Nadia nodded and then turned to Sidell. "Mr. Xiang, this is Miss Huo, the regional CEO of ZL Group. Miss Huo, this is Mr. Xiang, the president of First General Hospital. And his assistant. And this is..." Nadia recognized the man she was referring to. He wore a slight smile, like he was trying not to smile but losing that battle. But why was he here now? She knew nearly nothing about him.
Sidell's assistant introduced hurriedly, "Miss Huo, this is Dr. Tang, deputy director of the nephrology department in our hospital. The medicine we are to talk about could change the way kidney disorders are handled in this country, and our hospital would be one of the pioneers."
Evelyn and Sidell shook hands.
Sheffield then reached out his right hand towards her. Evelyn looked at it for two seconds and then extended the hand with the Cat's Eye ring. Instead of letting go, he fixed his eyes on Evelyn. With a broad smile, he said, "I've heard a lot about you, Miss Huo. It's an honor to be with so young a CEO, and such a beautiful woman."
She was struggling to maintain her composure. Sheffield's grip was crushing her hand. She had forgotten to place her index finger above his palm to avoid such tricks. With a straight face, she said, "Thank you for your praise, Dr. Tang. You're not bad-looking yourself. Deputy director, huh? And so young. Color me impressed."
He should have been an actor. He did a great job pretending not to know her.
The smile on Sheffield's face widened. He savored her words and said, "Impressed? Thank you for your compliment, Miss Huo." But he didn't know whether she meant it or not.
Evelyn tried her best to break free from his grip. She quickly looked away and said to Sidell, "Mr. Xiang, shall we have a seat and talk about it?"
Sidell withdrew his eyes from their hands and smiled, "Sure." He said to his assistant, "Since Miss Huo has arrived, we can probably start on lunch. Have them bring the food out."
"Yes, sir."
After a while, they all sat down. Evelyn sat in the seat of honor, with Sidell and Nadia on either side. Sheffield sat opposite her. Sidell had intended to ask him to sit next to him. But Sheffield looked at Evelyn and said jokingly, "I'll sit here and watch the wait staff. After, I'd be remiss in my duties if I didn't show Miss Huo here a good time."
Evelyn smiled and said, "Thank you, Dr. Tang."
Watching those two, Sidell didn't say a word. He just figured that Sheffield was working hard to schmooze with her. He did have a monetary stake in this, and maybe he was trying to get more than just some investment capital out of the CEO.
Sidell's assistant stood up, opened a bottle of liquor and poured a glass for each person there.
After the third round, the two sides finally got down to business. Sidell spoke first. "Miss Huo, this was the price we agreed on. It hasn't changed since we began this venture. Last time, it was the vice general manager of your company who negotiated with us. Now you come in his place and want to jack up the price? That's not good. Think of the little guy, and how much he can afford. We'll be the ones to take the fall!"
"This isn't my doing, Mr. Xiang. I had my research department crunch the numbers. I know what price is the most appropriate for the medicine. And this medicine has never been sold in your hospital before..."
From what Evelyn had said, Sidell's face changed. He knew what she meant. She was thinking more from the patients' angle. He retorted, "Miss Huo, you should also think about our staff."
"This shouldn't be my problem. You guys get a lot of kickbacks for the prescriptions you write. Take that into account, and you won't think the price is so high. I think you know what I mean, right?"
Sheffield sat in the chair, propping his chin up with his hand, elbow resting on one of the armrests. He looked at Evelyn, who was in the middle of negotiations. Evelyn was like a queen in business, and she had a laser focus. All eyes were drawn to her while she did her thing.
Sidell bowed his head and took a sip of liquor to conceal his emotions. Evelyn had ruined his daughter's bright future. He wasn't going to go easy on the young CEO.
But as soon as she was here, he was impressed and she soon dominated the negotiations. He had a bad feeling that he had to sell this batch of ZL Group's medicines. Otherwise, his hospital would lose a ton of patients.
Thinking of this, he smiled and asked half jokingly, "Miss Huo, do you think that your medicine is our hospital's best choice?"
Evelyn smiled too. Confidence was written all over her face. "What do you think? The nephrology department and renal transplant department of your hospital are now key departments. Those two departments alone account for 30% of the business you do there. But your doctors couldn't cure diseases without medicine, right? The fees for the patent of our new medicine alone cost us over one billion dollars. Of course a billion was not the point. The point is that its potency is worth more than a billion. Mr. Xiang, is there any medicine on the market better than this?"
Sidell cast a glance at the man who was observing the woman silently, and called, "Sheffield."
"Yes." Sheffield took his eyes off her in no hurry.
"Haven't you been researching and developing some medicine? What do you think of the price?" Sheffield was a gifted man in the industry. He was a good surgeon and had gotten himself involved in some high-profile projects. Sidell had no idea what kind of medicine he had been developing and researching.
Sheffield replied, "Since we can't buy the medicine outright, we have to pay the price as ZL Group said. Besides, I think Miss Huo is quite right. There are too many people taking kickbacks in our hospital. Instead of turning a blind eye to it, we should tackle it head-on and focus on the patients."
Evelyn cast a sidelong glance at him. He still had that trademark smile. 'He's on my side, then, not his boss'.'
Sidell's heart sank. He looked at Sheffield with a meaningful look and teased him, "What? A pretty face shows up and you sell us down the river? If Dollie finds out, you're so dead!"
Sidell knew more or less what kind of person Sheffield was.
The reason why he agreed to let Sheffield date his daughter was he thought Sheffield had a lot of potential.
It would be strange if Sheffield wasn't engrossed in Evelyn's beauty. In Sidell's eyes, it was normal for Sheffield to be like this.
With a smile, Sheffield stood up from his seat and came to Evelyn. He grabbed the bowl in front of her and offered, "Dollie won't get angry with me. If our hospital wants to work together with ZL Group for a long time, we don't have any room for negotiation on the price. But I heard that ZL group is about to launch a new drug recently. How about we get in on that too?" With that, he put a bowl of hot soup before Evelyn.
He propped up the chair behind her with one hand, and picked up the chopsticks with the other. "I heard that Miss Huo likes spicy food, so I had the chef make some Sichuan dishes for you. How about it, Miss Huo? Would you like a taste?"
Evelyn was rendered speechless. What did he mean? 'Is he trying to butter me up in front of Sidell?' Instead of eating the food that he put in her bowl, she asked Sidell, "I heard a rumor, and maybe you can help me with this. Are Dr. Tang and your daughter getting married?"