Falling Dawn (II)

Chapter 19

As if poisonous, I held the phone away from me, my arm stretched out as far as possible. Looking around, as if some invisible person could tell me what to do, I eventually put the phone to my ear.

"Hallo?" I carefully asked.

"Guten Tag!" a deep male voice greeted me. He sounded stressed, maybe a bit annoyed. "So? What shall we do?" he asked definitely annoyed when I didn't immediately gave him instructions.

"I'm sorry," I explained shyly, feeling my cheeks blush, even though nobody was there to watch me, "but I actually have no idea what this is all about."

"Right," the man on the other side of the line shot back. "Tom told me you'd make the decision. We need one now. Shall we go ahead with the purchase of the Indian plant, or not? It's a yes or no question."

I felt entirely out of my depth. Is this a bad joke? How could I make a decision on the purchase of a factory I had never even heard of?

"I think it is best you wait just a little longer, so Tom can tell you what to do. I'm sure he didn't really mean for me to make a decision."

"Look, Lisa. That's your name, isn't it?"

Is this a real question? I mumbled a quiet "yes" but he just went on.

"I don't know how well you know Tom, but he always means what he says. At least he used to, before leaving the country."

Yes, he is definitely annoyed.

"My boss used to be one hundred percent committed to his company. His phone never went to voicemail. If he was unavailable, phone calls were forwarded to an assistant. Feel free to dob me in. I don't care, but I'm not going down with this company. Do your boyfriend a favour and let him handle his business."

"Do you think I'm keeping him from working?" offended, I shot back at him now. Quickly, I checked though if Tom had heard me, but the bathroom door was still closed. My uncertainty turned into anger, simmering in my veins.

"What's your name? You haven't even introduced yourself, but are judging me?" Usually, I was a very nice person, and I could take a lot, but if people pushed me around enough, I'd explode.

"Hellwig."

"Hellwig, is it? That's your surname?"

"Yeeees!" He dragged the vowel. A loud sigh escaped him.

"So, I'm Lisa, you're Mr Hellwig? Am I taking this the right way?"

"Oh, give me a break. Call me Florian, or, if you want to anything else."

I was surprised he hadn't hung up on me already. He must have still felt dedicated to his job. I couldn't blame him, though. If it would have been me, I would have been annoyed to bits. But I just had trouble giving up a fight once started.

"Okay, Florian, how about you give me a quick briefing on what we're talking about here. Let's start with why you want to purchase that factory and then explain the problem to me."

The line went quiet for a few moments, before a deep inhalation was clearly audible. "Tom purchased a patent on artificial leaves. The problem is that the key part of it is only being manufactured in one factory. This part that we require is patented itself, so we need to acquire it, or all the money and time spent so far was for nothing. And as we just found out, this Indian plant is using child labour. Also, they have another interested party who is willing to purchase immediately, a competitor most likely. We need to give India an answer today or it'll be too late."

"Okay." Deliberate deep breaths slowly cleared my spinning head. "How much was spent on obtaining the patent? And why is Tom investing in artificial leaves? I mean, aren't there enough artificial plants around?" Tom was all for green energies and nature protection. This investment didn't sound like him at all.