The Prison-Made Queen novel Chapter 683

“I’ll go with you,” Hackett Sloan said, his face a mask of cold fury. He strode towards the door, then stopped abruptly, turning to scan the executives in the conference room. “I want the heads of Engineering, Public Relations, and Legal to come with me. The rest of you, continue the meeting.”

…

The atmosphere in the elevator was heavy. Staring at the descending floor numbers, Hackett asked in a low voice, “Josiah, have there been any problems with the company’s recent projects?”

Josiah shook his head. “We just completed a routine audit a while ago. The books are clean.”

Hackett’s brow tightened. If the books were clean, it meant no one had been embezzling company funds. So what was really going on?

“Ding!”

The elevator reached the ground floor. As the doors opened, a wall of sound washed over them. “Get Hackett Sloan out here!”

“Give us our hard-earned money!”

“Unscrupulous company, you have no conscience!”

Hackett’s face was grim. It had been years since anyone had dared to be so insolent to him. The head of security ran over, sweat pouring down his face. “Mr. Sloan, there are too many of them! We can’t hold them back!”

Hackett sneered. “Can’t hold them back? What does this company pay you for?” He adjusted his suit and marched toward the main entrance.

“We have one demand! If you don’t give us our money today, we’re not leaving!”

A swarthy, middle-aged man pushed his way to the front, roaring, “Are you Chairman Sloan? We worked for three months at your southern district construction site! A while back, your crane malfunctioned, and several of my crew members ended up with broken limbs! Your site manager promised us compensation, but to this day, we haven’t seen a single penny! Yesterday, we heard the foreman took off, and since Sloan Group is the main contractor, you owe us an explanation, don’t you?”

Hackett’s brow furrowed. The southern district site? That was a new project managed by one of his subsidiary companies, run by his old subordinate, Cedric Watson. He turned to the director of engineering. “Where is Cedric Watson?”

The director’s forehead broke out in a sweat. “I… I can’t reach Mr. Watson…”

Josiah’s eyes narrowed. With a protest this big happening at headquarters, Cedric Watson just happened to be unreachable? What a coincidence. It wasn't just Josiah who sensed something was wrong. Hackett also had his suspicions. But now wasn't the time to investigate. He had to handle the immediate crisis.