Post by Immanuel Taylor on Feb 19, 2011 20:47:58 GMT -5
But what is the point? What can money buy?
------
Chad Kennedy’s San Francisco office is so expensive that it borders on the edge of a painful self-parody. The spacious room itself, a mirror of Kennedy’s vanity, is divided into three parts. Upon entering through the large wooden oak doors, carved especially for Chad, you would find yourself in the first area which serves as both a vestibule and a mini-bar. The mini-bar, located to the far right, houses everything from martinis with green olives on toothpicks to espresso machines imported exclusively from a Starbucks production factory. Other notable aspects included the granite surface of the bar, the silver stools with black cushions on top, and the endless supply of pistachios, almonds and fruits.
The second part of the office began just as you continued forward on the white marble floor and descended into a wide circle which housed a plain weave carpet with Italian Natuzzi black leather couches imported exclusively from Italy surrounding the perimeter of the circle, four couches in total, and an imposing oak coffee table placed in the middle with several magazines, from Time and Harper’s to The Economist and Bloomberg Businessweek , covering its surface. There were additional cylinder-shaped coffee tables placed in-between each of the ends of the four couches.
Ascending over the three-step mini-stairs, you would find yourself back on the white marble floor and in the third and final part of Kennedy’s office: The Study Area. There were five Brazilian-texture imported bookshelves, two on the left side and three on the right, with books, mostly academic and some fiction, lining all the shelves that a vain person like Kennedy could not have possibly read even a third of. The middle part of the study was where Kennedy’s onyx-material gigantic desk lay. Yes, onyx. According to most Chemistry encyclopedias, it is a cryptocrystalline form of quartz with a chemical composition of Silicon Dioxide. Kennedy purposefully keeps the face of his gigantic desk mostly empty in order to show off the aweness of the Onyx’s eccentric colors and texture.
After his brutal attack on the past edition of Sunday Night Vengeance, the young and nubile Chad Kennedy was rushed to a hospital. After a short stay, he was cleared to spend some time in his San Francisco office. The second part of the office, the one with the Italian couches, was transformed into a mimic of Kennedy’s hospital room, with the funds being provided secretly by his father, Kirk Kennedy. Three of the couches were temporarily removed, the imposing oak coffee table shifted next to the remaining couch with a vodka bottle mysteriously placed on it and a bed in the middle with a hook-up to an IV Cable is present, along with the other standard medical equipment. Kennedy is in a seated position, with five pillows comforting his back, he is watching re-runs from the superbowl on a 42’inch LCD television hanging from steel-reinforced bars from the ceiling.
The only other human being in the room is Kennedy’s Ukrainian nurse, a voluptuous blonde known simply as Leysa. She sat on the Italian Netzaa couch with her mildly exposed legs crossed and was scanning through a copy of Time magazine. She’s wearing sandals and, on the crossed over leg, dangled the sandal in a nonchalant manner. Kennedy’s eyes kept alternating from the television screen to her pedicured nails. A sudden, loud ring came from Kennedy’s telephone-intercom hybrid phone on his Onyx-material desk. Leysa got up and approached it before clicking on one of the white keys.
“Mr. Kennedy, that gentlemen you requested is here to see you”
Kennedy signaled a thumbs up in response and Leysa picked up on that. “Let him in” she said into the intercom with near-perfect English. Kennedy picked up the remote on his sign, and with exactly two clicks, the television turned off and rescinded back up into the ceiling. Leysa helped Chad Kennedy get ready by adjusting his pillows, removing the breathing device from his nostrils and, upon his earlier written request, went to the mini-bar area and pulled out a bottle of Gold Symphony vodka and two shot glasses.
“Are you sure you want to drink your alcohol in the condition you’re in, Chad?” Leysa inquired. She refused to call anyone using “sir” or “maam”. If you wanted her sights, the first-name basis came as an automatic prerequisite. Kennedy simply signaled to the imposing oak coffee table next to the remaining leather couch. She placed it there and, just as she turned to face the large wooden oak doors, the left part of it sprung open after two audible knocks and Vitali Khodorkovsky appeared. A loud gasp emigrated from inside of Leysa’s mouth as Khodorkovsky made eye contact with her.
“Thank you, Leysa, you can leave us alone now” Kennedy said, hiding his physical weakness. The startled and frightened middle aged Ukrainian nurse made her way to the doors, keeping the maximum distance possible from the Russian individual. Vitali held the door open for her as she left, not meeting his empty gaze.
“What was that about? You two know each other?” Kennedy inquired as Khodorkovsky approached the center of the spacious office after closing the door.
“She’s Ukrainian, I’m Russian. Not good history between our nations”
“The Soviet Union, I assume?”
“Probably”
“Lovely” Kennedy re- positioned himself before pointing at the leather couch “Sit. Sit. Enjoy the Vodka.”
Khodorkovsky made his way down into the circle and took a seat on the Italian-imported leather, he barely glanced at the Vodka bottle.
“I don’t drink Alcohol”
“Really?” Kennedy seemed genuinely surprised “But aren’t you, like, old school Russian?”
“Yes but I’d rather have a cup of water when I’m conducting business”
Vitali Khodorkovsky is heavy tattooed but clearly well-dressed and well-kept. His hair, shoulder-length, is pulled back and tightened into one of those irritating ponytail hairstyles. His frame is of medium height with a thickly thin and well-toned abdominal area that goes well with his rigid frame and slim biceps. The man even has a little bookishness quality to him, indicated by his reading glasses sticking out of his left breast pocket. Chad Kennedy, EUW’s arrogant CEO, is clearly surprised and even a little awed.
“A man of prompt action, just like Jordan said you were”
Kennedy’s personal friend, Jordan King, is the current CEO of Sun-Times Media Group, having usurped control of the media conglomerate after the Conrad Black fiasco. Vitali Khodorkovsky was hired by King for one of the more shady aspects of doing business. As a personal favor to his friend, King recommended Khodorkovsky to Kennedy if he ever needed to deploy tactics that went beyond boardroom meetings.
“Fair enough, I guess you’ll have to excuse the lack of variety in drinks.” Kennedy reached for a folder from under his sheets but held on to it. “You’ll also have to excuse me delaying this meeting. As you can see, I’m a little incapacitated here. Professional wrestling, you see. Hazardous for one’s health”
Kennedy threw the folder he was holding on to towards the imposing oak table, missing it and ending up with the folder on the floor next to Vitali’s plain-looking CAT boots. Vitali himself didn’t even bother looking at it. Whether this was intentional by Kennedy or not, to gauge Khodorkovsky’s personality, is unclear. What is clear is so far, this Russian character seems disciplined but not submissive. Kennedy, young but ferocious, took silent mental notes.
“Now before I start this little briefing, I just want to make something sure. Jordan tells me you’re former KGB. The reason I’m asking is because I doubt a back-stabbing, fat fuck like Jordan King would have too many KGB friends or contacts. How’d you meet him?”
“The same way you and I met. My old employer introduced me to Mr. King and he told me you were similar to him in the sense that you have a lot of money and no moral restraints”
“Haha no moral restraints, I like that” Kennedy coughed a bit, feeling the effects of his beatdown before regaining his composure. “So you’re really KGB? Like the real badass KGB back in the days of the cold war? The KGB that poisoned people and stuff like that?”
“Yes”
“And why’d you come to America? What? No pension plans offered by Soviet Russia?”
“I was arrested” Khodorkovsky replied, slightly surprising Kennedy. Before the young CEO could muster up a vocal response, Vitali picked up the folder from the ground. “Is this what you have a problem with?”
“Yes” Kennedy said after a momentary pause. The folder in Vitali Khodorkovsky’s hands had “IMMANUEL TAYLOR” imprinted on it. He flipped it open and was greeted, firstly, with Immanuel’s submitted application along with a recent of photo of Immanuel himself attached with a paper clip. Vitali’s eyes widened as he unhooked it and looked at it.
“Looks Eastern European, doesn’t he?” Kennedy said as Vitali nodded. “Russian?”
“No” a sharp and direct response from Vitali. “I know how a Russian or a Muscovite looks, he’s neither. Eastern Europe, this I am sure of. Yugoslavia. Romania. Chechnya. Maybe even Poland”
“But definitely not Russian?”
“Definitely” Vitali said, stretching it into six syllables. Kennedy glanced at Khodorkovsky hand and noticed a “Dollar Sign” was tattooed in the area between his thumb and index finger. Chad had once seen a documentary about this. A certain Russian crime organization utilizes tattoos as a form of communication, especially in prison. The dollar sign, a famous one, was indicate of dealing in hard currency, which was banned back in the times of communist Soviet Russia. Kennedy surveyed Khodorkovsky as Khodorkovsky surveyed Immanuel Taylor’s file.
There were times where Kennedy had only to simply stare at Vitali Khodorkovsky. Jordan King had said that Vitali was worthy of the money that Kennedy is showering him with in order to get him to investigate Immanuel Taylor. He’s even worth the extra “tax” that Kennedy had to pay Jordan King for recommending Vitali to him and for the airplane ticket and hotle accommodation that Kennedy had to pay for too. Kennedy stared further at Khodorkovsky’s figure, noting the numerous tattoos, and these are just the visible ones, not hidden by the extensive clothing Vitali purposefully has on.
“One question” Vitali said, breaking the silence, while keeping his eyes on the folder. His English dialect was heavily Americanized with traces of some Russian heaviness when it came to long-syllable words.
“Shoot”
“If this Immanuel character is giving you so much trouble then why did you hire him to a five year contract?”
“It was a bloody accident” Kennedy barked as Khodorkovsky put the folder down and eyed Kennedy. “And I can’t fire him until his first year is up but that’s not the problem. The problem is I can’t trust him, ok? I cannot trust that cocksucker to go one full year without hurting himself or hurting someone else. Now I tried to be nice, god knows I did. I invited him to my office, offered him a cup of coffee, I tried to reason with him, I even tried to bribe the guy to fucking behave like a human being and you know what he did? He just kept staring at me with those empty eyes of his and then he stands up and walks out as…”
Kennedy’s infamous vocal rambling is cut short by violent coughing as Kennedy, still reeling from his brutal assault, doubles over to the left side of his bed. Khodorkovsky watched on for a bit before diverting his gaze towards the bookshelves in Kennedy’s study. Blood from Kennedy’s mouth dripped on the plain weave carpet leaving an ugly stain on an otherwise expensive carpet. Kennedy wiped his mouth with his bed sheets.
“Do excuse the drama” Kennedy recomposed himself and repositioned himself before continuing. “Ok so this guy, Immanuel Taylor, walks in one day out of the fucking blue and slips in an application just like that. Now, I read this thing and I literally cannot believe that this guy actually applied. I mean, he’s a Gulf War veteran, 42 years old and his so-called wrestling experience consists of local wrestling. And that’s what makes me suspicious of Taylor. The fact that he states this shit openly, he doesn’t try to hide it or anything. The guy doesn’t even pad his application a little bit. I mean, look at his moveset. It is without a doubt the most primitive and simplistic one I’ve read. Every wrestler here makes his moveset look more diverse than it really is, everyone pads a bit, but this guy….this guy doesn’t even try to conceal anything.”
Kennedy stopped to take a breath, pushing the inhaler further into his nostrils as Khodorkosvky closed Immanuel Taylor’s folder after unclipping the photo and taking off his reading glasses. He placed both the reading glasses and the photo of Immanuel Taylor in his left breast pocket.
“Well?”
“Your fears are well-founded, Mr. Kennedy. How do you want me to look into this?”
“I don’t want a James Bond running around here. Be silent and professional. The important thing is you shedding more light on who this cocksucker is supposed to be”
“How extensive should I be?”
“As extensive as it fucking takes. I don’t want any surprises until his first year is up. Which is why I hired you. Dig into him, use your resources and whatnot, find out if he is dangerous and if he is then to what degree? Also, there’s a bonus in your paycheck if you can find anything incriminating”
“Such as?”
“Anything. Absolutely anything. If he did drugs as a snotty teenager, if he got fired from a job for harassing a co-worker. The more sexual and twisted it is, the better it would be. I’ll leak that shit into the San Francisco Chronicle and the shareholders of EUW would give me the greenlight to fire his ass regardless of what contract he has with this corporation. If its twisted enough, and if I time it correctly, I’ll be able to convince those fat cats in the board of directors to approve his termination without asking too many questions about how he got hired.”
“And where will I be obtaining the first half of my paycheck as agreed upon?”
“I’ll drop the bills from a helicopter just across the street from where you are staying. How the fuck do you think I’m going to give you the money? Via a secure bank account of course. My secretary will give you the PIN and all the information”
“I’d rather get it up-front if possible”
“No, that’s not possible. This is America, comrade. When we funnel dirty money here, we do it through private domains and as digitally as humanely possible. This way none of this will blow back on me. Anything else before you go hunting?”
“Actually yes” Khodorkovsky stepped to the left of the encircled part of Kennedy’s office and pointed at the bookshelves. “Do you mind if I borrow some books? For any free time I might have”
“Go for it. Just don’t take anything from the lower shelves.”
Kennedy grabbed the remote and, moving on to other matters, had clicked at the soon-to-descend 42-inch television. Khodorkovsky made his way to the shelves and, having discreetly analyzed the shelves beforehand, was able to swiftly pick out four books. One fiction and three non-fiction.
Vitali Khodorkovsky had been extensively reading American literature and political history since he had come to America in the early part of the 2000s. Vitali picked up David Ricardo’s Principles of Taxation and Political Economy , Herman-Melville’s Moby-Dick , Bertrand Russell’s A History of Western Philosophy , and Daniel Bell’s The Culture Contradictions of Capitalism.
None of these books, like many and many of the books on Kennedy’s bookshelves, were ever read or even opened. Vitali smirked at this and, clutching the books under his left arm, nodded to CEO Chad Kennedy on his way out. As Kennedy clicked open the 42’ inch television, he pondered about the character of Vitali Khodorkovsky. The man with all those tattoos yet a bookish veneer to him and stoic-like concentration. The man with the KGB history yet all these tattoos notoriously associated with the Russian Mafia. The pony-tailed fixer that Kennedy had just unleashed on Immanuel Taylor.
“Such a literate, cultured and well-composed man” Kennedy reflected as he switched to the History Channel. “for a Russian thug”
------
Chad Kennedy’s San Francisco office is so expensive that it borders on the edge of a painful self-parody. The spacious room itself, a mirror of Kennedy’s vanity, is divided into three parts. Upon entering through the large wooden oak doors, carved especially for Chad, you would find yourself in the first area which serves as both a vestibule and a mini-bar. The mini-bar, located to the far right, houses everything from martinis with green olives on toothpicks to espresso machines imported exclusively from a Starbucks production factory. Other notable aspects included the granite surface of the bar, the silver stools with black cushions on top, and the endless supply of pistachios, almonds and fruits.
The second part of the office began just as you continued forward on the white marble floor and descended into a wide circle which housed a plain weave carpet with Italian Natuzzi black leather couches imported exclusively from Italy surrounding the perimeter of the circle, four couches in total, and an imposing oak coffee table placed in the middle with several magazines, from Time and Harper’s to The Economist and Bloomberg Businessweek , covering its surface. There were additional cylinder-shaped coffee tables placed in-between each of the ends of the four couches.
Ascending over the three-step mini-stairs, you would find yourself back on the white marble floor and in the third and final part of Kennedy’s office: The Study Area. There were five Brazilian-texture imported bookshelves, two on the left side and three on the right, with books, mostly academic and some fiction, lining all the shelves that a vain person like Kennedy could not have possibly read even a third of. The middle part of the study was where Kennedy’s onyx-material gigantic desk lay. Yes, onyx. According to most Chemistry encyclopedias, it is a cryptocrystalline form of quartz with a chemical composition of Silicon Dioxide. Kennedy purposefully keeps the face of his gigantic desk mostly empty in order to show off the aweness of the Onyx’s eccentric colors and texture.
After his brutal attack on the past edition of Sunday Night Vengeance, the young and nubile Chad Kennedy was rushed to a hospital. After a short stay, he was cleared to spend some time in his San Francisco office. The second part of the office, the one with the Italian couches, was transformed into a mimic of Kennedy’s hospital room, with the funds being provided secretly by his father, Kirk Kennedy. Three of the couches were temporarily removed, the imposing oak coffee table shifted next to the remaining couch with a vodka bottle mysteriously placed on it and a bed in the middle with a hook-up to an IV Cable is present, along with the other standard medical equipment. Kennedy is in a seated position, with five pillows comforting his back, he is watching re-runs from the superbowl on a 42’inch LCD television hanging from steel-reinforced bars from the ceiling.
The only other human being in the room is Kennedy’s Ukrainian nurse, a voluptuous blonde known simply as Leysa. She sat on the Italian Netzaa couch with her mildly exposed legs crossed and was scanning through a copy of Time magazine. She’s wearing sandals and, on the crossed over leg, dangled the sandal in a nonchalant manner. Kennedy’s eyes kept alternating from the television screen to her pedicured nails. A sudden, loud ring came from Kennedy’s telephone-intercom hybrid phone on his Onyx-material desk. Leysa got up and approached it before clicking on one of the white keys.
“Mr. Kennedy, that gentlemen you requested is here to see you”
Kennedy signaled a thumbs up in response and Leysa picked up on that. “Let him in” she said into the intercom with near-perfect English. Kennedy picked up the remote on his sign, and with exactly two clicks, the television turned off and rescinded back up into the ceiling. Leysa helped Chad Kennedy get ready by adjusting his pillows, removing the breathing device from his nostrils and, upon his earlier written request, went to the mini-bar area and pulled out a bottle of Gold Symphony vodka and two shot glasses.
“Are you sure you want to drink your alcohol in the condition you’re in, Chad?” Leysa inquired. She refused to call anyone using “sir” or “maam”. If you wanted her sights, the first-name basis came as an automatic prerequisite. Kennedy simply signaled to the imposing oak coffee table next to the remaining leather couch. She placed it there and, just as she turned to face the large wooden oak doors, the left part of it sprung open after two audible knocks and Vitali Khodorkovsky appeared. A loud gasp emigrated from inside of Leysa’s mouth as Khodorkovsky made eye contact with her.
“Thank you, Leysa, you can leave us alone now” Kennedy said, hiding his physical weakness. The startled and frightened middle aged Ukrainian nurse made her way to the doors, keeping the maximum distance possible from the Russian individual. Vitali held the door open for her as she left, not meeting his empty gaze.
“What was that about? You two know each other?” Kennedy inquired as Khodorkovsky approached the center of the spacious office after closing the door.
“She’s Ukrainian, I’m Russian. Not good history between our nations”
“The Soviet Union, I assume?”
“Probably”
“Lovely” Kennedy re- positioned himself before pointing at the leather couch “Sit. Sit. Enjoy the Vodka.”
Khodorkovsky made his way down into the circle and took a seat on the Italian-imported leather, he barely glanced at the Vodka bottle.
“I don’t drink Alcohol”
“Really?” Kennedy seemed genuinely surprised “But aren’t you, like, old school Russian?”
“Yes but I’d rather have a cup of water when I’m conducting business”
Vitali Khodorkovsky is heavy tattooed but clearly well-dressed and well-kept. His hair, shoulder-length, is pulled back and tightened into one of those irritating ponytail hairstyles. His frame is of medium height with a thickly thin and well-toned abdominal area that goes well with his rigid frame and slim biceps. The man even has a little bookishness quality to him, indicated by his reading glasses sticking out of his left breast pocket. Chad Kennedy, EUW’s arrogant CEO, is clearly surprised and even a little awed.
“A man of prompt action, just like Jordan said you were”
Kennedy’s personal friend, Jordan King, is the current CEO of Sun-Times Media Group, having usurped control of the media conglomerate after the Conrad Black fiasco. Vitali Khodorkovsky was hired by King for one of the more shady aspects of doing business. As a personal favor to his friend, King recommended Khodorkovsky to Kennedy if he ever needed to deploy tactics that went beyond boardroom meetings.
“Fair enough, I guess you’ll have to excuse the lack of variety in drinks.” Kennedy reached for a folder from under his sheets but held on to it. “You’ll also have to excuse me delaying this meeting. As you can see, I’m a little incapacitated here. Professional wrestling, you see. Hazardous for one’s health”
Kennedy threw the folder he was holding on to towards the imposing oak table, missing it and ending up with the folder on the floor next to Vitali’s plain-looking CAT boots. Vitali himself didn’t even bother looking at it. Whether this was intentional by Kennedy or not, to gauge Khodorkovsky’s personality, is unclear. What is clear is so far, this Russian character seems disciplined but not submissive. Kennedy, young but ferocious, took silent mental notes.
“Now before I start this little briefing, I just want to make something sure. Jordan tells me you’re former KGB. The reason I’m asking is because I doubt a back-stabbing, fat fuck like Jordan King would have too many KGB friends or contacts. How’d you meet him?”
“The same way you and I met. My old employer introduced me to Mr. King and he told me you were similar to him in the sense that you have a lot of money and no moral restraints”
“Haha no moral restraints, I like that” Kennedy coughed a bit, feeling the effects of his beatdown before regaining his composure. “So you’re really KGB? Like the real badass KGB back in the days of the cold war? The KGB that poisoned people and stuff like that?”
“Yes”
“And why’d you come to America? What? No pension plans offered by Soviet Russia?”
“I was arrested” Khodorkovsky replied, slightly surprising Kennedy. Before the young CEO could muster up a vocal response, Vitali picked up the folder from the ground. “Is this what you have a problem with?”
“Yes” Kennedy said after a momentary pause. The folder in Vitali Khodorkovsky’s hands had “IMMANUEL TAYLOR” imprinted on it. He flipped it open and was greeted, firstly, with Immanuel’s submitted application along with a recent of photo of Immanuel himself attached with a paper clip. Vitali’s eyes widened as he unhooked it and looked at it.
“Looks Eastern European, doesn’t he?” Kennedy said as Vitali nodded. “Russian?”
“No” a sharp and direct response from Vitali. “I know how a Russian or a Muscovite looks, he’s neither. Eastern Europe, this I am sure of. Yugoslavia. Romania. Chechnya. Maybe even Poland”
“But definitely not Russian?”
“Definitely” Vitali said, stretching it into six syllables. Kennedy glanced at Khodorkovsky hand and noticed a “Dollar Sign” was tattooed in the area between his thumb and index finger. Chad had once seen a documentary about this. A certain Russian crime organization utilizes tattoos as a form of communication, especially in prison. The dollar sign, a famous one, was indicate of dealing in hard currency, which was banned back in the times of communist Soviet Russia. Kennedy surveyed Khodorkovsky as Khodorkovsky surveyed Immanuel Taylor’s file.
There were times where Kennedy had only to simply stare at Vitali Khodorkovsky. Jordan King had said that Vitali was worthy of the money that Kennedy is showering him with in order to get him to investigate Immanuel Taylor. He’s even worth the extra “tax” that Kennedy had to pay Jordan King for recommending Vitali to him and for the airplane ticket and hotle accommodation that Kennedy had to pay for too. Kennedy stared further at Khodorkovsky’s figure, noting the numerous tattoos, and these are just the visible ones, not hidden by the extensive clothing Vitali purposefully has on.
“One question” Vitali said, breaking the silence, while keeping his eyes on the folder. His English dialect was heavily Americanized with traces of some Russian heaviness when it came to long-syllable words.
“Shoot”
“If this Immanuel character is giving you so much trouble then why did you hire him to a five year contract?”
“It was a bloody accident” Kennedy barked as Khodorkovsky put the folder down and eyed Kennedy. “And I can’t fire him until his first year is up but that’s not the problem. The problem is I can’t trust him, ok? I cannot trust that cocksucker to go one full year without hurting himself or hurting someone else. Now I tried to be nice, god knows I did. I invited him to my office, offered him a cup of coffee, I tried to reason with him, I even tried to bribe the guy to fucking behave like a human being and you know what he did? He just kept staring at me with those empty eyes of his and then he stands up and walks out as…”
Kennedy’s infamous vocal rambling is cut short by violent coughing as Kennedy, still reeling from his brutal assault, doubles over to the left side of his bed. Khodorkovsky watched on for a bit before diverting his gaze towards the bookshelves in Kennedy’s study. Blood from Kennedy’s mouth dripped on the plain weave carpet leaving an ugly stain on an otherwise expensive carpet. Kennedy wiped his mouth with his bed sheets.
“Do excuse the drama” Kennedy recomposed himself and repositioned himself before continuing. “Ok so this guy, Immanuel Taylor, walks in one day out of the fucking blue and slips in an application just like that. Now, I read this thing and I literally cannot believe that this guy actually applied. I mean, he’s a Gulf War veteran, 42 years old and his so-called wrestling experience consists of local wrestling. And that’s what makes me suspicious of Taylor. The fact that he states this shit openly, he doesn’t try to hide it or anything. The guy doesn’t even pad his application a little bit. I mean, look at his moveset. It is without a doubt the most primitive and simplistic one I’ve read. Every wrestler here makes his moveset look more diverse than it really is, everyone pads a bit, but this guy….this guy doesn’t even try to conceal anything.”
Kennedy stopped to take a breath, pushing the inhaler further into his nostrils as Khodorkosvky closed Immanuel Taylor’s folder after unclipping the photo and taking off his reading glasses. He placed both the reading glasses and the photo of Immanuel Taylor in his left breast pocket.
“Well?”
“Your fears are well-founded, Mr. Kennedy. How do you want me to look into this?”
“I don’t want a James Bond running around here. Be silent and professional. The important thing is you shedding more light on who this cocksucker is supposed to be”
“How extensive should I be?”
“As extensive as it fucking takes. I don’t want any surprises until his first year is up. Which is why I hired you. Dig into him, use your resources and whatnot, find out if he is dangerous and if he is then to what degree? Also, there’s a bonus in your paycheck if you can find anything incriminating”
“Such as?”
“Anything. Absolutely anything. If he did drugs as a snotty teenager, if he got fired from a job for harassing a co-worker. The more sexual and twisted it is, the better it would be. I’ll leak that shit into the San Francisco Chronicle and the shareholders of EUW would give me the greenlight to fire his ass regardless of what contract he has with this corporation. If its twisted enough, and if I time it correctly, I’ll be able to convince those fat cats in the board of directors to approve his termination without asking too many questions about how he got hired.”
“And where will I be obtaining the first half of my paycheck as agreed upon?”
“I’ll drop the bills from a helicopter just across the street from where you are staying. How the fuck do you think I’m going to give you the money? Via a secure bank account of course. My secretary will give you the PIN and all the information”
“I’d rather get it up-front if possible”
“No, that’s not possible. This is America, comrade. When we funnel dirty money here, we do it through private domains and as digitally as humanely possible. This way none of this will blow back on me. Anything else before you go hunting?”
“Actually yes” Khodorkovsky stepped to the left of the encircled part of Kennedy’s office and pointed at the bookshelves. “Do you mind if I borrow some books? For any free time I might have”
“Go for it. Just don’t take anything from the lower shelves.”
Kennedy grabbed the remote and, moving on to other matters, had clicked at the soon-to-descend 42-inch television. Khodorkovsky made his way to the shelves and, having discreetly analyzed the shelves beforehand, was able to swiftly pick out four books. One fiction and three non-fiction.
Vitali Khodorkovsky had been extensively reading American literature and political history since he had come to America in the early part of the 2000s. Vitali picked up David Ricardo’s Principles of Taxation and Political Economy , Herman-Melville’s Moby-Dick , Bertrand Russell’s A History of Western Philosophy , and Daniel Bell’s The Culture Contradictions of Capitalism.
None of these books, like many and many of the books on Kennedy’s bookshelves, were ever read or even opened. Vitali smirked at this and, clutching the books under his left arm, nodded to CEO Chad Kennedy on his way out. As Kennedy clicked open the 42’ inch television, he pondered about the character of Vitali Khodorkovsky. The man with all those tattoos yet a bookish veneer to him and stoic-like concentration. The man with the KGB history yet all these tattoos notoriously associated with the Russian Mafia. The pony-tailed fixer that Kennedy had just unleashed on Immanuel Taylor.
“Such a literate, cultured and well-composed man” Kennedy reflected as he switched to the History Channel. “for a Russian thug”
