sure Arthur would be asleep. He normally slept through most board meetings.

  "No Arthur. The fraud and harassment charges have been lying around. The stock option mess came to light yesterday. One of the clerks discovered it," Oakes said.

  Jay was going to be happy to hear he got a promotion to clerk.

  "As far as I was concerned," Chris continued, "that was the straw that broke the camel’s back."

  Larry interrupted. "When did you find out about the fraud?" In typical male fashion, he was ignoring the sexual harassment issue. "This stock option thing is fraud too. Our shareholders’ll kill us when they find out we didn’t act on the first complaint. A chief financial officer has to be beyond reproach," he lectured.

  "Uh, um. The other fraud issue was just brought up too," Chris lied. He had just told Arthur the other charges had been lying around and no one reminded him of this little slip up.

  "Good," Larry said. Larry had now taken over the meeting and was in charge. "If asked, we can say both things came to light at the same time. Grace, have you looked into both charges?"

  "I’m not aware of the other issue. The only thing I was asked to look at by Harold Didrickson, with Chris Oakes’ approval, was the stock options," she said.

  "Chris, you haven’t investigated the other charge?" Larry demanded. Before Chris could lie again, Larry charged on. "Grace, investigate the other fraud charge. Let me have your report by Monday afternoon."

  "People," Larry continued. "We’ll issue a press release before market opens on Monday. Take the hit right away. Chris, get Rick into the office and have him sign a resignation. Grace, you should be present as a witness. The only way this goes out is as a resignation. Word it something like, Rick Cox wants to pursue other business interests. Get your PR people on it. Is everyone in agreement?" he asked.

  There were a few murmurs of consent but Whit Williams piped up, "Now hold on a second Larry. We have to at least give the man a chance to defend himself. Accusing him of fraud is a very serious issue. We’ve got to look at the legal ramifications here. Has anyone consulted Harold?"

  Chris answered. "I don’t want Harold consulted. I’ll call in outside counsel. Harold and Rick are too chummy-chummy for my liking."

  Well. The cat was out of the bag. I knew Harold had been quie
tly and discretely aligning himself with Rick Cox and I guess I wasn’t surprised that Chris Oakes knew it. I wondered how long Harold could hold on to his job. This was a fast lynching.

  "And another thing," Larry said. "Get the Human Synergies people in to do damage control. This has to come across as a resignation and we’ll have to get working on Rick’s replacement."

  "Uh, Larry," Oakes said. "I’ve been thinking about that. I’d like to talk it over with you."

  Well. Chris Oakes was seeking someone’s permission. I was glad someone had him by the short and curlies.

  "Call me tomorrow and we’ll discuss it," Larry said.

  "Sure Larry." Oakes took back the meeting. "Okay everyone, if there’s nothing else I’ll let you go. I’ll be in touch about that other matter over the next couple of days. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone on Thursday for the quarterly meeting."

  Everyone started saying good-bye and I hit the release button on the switchboard console. I quickly turned it over to the nightline, grabbed my stuff off the desk, turned off the lights and hightailed it back to my office before someone could ask me to do more work. It was late and I’d had it. I was going home.