Work Text:
Three minutes, exactly.
The rumble of the sportscar’s engine cut off abruptly as Tyson Lancaster twisted the key free of the ignition and unfolded him frame from the low-slung seat. A few muscles complained, remnants of his 6 A.M. workout with Ben Broom, his personal trainer, but he steadfastly ignored them as he stalked toward the glass doors to Rampant Lion Incorporated, the intense southern California sun already casting a ferocious glare off of the rampant brass lion wroughtwork looming large above his head. He would be in his office by 8 A.M. precisely; this walk would serve to stretch recalcitrant limbs. Twinges were nothing to compare with the pain that would be suffered by anyone, but anyone, who chose to get in his way.
As he shoved the doors aside, the chill of the air conditioning system blasted his face, the light outside fading into dimness thanks to tinted windows and the spare lighting in the building foyer. On cue, a slender young woman stepped out of the shadows where she has been waiting in silence. He didn’t spare her a look, or break stride as she followed him up the stairs. Other employees avoided this particular stairway, at this particular hour. New ones learned quickly, and he appreciated the silence as he took the stairs two at a time, 100 lunge reps this morning be-damned. Joy’s heels clicked on the polished wood behind him, and as he reached the top step, he tacitly acknowledged her presence.
“Postpone my 11:45 today, the usual Friday lunch with some lower management, I don’t have time. We’ll fit it in down the road. Who is it today, anyway?”
“Ralph Spicer.” He snorted.
“Postpone indefinitely. The Eastern Imports division has been losing money hand over fist; the whole lot of them is a divestment waiting to happen. Gavin Westerly is useless as a manager, and tastes for the exotic have been on the decline in this economy. No interruptions today for anyone.”
“I’ll make certain of it,” Joy said smoothly, silently closing the door behind him as he strode into his expansive office. Gary’s daughter had turned out to be a real asset to the company. His damn brother had been too clever at the best of times and a delusional drug addict at worst, before disappearing off on some nebulous spiritual quest to the East, but his daughter had all the attractiveness and sweetness of her Hollywood-dazzled wannabe starlet mother and all of the Lancaster brains, just without Gary’s wild streak. Her loyalty to the family made her the perfect assistant, and certainly he could afford to be generous with her pay.
Tyson settled into the plush leather chair behind a massive mahogany desk that dominated the room. His PC was booted up – Joy’s work – waiting only on his password to be entered. A steaming, delicate cup of espresso was in reach, along with a simple breakfast – a quartered hardboiled egg, sliced fruit, and dry sourdough toast. He touched none of the food – it was purely decorative, as much a part of the landscape of the desk as the computer and the elegant fountain pen that he never found need to touch, either - but sipped the espresso briefly before logging onto his computer after a rattle of keystrokes. Dozens of useless new emails were scanned coolly as he lifted his espresso for a second sip. Delete, delete, delete, Summer Islands bank scam delete, delete, Greg Cregan... That one gave him pause, and he deigned to open the message. Cregan was a valuable employee. He might be volatile and without the slightest pretense of warmth, but his abilities to clean house after acquisitions was legendary and spoken of only in whispers on every floor of Rampant Lion, Inc. Tyson scanned the terse message and leaned back into his chair, immediately deleting it. The protections on the company’s servers were legendary, but there was no need to let that little message remain. How Cregan had “taken care of” the former employee who had threatened to bring sexual harassment charges against Cregan himself and, by extension, the company’s upper management, he did not know, nor did he care to. Cregan knew his work, and needed very little oversight, only the occasional nudges in the right direction, and he would be tenacious as a fighting dog in his consistent attempts to represent the company’s interests.
The rest of the messages were of minor importance. Tyson dashed off a few brief responses to several of the missives, but most needed no direction. His employees knew not to come to him with every little thing. They did their jobs, or they lost them. He pushed his chair away from the desk, turning around to face the windows behind him, thumbing a discretely-located button to power the silent mechanism that pulled the blinds apart and up to allow the morning sunshine to stream into the room. He looked out over the view – cliffs dotted with scrubby brush down to an ocean, high tide’s waves sending up a spray. It was impressive when he actually had clients in the room, to be sure, but for the most part, the view was a private pleasure. This morning, however, his brief reverie was disturbed by the insistent, soft growl of his slim cellular phone, vibrating in his pocket. This was a number only a few select individuals had access to; if someone was calling him on this phone, it was important. Without removing his gaze from the view spread out before him, he lifted the phone to his ear.
“Speak.” The response was immediate.
“Father, he’s done it.” His daughter’s voice was brittle and crackled over the phone line.
“Casey, good morning. How are you? And the children?” he asked.
“Fine, Dad. We’re all just fine,” she said tightly. “Jeff’s just made the soccer team at Sidwell Friends, Michelle just won an all-school award for her history presentation on Eleanor Roosevelt, and I just dropped Tommy off at his new Montessori school, he loves it and NOW will you listen to me? He’s done it. The fucking oaf is taking us to god-damned Canada tonight, he’s having the jet prepared even now and will talk of nothing but knocking back a bunch of scotch with his buddy Ned. He’s going to offer him the job.”
“Casey, we’ve expected this since John Aaron’s funeral,” he reminded her calmly. “Replacing his law school mentor with his oldest friend is only natural in Robert’s thick head.”
“He should have promoted James,” she snapped.
“Your brother is not particularly suited to that role,” he replied curtly. “And he has plenty of other responsibilities as financial securities manager at Gold & Hart, as do you. Do not let this be a distraction from your work. Enjoy the vacation. Canada has some…natural beauty, I’m sure. Stark has a number of children, perhaps Jeff, Michelle and Tommy will make some new friends, especially if Ned accepts the job and they head back with you.” Casey huffed into the phone.
“This could ruin all our plans. How can you be so casual about all this? With Stark around, someone with the balls to actually tell Robert he’s a degenerate, ignorant boozehound, it will be harder to manipulate my moronic husband. We’ve been working at this for years, and we’re inches from having enough shares to make a takeover and merger possible. Inches, Dad. I was hoping to make it a Christmas present for you. And Stark will notice, because he’s not a fucking moron or a toady, like everyone else here besides me and James.” Tyson remained silent as the echoes of her furious tirade dwindled to silence in his ear, fixing his gaze out over the ocean, letting the quiet linger.
“Dad? Dad, are you listening to me?” Casey finally broke down and shattered the quiet.
“Casey. Be quiet and listen to me,” he said softly into the phone. “You’re bellowing like a frantic cow, and it’s affronting my ears. You will go with Robert, and the children, and your brother, and whatever other cavalcade Robert chooses to take with him on this pleasure jaunt. Smile at Ned, charm his wife Catherine, let the children play together, and keep your mind on the prize. You’ve grown complacent and overconfident surrounded by all this idiocy, and overly reliant on being able to keep Robert busy with his mistresses and his drink while you bought or eliminated everyone around him who was a threat. Now you’ll have to actually play the game. Cope, my dear. Cope. You and James will have every advantage when and if Ned takes the offer and comes to Washington. Home turf advantage is nothing to sneeze at. He’ll be a fish out of water and a foreign national besides. If you can’t outmaneuver him, you may not deserve to,” he finished, never raising his voice. Casey was shocked into silence for a few moments, before growling sourly in response.
“Cavalcade is right. He’s invited Tyrone along on this little trip.” Tyson throttled the flare of mingled anger and disgust that rose up in his chest like bile at the mention of his youngest son, and let a few moments of silence pass before he responded evenly.
“Immaterial, and it changes nothing. You know what to do. Give my love to the children.” He hung up the phone, not waiting to hear another of her excuses or complaints, sliding the mobile phone onto the desk as he looked outside at the water once again. The game was about to get interesting, and he found it oddly exciting. Within the year, Gold & Hart would be just another branch of Rampant Lion Incorporated, and no one, not even Robert Barrington’s backwoods Canadian drinking buddy, would have a say when the hostile takeover came crashing down around his ears.