With steel in his eyes, he holds out his hand for me to shake. I might have been fooled if I didn’t feel his clammy palm.
He’s flanked by two guys, one of who must be his son. The son, who looks mid-thirties like me, has his jaw set tight, ready for a fight the old-fashioned way.
“Call me Killian.” I remove my hand from his grasp.
Marek looks relieved. “Alfred.” The older man smiles at me. “And this is my son, Alfred Jr.”
Alfred Jr. mumbles a greeting.
Marek nods to the third guy farthest from me. “This is my lawyer, Mike Dempsey.”
Dempsey looks like someone they found from the local phone book, operating out of a car wash in Brooklyn.
I take my place at the head of the boardroom table and gesture for them to sit. “I trust my team has introduced themselves.” Sitting opposite the Marek family is Sarah, a senior lawyer, and a guy who looks fresh out of college.
“They have indeed,” Alfred Sr. says as the Mareks simultaneously sit. “I’ll admit, Killian, I’m surprised you agreed to the meeting. You’re a busy man. I’m sure we can come to a resolution, like adults, so we don’t take up too much of your time.”
I relax into my leather chair, nodding in agreement. “You have my full attention.”
He takes a sip of his water, then clears his throat. “Mr. Quinn… Killian.” His lips curl into a tense smile as he knots his fingers on the table. “Do you know the history of our restaurant?”
I offer a friendly smile. “I assume you’re going to enlighten me.”
“I don’t know how well you know our area in Brooklyn. Come out and visit us at the restaurant. You’ll get to see the wonderful, proud Polish community…”
I try not to lose patience but find my attention drifting out the window as he speaks. He’s doing himself no favors by giving me a history lesson about Brooklyn.
“So you see, the restaurant is where our community comes together. My father handed it over to me, and I ran it for fifty years to pass it down to my son and daughter.” He briefly looks with pride at his son before redirecting his attention back to me. “I want you to reconsider the development, Killian. Son. Think about-”
“Mr. Marek,” Sarah cuts in briskly. “Our contract has already been communicated to your lawyer.”
I lean back in my seat, letting out a frustrated grunt as I exhale. We should be finishing up the small details of this project by now.
“Please,” Alfred’s voice booms, but he fails to hide the slight rattle. “I’m talking business owner to business owner. Father to father. You have children too. Someday you’ll want to pass your business to them.” He pauses. “Her.”
He’s done his research. Except handing over my business would require my beautiful daughter Teagan to say something other than “I hate you” to me. Anything beyond that seems like a pipe dream these days.
“I’m sorry, Alfred. This isn’t personal, but the development is going ahead. It’s already underway.”
“We’re aware of that,” Alfred Jr. growls. “We can see the bulldozers from the restaurant window. The noise is driving our customers away.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
Alfred Jr. hisses in response like the meathead I expected him to be. He slams his fist on the table, making the water glasses shake.
“Hold up, Son,” his father cuts in, leveling him with a stern look. He places a hand over his son’s before turning his attention back to me. “Killian. You’re putting me out of business with your bulldozers.”
“Which is why you should accept my generous offer.”
Senior blanches. “So… what? You’re going to ruin this community with a gaudy hotel and casino?”
“It’s a prime plot of land near JFK,” I point out calmly, drumming my fingers on the table with mild impatience. “Not a community center to drink tea in. Be sensible.”
“Sit down, son,” Senior snaps as Junior makes to stand. He grabs his son’s arm and forces him back down into his seat. “So that’s it? We have two options. Either sell our livelihood to you or watch you destroy it by building around us?”
“I would advise taking option one,” I respond crisply. “I was expecting to have a sensible conversation with you today.”
We’ve offered Marek a package that could give his family financial stability for life but he’s too blinded by pride to take it.
Jr. growls something in Polish.
“Mr. Quinn,” their lawyer pipes up from the corner, clutching papers that are probably props. Fucking useless. I forgot he was even in the room. “You leave us no option but to seek an injunction from the courts under the Nuisance Law.”
Feeling my phone vibrate in my pocket, I take it out. Connor. For a moment, the phone is the center of attention; a chance for the Mareks to regroup. Canceling Connor, I slide the phone back down on the table, out of arm’s reach of the moronic son in case he fancies himself as a vandal.
“The hotel is going ahead on that land. We have your accounts; my offer is much more than the restaurant is worth,” I remind them. “I was in a bidding war for the land with five other property developers. The others were willing to offer you half of what I did. See this as an opportunity, not a threat.”
“Real fucking saint you are, Quinn,” Alfred Jr. spits. I look in disgust at where droplets have landed on the table. “You sit in your glass box, thinking you’re better than us. You think you can forget your roots? Your family came from nothing.”
“Are you done?” I ask him coldly. “Because you’ve made life a whole lot more difficult for yourself.”
I tap on my phone to alert security.
“Our community won’t let this happen.” Alfred Jr. rises to his feet. “It’ll be burned to the ground with all your fucking high-rollers from the island in it. You don’t have support in Queens, and now you don’t have any in Brooklyn either.”
I regard him coolly. Nothing new there. I grew up in Queens. Killian Quinn Sr., from whom I inherited my genes, was a lowlife, according to every Irishman within a ten-mile radius. A man who would show up to a dead man’s send-off for the free food and then bed his widow. Unfortunately, his reputation extended to the wider family. Fortunately, he died before I hit my teens.