Powerful Men 2: Four More Alphas Who Seize Control Read Online Free Page B

Sometimes it could be thankless work, but then sometimes, the rewards were bigger and better than anything else in the world.
    But that wasn’t to say it didn’t take up a lot of her time. For Jennifer it was a fulltime job, one with plenty of overtime. Other people would have said it was a good thing she’d been born rich, but for Jennifer it was her way of making up for it. She knew it wasn’t fair she’d had everything growing up and others had so little, so this was her way of returning the favor to the universe.
    And her way of proving herself as a person in her own right too. Her father had built a company from the ground up and worked his way out of poverty and Building Bridges was her way of showing that she could build something too. And if she didn’t, by necessity, have to do it for herself then she would do it for others instead.
    The organization was headed by Al Duncan, a kind-hearted old liberal, who just didn’t really have the punch and panache to make something big of it. When Jennifer came aboard five years earlier at the age of twenty two, Building Bridges had been little more than a mobile soup kitchen. Now they were preparing to branch out into other states with their educational programs and had secured funding far and wide from colleges, charities and even multinational companies who approved of the work they’d been doing. The only reason Jennifer herself wasn’t president was because it might send a bad message to potential patrons and investors to have someone so young in charge.
    But the fact that the position would be hers one day, and probably soon, was a given. Jennifer demanded it. That’s why she worked so hard, so tirelessly, to defend the rights of the downtrodden and the disenfranchised in her city. That would be her legacy.
    She stepped up to the counter and smiled at the youngish, cute cop on desk duties that night. She knew this one pretty well. He was one of the better ones.
    ‘Hi Joey,’ she smiled, ‘the captain in? I have an appointment.’
    Detective Joseph Gonzales spun on his chair and smiled up at her. ‘Jennifer,’ he grinned, ‘I was wondering when you’d turn up. Don’t you ever take a night off?’
    ‘Do you?’ Jennifer smiled. ‘Do any of these guys?’ She gestured at the raggle-taggle group of hookers, pimps and players lounging around the station.
    ‘I guess not,’ Joey grinned. He flicked back his soft black hair. ‘You look good,’ he said.
    ‘Thanks,’ Jennifer replied, ‘now is the captain in?’ She wasn’t going to be brushed off that easily.
    Joey studied her face coyly. ‘You really have an appointment?’ he asked. ‘The captain told me not to let anybody disturb him tonight.’
    ‘Ten PM: Saturday night,’ Jennifer nodded, ‘on the dot.’
    ‘Ok,’ Joey shrugged, ‘but be warned: the big guy’s in a bad mood tonight.’
    He reached down and pressed the buzzer on his desk. ‘Captain?’
    ‘ What? ’
    ‘Uh Jennifer De Le Cruz is here to see you, she says she has an appointment.’
    ‘… Oh God damn it! ’
    The line went dead for a second. Joey glanced up at Jennifer with a look that said he was glad he wasn’t in her shoes right now. A moment later, the captain came back on the intercom.
    ‘ Fine, send her in. ’
    ‘Yes sir,’ Joey said and flicked off the switch. ‘Good luck in there,’ he grinned to Jennifer, ‘and remember – if you need help there’s like, a gazillion cops just outside the door.’
    ‘Thanks Joey,’ Jennifer replied, ‘but I think I can handle it.’
    She walked past his desk towards the Captain’s office as Joey Gonzales checked her out from behind, trying to be discreet about it but failing completely.
    She pushed open the Captain’s door.
    ‘Captain Leahy.’
    Captain Mick Leahy was the ruler of this little slice of Hades and the hardships that plagued the streets around his station showed on his face. He was only forty years old or so but he looked a little closer to fifty. He was