This Newfound Friendship
| This Newfound Friendship | |
|---|---|
"I didn't call you here to threaten you. I called you here to help you." | |
| Players |
Lucius and Kasandra reveal some uncomfortable truths about Ethan's past...and their role in it. |
Jenson, Jenson, & Allen. Among the top one hundred law firms in Chicago, they were consistently ranked among the top twenty. They had a variety of non-partner lawyers covering an equally large portion of US law from civil cases to criminal, but primarily they were known for one thing: contract law. It was well known among the upper echelons of the business world in the Windy City, that if you were closing a deal, anything overseen by one of Jenson, Jenson, & Allen's partners would be ironclad. Thus, it's probably slightly surprising when one of their paralegals calls Ethan and asks to schedule a meeting at their offices concerning his payout. At no point were any of their lawyers involved in the proceedings of a several months ago, and they currently represented none of the officially interested parties. However, their request was polite, and there was mention of lunch being paid for. As one might expect of such a well-placed law firm, their downtown offices were extremely nice. They radiated an aura of importance that hung thick in the air of the immaculately marbled lobby, and seemed almost to demand a hushed tone as lawyers, paralegals, investigators, and clients moved about with a determined step and quiet conversation. If nothing else, Ethan Weaver is uneasy enough about *anything* to do with his payout that the request could come signed by Bunny, Sam, and Claus with an office address that Googled out to some murder mansion and he'd probably go, just to see what the hell was going on. Granted, in that hypothetical he brings back up, and for this one he just dug out his best tie. His best tie would have been a power tie about…oh. Six years ago maybe. The subtle hint of stitchery says it has seen some very careful repair work, the faded color suggests that someone did something to it to carefully lift and remove a stain. He wouldn't be that out of place as some ramen-eating 1L who is professional enough to pass muster but not quite enough to look like one of the power players. He's right on time though, five minutes early, in fact, and he bows to that pressure for a hushed tone as he approaches the reception desk, clearing his throat and leaning in so he can all but murmur: "Ethan Weaver, I've got an 11:30 appointment with…" He trails off, because he has no idea who; if a name was given it went right out of his head with the sharp intake of breath he'd made when the paralegal had called him up. So he just rounds this up with an awkward, "the lawyer who wanted to see me," in a way that blatantly broadcasts that he sure hopes the receptionist knows what's going on…because he barely does. A heartbeat after Ethan reaches the receptionist's desk, the overworked older woman preparing to say something, there comes a clearing of throat to the right side of where he's standing. "Mr. Weaver?" comes a warm, richly accented feminine voice. Kasandra fits the receptionist with a brilliant smile that says, 'I've got it from here, thanks' before she fixes dark eyes squarely upon Ethan again. "Right on time. If you could follow me, I'll get you right up to your meeting." If Kasandra is a paralegal or assistant, she is the best-looking and dressed one in the entire building. From head to toe, she radiates a confidence one is born with, standing beside that high-glossed receptionist desk dressed in a bold black and red pantsuit, matching jacket, and glossy red heels. Everything about her screams order and professionalism. That smile doesn't quite reach her eyes, but there is a glint of something there. Another heartbeat, and she turns, the total weight of expectation that Ethan will do as he's been told and follow settling over everything. The receptionist even eyes Ethan, giving a jerk of her head for him to 'go' if he doesn't immediately follow Kasandra. She doesn't even glance back as she heads down the hall, heels click-clacking with authority as her graceful figure moves deeper into the building. Right toward a bank of elevators, she zips right past them to the closed door of a conference room. t's here that she finally turns, flashes him a brilliant, professional smile, and says, "Right in here, please." And then opens the door, allowing Ethan to enter before she follows in behind him. The door closes with finality, that subtle click, the blinds on those windows drawn closed. "No... No. Check again." The room isn't entirely empty when they arrive. Despite being large enough to fit two opposing football teams with a bit of tight squeezing, there is only one man waiting for Kasandra and Ethan. When they enter his back is turned towards them and he stands with one hand in the pocket of an extraordinarily expensive pair of navy trousers. Nearby, an equally expensive and matching blue jacket rests across the back of the middlemost, high-backed, leather office chair among a row of high-backed, leather office chairs on one side of a conference table that stretches nearly the entire length of the room. He is on the phone, arguing good-naturedly with someone on the other side, but when he hears them enter he turns partially and smiles briefly through his well-groomed beard before holding up a finger indicating that he'll need just a moment. "I said check again, doctor. I'm not spending thousands of dollars of the shareholder's money for no reason... Just do it. Good-bye." With a sigh and a short tap of his thumb that somehow conveys the depths of his frustration, he hangs up the phone. He pauses for a moment to collect himself before turning on his heel and offering Kasandra and Ethan another smile. "Please, come in. Take a seat." With a wave, he indicates the chair directly across from the one he's seemingly claimed with his jacket while moving closer to the table and his own seat. "Ethan Weaver?" he asks unnecessarily, still shining that smile as he begins to roll up the sleeves of his crisp white dress shirt to just below his elbows. His tie is in fact a power tie. So in-fashion and immaculate that it very well might have been purchased this morning. "I'm Lucius Shaw. It's a pleasure to meet you, Ethan." Kasandra thinking Ethan would just follow was…an excellent bet. She'd gotten a: "Yes ma'am," and then he'd just sort of trailed after her, adjusting his tie a little bit while her back was turned. She gets a second: "Yes ma'am," when she tells him what room to go in, though there's no second tie adjustment. He takes in the entire vignette; from the enormous room to the man standing center stage, and micro-expressions speak of wariness even as he slaps on his best 'pleasantly attentive' face. "A…pleasure to meet you, Mr. Shaw," Ethan says, very slowly. He doesn't sit down, not right away; he's got a handshake to offer, though after it's either accepted or rejected after the appropriate period of time he sits down readily enough. He'd had a mostly neutral middle-America accent that was just off enough to suggest that it was practiced downstairs. It's either all the ma'am-ing or the uncertainty that lets his down South origins creep into his words now. A glance that takes in Kasandra again; he'd sort of done the…should I offer a hand, should I not dance with her before sitting down. Entirely on his back foot, he clears his throat and asks, "And you. Ma'am. To what do I owe the–ah—the honor?" Once that door is closed, Kasandra shifts gears. Her charge has been delivered, and now it is time to go to work. She lets Ethan go for his handshake as she advances towards a push cart tucked off in a corner out of the way loaded with refreshments of the standard fair. "Mr. Weaver, would you care for some refreshments? Coffee? Water?" A look suggests 'something stronger?' as she starts prepping a drink, presumably for Lucius himself. A grin tugs at her lips when Ethan asks for her name, all of those drops of ma'am finally getting a little laughter out of her too. "Kasandra. Kasandra Moreno. It's a pleasure, Mr. Weaver. I'm certain." A beat. "But please, just Kasandra or Ms. Moreno. My mother is ma'am this, ma'am that." Lucius is quick to take the offered hand with a firm, but not too aggressive shake before he settles into his chair with a soft sigh of comfort. He smiles, nods, and listens quietly to the short exchange between Kasandra and Ethan, but when the latter asks after the purpose of the meeting, Lucius responds with an easy chuckle. "Straight to business. I like it." Rather than answer though, he leans back in his chair, rotating slightly so he can face Kasandra a bit more head-on and receive the coffee she hands him. With a slight nods towards the door, and a pointed look directed her way, he then turns back to Ethan and lets a touch of sympathy bleed into his still-present smile. "You had a bit of trouble recently didn't you, Ethan?" Almost immediately he pauses, pulling his attention back to Kasandra again as he asks her: "Well... What, a little over a year ago now, right?" Back to him. "Though, considering what you went through, that's not that terribly long is it?" "Coffee, yes please, ah, Kasandra, thank you," Ethan says, with a sheepish grin for her laughter, though for a moment that gaze does flick towards the 'something stronger' with a look that says he gave it serious thought. But. Straight to business. The grin fades. He places his hands flat on either chair arm as Lucius speaks, then leans back. "Little bit," he allows. "And you've taken an interest in that, Mr. Shaw?" The way he opens his mouth after that question suggests plenty more questions where that one came from; the way he closes it suggests he knows even questions can reveal an awful lot. None of it stops the furrow from appearing between his brows, the tension in his muscles that whispers of a wolf in the grass even though there's nothing overtly hostile about him. Just readiness; someone rapidly evaluating options, trying to catch the scent of dangers in the air. "Do you take cream and sugar?" Kasandra asks as she heads back toward the pushcart. She registered Lucius's gesture at the door, so she halts there first, a flick of the lock, and then right to the cart Kas goes as if locking a conference room door is nothing. Standard procedure at all meetings. Nothing to worry about. "Never too late for a shot of whiskey. All I'm saying." She doesn't even have to look back at them to read the change in the room. The coffee comes, doctored or undoctored, and sans whiskey, set down before Ethan with one more of those brilliant smiles full of white teeth. Kasandra gives a little 'mm' and a nod at the year. "Smidge over a year now. Awful stuff." Her warm voice comes threaded with sympathy, the greeting card style stuff, warm enough to mean well but... still Hallmark. "Taken an interest..." Lucius repeats to himself, loud enough for both to hear as he tilts his head down and scans his hands. With a short rap upon the wood of the table with his knuckles, his attention shifts back up to Ethan with another smile, "Yes... Yes, you could say I've taken an interest." He then tilts his head to the side, fingers rising to scratch at the side of his head in a very casual fashion as he asks Kasandra, "How much did we donate to the police pension fund? Five? Five hundred thousand, right?" There's a pause as he waits for correction or confirmation from his assistant before turning back to face Ethan head on again, still smiling his casual smile. "Half a million. For a... what was he? A comptroller?" Again back to Kasandra. "Was he on the general assembly?" He shrugs -- this time he's not really looking for an answer as his gaze falls back on Ethan. "A nobody. An abusive nobody, who got what he deserved. Shame about the wife, of course... I'm sure she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time." He lets out a sigh and adjusts his tie, still leaning back in his chair like he's discussing what they're planning on having for lunch. "Foul business. Messy business. But we made sure you got through it in one piece. And look, now you own your own business. Your own property. Good for you, Ethan." "Just black, please," Ethan says, but then the Storm Lord might, in this *particular* context, take accepting Kasandra's offer of whiskey as a violation of his tribal ban. Storm Lord or not, he can't help the sharp intake of breath as Lucius lays out number by damning number, and then wraps it all up with a neat little bow. It comes straight through his nose, a bare hiss of breath. His jaw works, his mouth tightens, and his teeth clench, and for a moment the arm of the chair beneath his hand creaks. His gaze goes straight to Kasandra, of course, the way he tilts his head towards her, the way he breathes deeply the second time saying he's zeroing in on something now, and may even believe she must be the source of these numbers…but his gaze is drawn inevitably back to Lucius. There's that taking-in-the scent thing he does again. And then he deliberately lifts his coffee to his lips and takes a careful sip. "You don't spend thousands–hundreds of thousands–of the shareholder's money without reason," he says, and he *just* misses sounding like he's utterly evenhanded about this. But the edge in his voice betrays the fight or flight just beneath the surface. "What did your projections suggest about your ROI there, Mr. Shaw?" He says that like an intern. Roy. Instead of spelling out the acronym like someone who knows what the hell he's talking about. "That's right, Mr. Shaw, it was five," Kasandra confirms as she lingers on Ethan's side of the table. She isn't looming over Ethan so much as staying well in orbit as she faces Lucius. There's no comment or correction on the 'what' that dead man was. He's a footnote in this history now. So is his wife. The closeness Kasandra keeps affords her a vantage point, a dangerous one that it might be, but she hears that hiss of breath. The creak of the chair. She clears her throat almost inaudibly as Ethan's head tilts her way, but she smiles. And for Ethan, he can easily scent that expensive perfume Kasandra is wearing, the scent fresh and light, surprisingly not cloying. Kasandra doesn't overstep her place, a slant of dark eyes toward Lucius when Ethan asks just what those projections suggest on that ROI. She'll let Lucius bask and Ethan squirm. "Shareholders' money? Good lord, no," Lucius balks, chuckling as if it was a good little intentional joke of Ethan's, "No, there is a great deal more scrutiny involved when it comes to spending the company's money. This was a... personal investment." Lucius for his part smells mostly of coffee and leather, with no hint of anything deeper to be found aside from a subtle hint of cologne. "My..? Roy..." He repeats the phrase, pausing for a moment to suppress the hint of amusement before he presses on, pronouncing it just as Ethan had with a straight-faced confidence and offering no correction. "I was preparing to shift a large portion of my company from California to Chicago, Ethan. I was listening. Watching. When my staff gave me the details about your... predicament, I saw an opportunity." He pauses, watching the other man with a keen interest. Despite his casual demeanor, Lucius is observant enough to see the telltale signs of stress that Ethan is broadcasting to the room. With a quick drumming of his knuckles against the table again, Lucius suddenly stands, pacing away from his chair and towards a shuttered window. "I need allies, Ethan. I need friends. I am not like you. I can not... do the things you can do, though--" he pauses and turns towards Ethan and Kasandra, pointing to her while he looks and speaks to him as if giving a fun fact: "I understand Ms. Moreno here is related to you in a more... metaphysical sense." Immediately he turns back, resuming his pace towards the window. "I didn't call you here to threaten you. I called you here to help you." Ethan can't help it. The 'good lord no' tugs almost a smile out of him, releases some of the tension. The amusement over his phrasing makes him grimace; there's a good bet he'll be YouTubing business things by the end of the night. He *also* broadcasts a big glaring fact about himself. He dislikes being ignorant, or looking the fool. At first when Lucius had done that abrupt whirl and spin towards the window he'd tensed again, only to relax at what Lucius says. A little. He glances at Kasandra, and the skeptical quirk of his eyebrow isn't for her metaphysical relation, it's for Lucius' last. But there's a chuff of a laugh all the same. A little cynical, perhaps, but…also like in the snap of that moment he's accepted his position, and even if all Lucius is offering him is polite fiction, well—polite fiction exists for reasons, and those reasons smooth the waters. "Then I apologize for my initial wariness, Mr. Shaw," he says, with a ghost of a smile, and if something a *little* wry lingers the quality of it is somewhat different. "Friendship is always welcome." A glance over to Kasandra. "May I please have a refill on that coffee? Perhaps I will take a little hit of something extra this time." The playing field has changed just enough, it seems, to allow for that. "And your kindness towards me is appreciated." "There was video," Kasandra mentions off-hand to Ethan, a soft murmur as she shifts from one foot to the other. "Was." She lets that hang there again as she smiles down at Ethan and then winks. "Blood of the wolf," all Kasandra gives to there being a metaphysical relationship between them both. With a toss of that rich, dark hair of hers, Kasandra plucks up Ethan's coffee cup, "Smart," and saunters back toward that pushcart for that refill. The bottle of whiskey is there, as advertised. And Ethan gets more than a splash into his cup, but luckily there's a hint of coffee to even it out. Sorta. "Here you go," Kas says as she holds the cup out to Ethan, the smell of the whiskey overpowering the coffee by a mile as she teasingly dangles it before him. "To friendship, Mr. Weaver." Sensing a change in the wind from Ethan, Lucius pauses and turns on his heel to examine his guest with a fresh smile. "No apologies necessary, Mr. Weaver. I respect your caution. Without it, I might have had to pay significantly more to keep things quiet." He reverses his progress towards the window and returns to the table, but instead of sitting he simply grasps the back of his vacated chair and leans into it a touch. "I want to give you a gift, Ethan. Something to cement this newfound friendship of ours." With the precision of someone who knows exactly where their checkbook is at all times, Lucius bends forward slightly to reach into the inner pocket of his unworn jacket and withdraws his. With a quick and universally recognized 'air-signature,' he requests a pen of Kasandra as he slips around the chair and leans even further down to set the checkbook on the table and flip open to the next blank check. "Let's get that property of yours fixed up a bit, shall we? How does two hundred thousand sound?" There was video produces a widening of Ethan's eyes. Was, she says. "Jesus Clooney Frog," he whispers tightly, then gives a sharp exhale. And a nod of thanks. And after a moment he almost looks embarrassed, as if the wariness has melted away in favor of awareness of debts, of looking at balance sheets and seeing himself very much in the red. "To friendship. Thank you kindly. Turnabout is fair play though. Just call me Ethan." His eyebrows lift up as he holds out a hand to accept it from her, though it it teasingly dangled he waits until he's sure she's ready for him to take it before doing so. But then he's being offered a significant sum and his eyes pop, right on the heels of Kasandra's neatly done set-up. He stares at the checkbook, he stares at Lucius, he stares at Kasandra. Like a man who has absolutely no idea what to do here. Surely as the moon's face changes he's not radiating predator now, he's radiating a fellow who is in over his head in every way. Now his face is a goddamn open book; worry and uncertainty and a man trying desperately to rapid-fire resolve a ledger of values and not having much success. He rubs the side of his face, where he's broken out in a bit of a sweat. The equation resolves itself. His words come out faint, unfocused eyes fixing somewhere between the checkbook and the table as he lets out a dry-mouthed: "That's…right generous of you, Mr. Shaw." Kasandra doesn't dangle the whiskey'd up coffee cup for too much longer. Though, there is a mock gasp as she asks, "Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?" This time there's warmth to her dark eyes as they crinkle at the corners and her neat brows knit inward. "Filthy." She lets Ethan take the cup as she says, "Ethan." As Lucius makes his way for the checkbook, Kas reads his gesturing loud and clear and makes her way around the long way. There's no pause in how those long legs get her around the table as she reaches into the inner pocket of her jacket. Kas pulls out a work of art - a silver bodied filigreed fountain pen of rich red and gold with glints of green gem accents. She hands the pen off to Lucius only after she posts the cap herself. "What are friends for, hm?" Kasandra's gaze slants back to Ethan on the other side of the table as she lingers next to Lucius as he scribbles out all the necessary parts of the check. "Imagine what you can do with that money. All the repairs." "Thank you," Lucius murmurs briefly to Kasandra when he's handed the work of art that doubles as a pen, but he's either seen it before, or seen it's like, because he's utterly indifferent to the jeweled writing implement. His penmanship is quick and neat, and without a word he fills in the relevant details, hands the pen back off to Kasandra, and then tears the check out of the book in one smooth motion. "It's nothing, Ethan. Make good use of it." He holds the very valuable scrap of paper out to the other man across the table, but before it can be taken he suddenly draws it back as if remembering something. "Oh, that reminds me... I do have one small favor to ask of you, Ethan. As I said earlier, I'm new to Chicago. Already I've faced a bit of an..." He gestures about casually, the check accenting the movements nicely as he searches for a suitable word, "Obstacle. I've had a difference of opinion with a man by the name of Drasche. We're both interested in a particular bit of real estate, you see..." Abruptly he catches himself and waves off the tail end of the sentence as if it were a physical thing. "Anyway, the point is I am lacking in friends. It would be greatly beneficial to me if you could help me correct that state of affairs, Ethan. There are resources I have at my disposal that I think would be of great benefit to you and yours, and you have many... abilities that I can only dream of." Slowly and very pointedly, he sets the check down on the table and slides it across to Ethan with his fingertips, still smiling, eyes locked on the other man. "I think we can do great things together." Kasandra's comment about kissing his Momma produces a dark twitch of Ethan's lips. The teasing still manages to reduce some of the tension, though the follow-up enticements about the repairs has him staring down into his whiskey with his cheeks flushing with something that could very well be shame. He exhales and takes a long drink of that drink now that it's in his hands. It's just as well it's only a little bit coffee in that cup, at this point. He is in no hurry to take the check. For a long moment his hands remain wrapped firmly around his cup, instead. He may be accepting it, for a long list of reasons, but neither does he snatch after it. Whatever is motivating him to go ahead and accept the money isn't avarice. It's something else. And when the request for a favor comes down the dark half-smile returns. He closes his eyes for a moment, tilts his head to one side, but he listens. Then? He takes one deep breath and nods a few times. When he looks up the half-smile carries a tinge of hard resignation. "Sure. Send me the details. I'll get on it." He reaches over to accept the check with two of his own fingers, stares at it for a moment, shakes his head, and tucks it into the inner pocket of his jacket. That quick, cynical half-smile takes in Kasandra as well. "Great things. Absolutely. Friendship." He stands up, though. Tips two fingers to the top of his eyebrows in salute; a man preparing to take his leave. It's a scene Kasandra has seen no less than a hundred times at this point. Ethan is just the latest in a long line of recipients of one of those damning slips of paper. Still, she's all professional, smiles, and nods as she listens. There's a fleeting moment of annoyance at the mention of Drasche. Still, it fades and smooths back into that patent professionalism. Her dark eyes don't linger much on the check so much as they do the man on the receiving end. She watches Ethan with bold-faced interest as he hesitates and then ultimately gives in. When he rises, a light bulb goes off. Kas holds up a finger for him to wait as she pulls a bright white business card out from that inner pocket of her jacket, "You are going to need this," she says as she comes round to his side of the table. "My number. Don't lose it. Guys only get it once." She holds that brilliant, almost blindly white card out to Ethan. "This is your lifeline. Need anything, you call me. Not sure if you need that thing you might be thinking you need. You call me." Lucius watches Ethan's face, watches the evolution of that half-smile, and watches as he rises from the table. At no point does his own smile or friendly outward demeanor slip, even as he begins to nod and swivel his chair around so he's parallel to the table, one arm lifting to rest his elbow on the wood. "Excellent. I'm glad we could see eye-to-eye on this Ethan." He pauses to allow Kasandra to hand Ethan her card while explaining when and for what he should call her. There's a hint of genuine amusement somewhere behind the otherwise mask-like guise of friendship, which they both know is -- at best -- a polite pretense. "Just remember, Ethan... I would very much like to make friends in this city. Conflict is bad for business." He waves his hand, clearly indicating the surrounding area -- potentially the entire city. "People don't have to like me... to work with me. What I offer is mutually beneficial for all parties." For just a moment he lets that mask fall to show Ethan the seriousness in his gaze and the weight behind his words. Then he offers another smile and completes the rotation of his chair so he can stand and walk back towards the window, "Have a good day, Ethan. We'll be in touch." "Friends or not, somehow I doubt you go dancin' with the likes of me, darlin'," Ethan drawls to Kasandra with a another quirked half-smile, "so I'll hold the swooning for now. But I won't lose it, and I suspect you'll be hearing from me." Genuine amusement despite his clear ambivalence about this entire situation. But then, an ambivalent werewolf who is a little scared shitless by the day he's having but who is still able to laugh about it is probably a bit preferable to a werewolf who is pissed off, or scared straight into being pissed off. But then if there was tape, they've seen *those* gory results. He pauses, though, as Lucius says his piece. "I don't dislike you," he says carefully. "I'm not without gratitude, however…uneasy…I may seem. You did me good turns. I pay my debts, and the debt was made a year or so ago. Once a hole is 9-foot deep the only thing you get by refusing to dig is a muddy hole with no water. Might as well dig the final foot and make it work. And you could have gone about this a few different ways." A mask falling is repaid with equal honesty. Which means he adds one thing of his own. "There are limits to friendship though, however they're born. Things I won't do. I suggest a policy of hearing me out and finding alternatives when we're getting close to lines I'm not willing to cross. Loyalties I will not betray. A cornered wolf is an ugly thing. That's just nature." He taps the card in his pocket, and adds: "A pleasant afternoon to you both." Then he turns towards those huge, imposing doors. His long strides carry him quickly, as if he is a man in desperate need of some air. It's the first real show of amusement from Kasandra, but she laughs, low and rich at Ethan's comment about just who she does or doesn't dance with. It's quick, but it's there, that look up and down. "Only one way to find out, Mr. Weaver." A tease, but the elegant Kasandra slips easily out of Ethan's way to allow him to run free out of those doors. When he's ready. She's still all smiles as she listens to the exchange between Ethan and Lucius, mental notes no doubt made and saved. "Be careful out there. And just remember: call me even if you think you don't need to call me. Means you probably really do." Remembering one last thing, Kas does stride to the doors before Ethan can get there, flicks the lock and opens them up to release the wolf to the wilds. "Be talking to you soon." | |