Chapter 4
Shango and his crew of goons had left. Omar hunched over the sink in the office restroom, spitting blood into the basin and tenderly assessing his bruised face.
Standing in the doorway, Nick had tried to talk Omar into going to the hospital.
His partner’s jaw had to be dislocated, possibly broken, and he was probably going to be pissing blood for a few days.
Omar was less interested in his health and more concerned about coming up with Shango’s money, and Nick tended to agree with him. Shango had not set a date for when he expected payment, but Nick doubted that the guy had a reputation for patience.
“How much do we have in cash reserves?” Nick asked. “We should be able to cover it, right? I mean, it’s gonna hurt for sure, but don’t we have the funds?”
Omar pressed a wet towel against his face that he had filled with ice cubes, a makeshift ice pack. Wincing, he said, “Not as much as he’s asking for.”
“But how much?” Nick asked.
“About a hundred.” Omar didn’t meet his gaze.
“A hundred thousand dollars?” Nick couldn’t believe what he had heard. “Omar, we’re bringing in what—almost a million a month, gross sales? But we have only a hundred grand in savings?”
“We’ve got expenses, Nick. It’s not that simple. We gotta pay all these vendors: the phone reps, the office space, the manufacturing company in Beijing. We’ve got employees and contractors. We pay ourselves, too, serious coin.”
“I didn’t know you had seven cars,” Nick said.
“I’m supposed to tell you every time I buy a car?”
Nick turned away from the bathroom, paced across the adjoining hallway. Beads of cold sweat pebbled his hairline.
“I’ve got about fifty grand in savings,” Nick said. “What about you?”
Omar was shaking his head. “I don’t know, about five, I guess.”
“Five thousand dollars in savings? And yet you own seven luxury vehicles?”
“What are you, my dad?” Omar spat blood on the carpet between them. “I could sell the cars—it still won’t be enough. I’d net maybe four hundred. You could sell yours, too. What would we get?”
Nick did some quick math in his head. “Two fifty, rough guess.”
“All right, three hundred from you—that includes your savings. Four hundred from me. A hundred in the company cash fund, a total of eight hundred grand. He wants one point five. We’re still short seven hundred.”
“Jesus.” Nick slumped against the wall. “What about a loan?”
“A loan?”
“A bank loan. We’ve got business credit; we have Amex cards for both of us in the business name. Why not go to the bank?”
“I can look at that, but realistically I don’t see a bank fronting us seven hundred, Nick.
We’re still a new business, not much of a credit history, and we don’t have A1 credit, not as Legacy Nutrition.
You know how tight it was when we got started.
Robbing Peter to pay Paul like my moms would say. ”
Nick remembered those lean days, when leaving his cushy job with a pharmaceuticals firm to start his own company had seemed like a catastrophic mistake. “Okay, I know it’s a long shot. But do you think Shango might negotiate?”
Omar actually laughed, though a spark of pain flashed in his eyes and he cradled his face. “Yeah, like he negotiated his royalty from fifteen percent to fifty?”
“Why do you think he wants all this cash from us anyway?” Nick asked. “Why isn’t the royalty hike enough? Why hit us up for more?”
“Maybe because he’s a criminal, Nick?” Omar spat again, pressed the ice pack to his swollen jaw. “He sees our business making money hand over fist, and in his mind, it’s like an ATM. He’s gonna suck out cash whenever he wants.”
“You knew this about him but thought he was a good choice as an investor for us?” Nick said.
“I didn’t know what I know now, okay?” Omar found a chair, nearly collapsed into it. Nick found a nearby chair, settled into that one.
They hung their heads in silence.
“What do you think he’ll do if we don’t pay him the full amount?” Nick asked. “What if we give him what we can, up front, and then go on a payment plan for the balance?”
“He’s not the IRS, man. Guys like him don’t do payment plans.”
“But we need to be sure. We need to ask him. You need to ask him. He’s your contact.”
Icepack cradled against his face, Omar closed his eyes and tilted his head backward, resting it against the wall behind him. He sighed.
“Ask him,” Nick said.
“Don’t expect miracles,” Omar finally said.