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“Good to see you,” he said. “I’ve got to be honest. We haven’t found anyone nearly as good as you for your replacement at the company.”
“Why are you here, Raphael?” I asked flatly.
“Right to business. No formalities,” he said with a chuckle.
He was standing stock still, his hands clasped behind his back.
“You know we don’t believe in wasting time,” Elias said.
“Well, I came up with a proposition,” he said.
“For whom?” I asked.
“For whoever wants to take it,” Raphael said.
Confirmation that he wasn’t here for us, or at least not for us alone.
“Our relationship began unusually, but it has opened my eyes to possibilities I hadn’t considered before,” he said.
“Meaning?” Elias said.
“Meaning I want to go bigger. Right now we’re playing small, and I think James Industries could be a much more lucrative and valuable asset,” he said.
“Raphael, what are you proposing?”
“Right now, we’re only using a fraction of my capacity. I want to expand that,” he said.
“You have no idea what you’re doing, Mr. James,” Elias said.
“I’ll admit, I am new to this business, but I’m a very quick study. And given what I’ve seen, I know I can do more.”
I looked at Elias, and though he didn’t look at me, I could sense that we were on the same page.
“We’ll take it into consideration,” Elias said.
Raphael smiled, though I knew that wasn’t the resolution he had hoped for.
“Is there anything else you need to ask?” I said.
He shrugged. “No. But I will remind you that there are other interested parties.”
A threat, a subtle one, and one that I knew Elias didn’t take well to.
Still, he gave nothing away.
“Duly noted, Raphael,” I said.
“If there’s nothing else,” he said, looking back and forth between the two of us.
“You’re not even going to ask about her?” I said.
“Who?” he asked, looking confused. A moment later he nodded. “Oh, Amy?”
I thinned my lips, but then tried to relax myself, not wanting to give anything away. Still, it pissed me off that his daughter was less than an afterthought.
“I assume she’s fine,” he said.
“She is,” I responded.
