Page 43 of The Meeting
She wouldn’t let him get under her skin right now. He brought Sheila specifically to rattle her, that much she knew.
Chase and Drew’s lawyer, Diana Lawson, exchanged pleasantries and shook hands, only just now formally meeting in person. Donna appeared in the room a short while later, carrying a tray of waters, which she handed around the table. As if on cue, a man stepped into the room as soon as she had left.
“Hi everyone. My name is Gerald. I’ll be your mediator for the day.” He sat at the head of the table and rustled through his papers. “Shall we begin?”
Everyone’s heads nodded in response.
“So this has to do with a split of a business. Ms. Kailynn Winters would like to keep the business, while Mr. Andrew Jones would like out. Is that correct?”
“Yes,” both Chase and Diana replied.
“For the record, I’d like each of you to state your demands and what you would like to see happen. Ms. Lawson, please present your client’s case first.”
Diana nodded. She slid forward paperwork to both Chase and Gerald of a valuation she had done on the company by an outside party.
“As you can see on the paperwork, we had a valuation done, and it’s listing the amount that my client should receive to buy him out below.”
Kailynn scanned to the bottom of the document, and her mouth dropped open. She was about to protest, but Chase set a hand on her knee and squeezed. They knew Drew would play dirty, but this was robbery. If he thought he was going to get that after stealing money from her, he was insane.
Her eyes met his across the table, and he only smirked. She wondered whether or not he realized Chase had discovered that he had been paying Sheila and Jessica through the company. With as horrible as he had treated her, she suspected maybe he was just that big of an asshole to want half the company on top of the money he already took.
“My client and I think it’s fairly straightforward that he should get half of all the assets. We are willing to discuss payment options,” Diana said.
Gerald nodded in response. “Mr. Romano, please present your client’s case.”
Chase slid his papers to both Gerald and Diana. “We also had a valuation done by an independent party. Our numbers are fairly similar, so that’s no cause for concern. We agree that Ms. Winters needs to buy Mr. Jones’s share of the company in order to continue running the company under the current name and to keep the same clientele.”
Drew smirked at Kailynn from across the table.
“But,” Chase said. “Please see page two, section three.”
He waited until they flipped to the respective page.
“It’s come to our attention that Mr. Jones has been taking large sums of money out of the company without my client’s consent and paying them to a Ms. Sheila Cale and Ms. Jessica Bench. It was discovered while going through the financial statements of the company. Ms. Cale is not a vendor nor a customer of the company and had no reason to be paid. Because of these findings, we request that this be viewed as a personal loan of Mr. Jones’s and taken from his portion of the company. As far as Ms. Bench’s funds are concerned, she has done marketing for the company, but they ran all of those checks through payroll. The additional checks which were posted to various accounts for services Ms. Bench didn’t provide for the company were not authorized by my client.”
This time, Kailynn watched as Drew’s mouth dropped open. Diana shot Drew a sideways look as if she was asking him why he hadn’t mentioned the payments. Sheila stared, dumbfounded.
“I have not been taking money. Sheila was a vendor who supplied us with fabric for the clothing,” Drew said.
Sheila looked at him. “I wasn’t supplying you with fabric. I was just servicing you.”
Diana shot both of them a glare.
“Enough,” she whispered under her breath.
Kailynn glanced at Chase, who attempted to hide a smile. She raised an eyebrow at him. He gave her a wink back.
Drew looked between Kailynn and Chase. “The checks for Jessica were for the marketing.”
Chase turned his paper toward the group and pointed toward the second half of the page. “According to this, you had checks for Ms. Bench posted through payroll, which matched the hours recorded on her timesheet. We aren’t disputing that. We are disputing the checks written to Ms. Bench through the rent and utilities accounts. Ms. Bench didn’t provide utilities or anywhere where rent would be due for the company.”
Gerald raised an eyebrow before quickly dropping it again and clearing his face of emotion. “I would like to see the checks written to Ms. Cale and the invoices for the fabric that Mr. Jones is claiming they were for. I would also like to see the timesheets for Ms. Bench and the corresponding checks, plus the additional checks that were written and the corresponding invoices.”
Drew’s face turned bright red, and Diana cleared her throat.
“I would have to go through the company’s invoices to find the correct ones. We don’t have them with us today.”
Chase jumped in at that moment. “That won’t be necessary. As Ms. Cale so kindly just pointed out, she wasn’t actually supplying the company with fabric. I have been through all the invoices and there are none for her or Ms. Bench. I even pulled up the state’s database for companies in the state and none are registered under Ms. Cale’s name, nor are there any listed under Miss Bench’s name.”
