Chapter Thirty-two

He leaned forward in his chair. “Go on.”

“Your company seems profitable, and that’s great, but…”

“Yes?”

She pressed her lips together, then looked up. “But people work at those companies. People who lose their jobs. When you buy those companies and dissect them, these people lose their source of livelihood and they are forced to give up.”

“So?”

There was a loud burst of mariachi music from the town below, and she looked in the distance at the dark, moonswept Pacific. “I’m biased, I guess. My grandfather had a candy company a long time ago. It did really well, then things fell apart. Ingredients became more expensive, and we didn’t have the nationwide distribution of the larger companies. Ten years ago, after my father took over, a conglomerate offered to buy Linden Candy. It would have made us wealthy, but my dad knew they’d close the factory and move production, leaving half our town out of work. So for the sake of his employees—his neighbors and friends—my father refused.”

“Fooli