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“Work something out,” Rebecca said, then looked at Marty. “Well, let’s look at what we’ve got here. We have a pretty, young thing at the beginning of her career. And we have a middle-aged man with another 20 years or so to go. This is the kind of thing you could both lose your jobs for.”
“If anyone found out about it,” Marty added.
“That’s right,” Rebecca said. “And, in this economy… I don’t know. Might be hard to get another job.”
This was infuriating. Not because of what they were trying to do, but because of how long it was taking them to do it.
“Okay,” I said, “I get it. You’re blackmailing us. What do you want?”
“How much is your job worth to you?” Rebecca asked.
“Not as much as you might think,” Sloane said, trying to act tough, but struggling with her voice muffled from under the blanket on the busted bed.
The whole scene was ridiculous. Rebecca and Marty might have thought they were in The Godfather, but it looked more like an episode of Scooby-Doo. I knew I had to take their threats seriously because they were right: they could easily ruin my career. But I wished they would just say what it was they wanted so we could move on with it.
It occurred to me, however, that there was a reason they weren’t naming what they wanted: they didn’t know what they wanted.
“If it’s money you’re after,” I said, “you’re not going to be able to make much. I bring home about $100K each year after taxes, most of which ends up going to my mortgage and bills. The rest is in a retirement fund that I can’t touch for more than ten years.” That wasn’t true but they’d never know that.
They both looked disappointed.
“I budget my money carefully and, in terms of expendable cash, I could get you about ten-K by the end of the week. Split that two ways and you could each maybe buy a low-end used Harley.”
“That’s your offer?” Marty asked.
“That’s what I’ve got,” I said. Now it was just a game of confidence. I had to act like I wasn’t scared of them, and I would be doing them a favor. “Now, five-K of pure cash is nothing to scoff at. Especially considering you’d be doing nothing to get it. But if it’s not enough, I guess you could go ahead and tattle on us. And get nothing.”
“No, no,” Rebecca said. “That isn’t all you’ve got.”
“I assure you, ma’am, it is.”
“You’re a manager at a real estate firm,” she said. “You can buy our house.”
The market value of the house was $1.2 million. She wasn’t wrong, I could use company money to buy the house and justify it as a property we could either rent out or, more likely, resell.
“You’re going to sell your house either way,” I told them. “What benefit does it have if Dynasty buys it instead of Joe Schmo down the block?”
“Dynasty is going to buy it for one point five million,” Rebecca said. “As is. And let us keep the commission.”
That would be a hard sell, but I could probably bury the details of the sale away somewhere. So long as nobody took a very close look, I figured I might be able to get away with it. Still, I wasn’t going to let them get away with this without a haggle.
“I’d have to justify it to the board. There’s no way they’ll let me buy it for anything more than a million, especially with the mold issue.”
That was me doing the math in my head. If we bought it for
“One point two,” I countered. “That’s an extra million dollars cash for each of you. Don’t get greedy.”
“That’s the asking price,” Marty said. “What’s the point of blackmailing you if we’re just going to get the asking price? We can just wait for the house to sell.”
“It’s one point five,” Rebecca said. “Final offer or I go to the KCAL five news team first thing in the morning to let them know how Dynasty Realty does business.”
If Marty was making the threat, I would have ignored it and kept haggling, but Rebecca was serious. If she was bluffing, she was an excellent bluffer, and I wasn’t about to call her on it.
“One point five,” I said.
“As is,” Rebecca repeated. “No commission.”
“Fine,” I said, and we shook.
