Short, styled light brown hair framed a face that had the beginnings of just enough lines to hint at the fact that he was probably in his late thirties or so. He was still attractive, his expression much softer than I would’ve imagined and his brown eyes surprisingly kind. He was stoic, but he didn’t look like a tyrant.
Hope sparked in my chest until the man at the front came into view. He hadn’t said a word and was still moving toward the front, but it was instantly clear that he was the corporate shark with the favorite pen. If his bespoke suit was anything to go by, he’d probably had said pen custom designed and only used it to sign his name with a flourish at the bottom of termination papers.
Despite the fact that I knew it was him, I couldn’t deny that he was stunningly attractive. He was just the sort of handsome man I would drool over on the cover of a magazine. Thick, jet-black hair shone under the fluorescent lights, the strands slightly longer on top than on the sides. It wasn’t messy at all, and yet it also didn’t give the impression that he’d spent hours in front of the mirror taming it.
My immediate impression was that he was probably one of those insanely blessed people who could just roll out of bed looking better than the rest of us did two hours into getting ready. Lashes as thick, luscious, and dark as his hair framed hazel eyes so intense that it felt like his gaze could pierce souls. I hadn’t even been the subject of that gaze yet, but I saw my co-workers ducking and glancing away whenever he looked into their eyes as he passed.
He had to be at least six foot three, standing head and shoulders above most others in the room. I realized I only hadn’t been able to see him immediately because I was seated, but there would’ve been no missing him from the get-go if I’d been standing.
The suit he wore had to have cost thousands, but every penny had been worth it for the way it fit him. I wouldn’t even have been surprised to learn that a master tailor dressed the man every morning, taking in the fabric exactly where it needed to be.
What made him even more attractive was that he wore the suit. It didn’t wear him. Nothing could dwarf or overshadow the natural magnetism he exuded or the air of power around him. There might as well have been cartoon sparks flying above his head.
It all made sense when he came to a standstill at the front of the room, beginning to speak without even having to clear his throat to get people’s attention. He already had it. Everyone was riveted to him.
He stood like a man who’d never doubted himself for a second, his shoulders wide and open, feet planted, and hands loosely at his sides. “Good morning, Prosper Insurance. Thank you all for being here this morning and for being ready to start on time. My name is Benjamin Reed. I’m the founder and CEO of Reed Global, your new employer.”
The room was so quiet I was convinced we were holding our collective breath in an attempt not to interrupt him in any way. Then again, I was also pretty sure that even a natural disaster would’ve waited for him to be done before it struck. He was that kind of intimidating—in the sexiest way possible.
All attraction I’d felt toward him vanished the instant he said he was our new boss, but sexy was sexy, and there was no two ways about it that whatever it was, he had it. It still didn’t mean I wanted him any more, though.
The man might have it, but he was also dangerous and holding not only my job, but everyone else’s jobs in his hands. To his credit, he addressed that particular issue right at the outset of his speech.
“A lot of you may have speculated that there will be job losses associated with this acquisition, and you were right. There will be cuts made. My team and I have been working nonstop, and we hope to have the process completed as soon as possible.”
No one dared look away, but in my periphery, I noticed that people were also trying to avoid making eye contact with him. It was that typical thing kids did in classrooms when they didn’t want to be asked a question. Like an ostrich that stuck its head in the sand, we believed the teacher couldn’t see us if we weren’t looking at them.
Unfortunately, that strategy had never worked at school and I doubted very much that it would work here. Regardless of whether he could see us or not, he’d obviously seen our files. My bet was that he already knew who had a chance of staying and who shouldn’t have bothered showing up this morning.
“This right here,” he motioned at the other man, “is Carl Patterson. He’s my COO. We’ll be meeting with all of you personally over the next few days. We will meet with everyone, so we appreciate your patience in waiting for us to get to you.”
Carl Patterson, the righthand man to the firing devil himself, managed to give the room a tight smile when he was introduced. Mr. Reed didn’t give him the opportunity to say anything, though. He simply plowed on with his explanation of the procedure.
“Once we’ve met with you, some of you will be invited to stay while others will be offered a severance package commensurate with your experience.” There wasn’t an ounce of emotion in his tone or his eyes when he said it, like yanking people’s livelihoods out from underneath them didn’t affect him in the least.
I might just really be staring at the devil. Bringing my gaze up as he panned his around the room, I half expected to see hellfire dancing in his pretty hazel irises. To my greatest disappointment, there were no red flames there. All I saw were blue-gold orbs with an underlying hue of ocean green. It was a little infuriating that there wasn’t even a hint of horns anywhere. Even his damn forehead was perfect.
Asshole.
There were so many people between us that I felt safe in scowling at him. Even if he saw me, I had a feeling our fates were sealed already.
“We look forward to meeting you all. When the process is completed, we’ll convene another meeting with everyone who stays on to discuss how things will work from now on.” He inclined his head at us, then lifted his chin and led Carl back out of the room.
I closed my eyes as they departed, wondering what was going to happen to me and all my friends here. I didn’t even want to think about my work family being ripped apart by someone who didn’t know us at all.
If he thought having a meeting for a few minutes with each of us would allow him to know enough about us to really make the call, he was sorely mistaken. Frankly, I didn’t even know why he was bothering with the meetings. He didn’t seem indecisive in the slightest or to have any problem bringing down the axe when he felt like it.
My insides churned at the somber mood in the room once they were gone. No one said anything, simply filtering out after them while trying to contemplate our own fates. I wanted to jump up and yell out a battle cry, let Benjamin what’s-his-name and Carl with the fake kindness in his eyes know that we wouldn’t just take this lying down.
I detested Benjamin and his company already, hating that he had this kind of power over us and that he was wielding it so bluntly. If creating a ruckus would’ve changed anything, perhaps I would’ve tried to lead a mini-revolution in the office. I was pretty sure we had face paint lying around here somewhere from the last bring-your-kid-to-work day.
Some nice, thick navy stripes over my cheeks and a high heel in my hand might’ve been effective in trying to rally the troops. However, if I tried, I would end up committed for observation in a mental ward—and rightly so.
Prosper had already been sold. Any mini-revolution would be a waste of perfectly good energy and an excellent way to get myself banned from the building. As much as I hated it, there wasn’t anything I could do in this situation except what he had said. My only option was being patient and waiting my turn to be called.
And that sucked.
Royally.
Chapter 8
BEN
The interviews were monotonous at best, and soul-destroyingly boring at worst. We’d been at it for almost a week, and I was more than a bit annoyed with my own controlling nature.
Carl had pointed out during the planning process that we could decide on the top-tier employees to keep and that those employees in turn
could then choose who to save and who to cut. It would’ve saved us time and effort, but no. I’d insisted that those people could be swayed by sentiment because they knew their employees, whereas we could be totally objective because we didn’t know them.
Reading about their personal circumstances in a file and knowing them because you’d been there as things happened were two completely different things. We weren’t emotionally involved and, therefore, better positioned to make decisions.
Now, however, I was remembering why I’d stopped doing these. I couldn’t get to know a person or assess their worth to the company in a twenty-minute interview, and my decisions were starting to feel a little too arbitrary even for my tastes.
There was a reason I’d stopped being personally involved in this shit, but there had been some blunders with our last acquisition, and taking charge from the outset was a hell of a lot easier than trying to clean up after. Even so, I’d decided to review our internal policies and processes when we were done here. If I had to do it between the hours of two and four a.m. to make time for it, I’d do it.
Hopefully, I could streamline things and put my stamp on it enough that my personal involvement wouldn’t always be necessary going forward. An oversight role was sounding better and better to me by each interview.
Carl and I were sitting in one of Prosper’s smaller conference room with their current COO, Bruce Lane. We’d had lunch together in here, reviewing the work we’d gotten done in the morning and planning for our afternoon.
“We’re seeing Avery Thorn next,” Bruce said with a smile that looked suspiciously salacious. “She’s one of our three receptionists. Young woman. Something appealing to the eye when a customer walks through the doors.”
My eyes wanted to roll, but I had a better poker face than that. I never gave anything away. Some people had faces that screamed in meetings, but mine was dead silent. It was a point of pride for me.
The door cracked open, and a pretty girl who was probably in her early twenties walked in. From the moment she set foot inside the room, she started making eyes at me. Her lips were kicked up into a small, secret smile I knew was meant to be provocative, and her gaze kept darting to mine before she pulled her lower lip between her teeth.
It was clear as fucking day that she was trying to use her femininity to her advantage, which was annoying but not something I’d have held against her if her answers to Carl’s questions didn’t make it abundantly clear that she added zero value to the company.
We’d interviewed the other two receptionists before her, both of whom were older women with years of experience. This one, however, seemed to only have been hired because of her looks. No wonder this place was on the brink of bankruptcy if that’s what they based their decisions on.
Hiring someone for their looks was fine if one ran a modeling agency, a casting service for films, or any of the other professions in which looks actually mattered. Insurance wasn’t one of those.
“Do you have any special skills?” Carl was asking her after going through the initial list of questions.
She giggled, shrugging one shoulder before batting her eyelashes at all three of us. “I can knot cherry sticks with my tongue, and I can apply mascara without looking in the mirror.”
Bruce chuckled in response while Carl simply sighed and noted something down before moving on to the next question. My impatience with this woman was prickling at my skin. How the fuck does she think those are relevant special skills for a receptionist?
“What does a typical day look like for you?” he asked, but I cleared my throat and jumped in before she could answer.
“Thank you for your time, Ms. Thorn. We appreciate it, but we’re not going to be able to keep you on moving forward. Mr. Lane has a team downstairs who will work with you to settle on an appropriate severance package.”
She slumped in her chair, looking startled as she blinked rapidly at us. When none of us said anything further, she got up and left. She started to sniffle on her way out, and I inhaled a deep breath.
I didn’t enjoy firing people. No matter what the papers said about me, I wasn’t so ruthless that I actually enjoyed putting employees out of a job. I just wasn’t going to keep dead weight hanging around either. If that meant having to be the bad guy, then that was what I had to be. So sue me.
Bruce released a heavy sigh when the door closed behind Avery, looking at me like he wanted to say something but then decided against it. He glanced down at the stack of papers in front of him instead. “Our next interview is with my current executive assistant, Victoria Mitchell.”
“What has her performance been like?” Carl asked, pen at the ready to record the answer.
Bruce shrugged, but his expression had gone hard. “She’s a smart girl, but she’s always volunteering her ideas about everything. She doesn’t always know her place.”
I frowned as I absorbed his assessment, not sure if I liked the phrasing of what he’d just said. Sometimes, good ideas came from unexpected places and sources. I was controlling, but even I knew micro-managing employees to the point where they didn’t share their thoughts at all was a recipe for failure.
Who better to get ideas from than the people at ground level? I was still musing about his opinion when the door opened and I froze. My eyes were suddenly glued to the vision who walked inside. It took me half a second to realize that she was the brunette from the restaurant, the woman who had been starring in my fantasies every night since.
Apparently, her name was Victoria Mitchell and she was now my employee. Unless I decided otherwise. Well, this is an interesting turn of events.
Our gazes caught once she was seated, and for a second, it felt like I couldn’t expand my lungs far enough to suck in air. I’d been right about her eye color. It wasn’t just blue. An infinite amount of shades melted together to form a color much closer to a soft lilac than just any one shade of blue.
Her features were daintier than I’d realized though. Her nose tipped up just the tiniest bit at the end and her cheekbones were slanted but only gently pronounced. There was something graceful about her movements, almost reminding me of the way I’d seen dancers and prima ballerinas move even when they were just walking.
We probably only maintained eye contact for a few seconds, but in those moments, it felt like a year. And yet I still hadn’t gotten enough when she bowed her head at Carl as she reached the table.
“Please sit down, Ms. Mitchell,” he invited, gesturing her into the hot seat across from us. My throat was dry, my brain reeling with these new revelations as I tried not to make it too obvious that I was staring.
Carl took the lead in the interview, just like he’d been doing all along. He took her through the initial questions, and from what I could tell almost immediately, she was organized and had an aptitude for her work.
Her gaze only darted to me once or twice while she answered. Her poise and coolness under the pressure I knew she felt was impressive. “I’ve been working under Mr. Lane for four years. During that time, I’ve learned a lot but I’m not blind to the fact that there will always be more to learn. I feel like I’ve contributed greatly in my role as his executive assistant, but I also assist on various committees within the company. I believe my involvement in those committees positions me uniquely to be of use to you in the future.”
Carl scanned the page in her file listing the committees she served on. “Can you tell me about your work with the digitization committee?”
“Yes, sir.” She quickly and efficiently outlined the work of the committee itself and highlighted her role within it. “To conclude, I’ve enjoyed being part of the team tasked with incorporating our past into our future.”
“Tell me about your life,” he said. “We’d like to know who you are and how you balance that with your work.”
She looked taken aback but recovered fast and smiled. “I’m not married. I don’t have any children yet, but I’d like to some day. Is that a problem?”
�
��Not at all,” he assured her. “Reed Global has some very progressive family benefits. Tell us more and please don’t worry about what might be a problem.”
I knew that wouldn’t be possible, but she took it in stride. “Well, okay then. I have a sister who I share an apartment with. I got my degree in Business Administration where I majored in Banking and Insurance. I’ve also been certified in a variety of computer programs, but I guess you know all that from my file.”
Carl chuckled, Bruce looked bored, and I was, once again, riveted by this woman. She swiped her tongue over her lips but didn’t even seem to be conscious of it. It was a far cry from having been deliberate about it to get our attention.
“Okay, so facts not in my file that may still be relevant. I have a subscription to an internet learning site and I take short courses on the bus on my way to and from work. I’d love to learn more about several aspects of the business, and if given the opportunity, I’d like to get my Master’s degree.”
For every question Carl asked, she had a more than satisfactory answer. Whereas it had been clear to me that the last few candidates brought nothing more to the table than others, this one was different. She took initiative above and beyond her formal responsibilities, and I liked people who took initiative.
I liked her, and it wasn’t just because I wanted to fuck her.
The only problem was that I’d already decided to fire her boss. He was too stuffy and seemed like a closet misogynist to me. Plus, Carl was my COO and his team could take on the organizational work for Prosper without breaking a sweat.
Carl also already had a very capable executive assistant with years of experience. Some days, even I swore the very building we occupied would fall apart if Anna decided to leave the company. Since the role of executive assistant to our COO was very much taken, that meant Victoria’s job was redundant and not likely to be renewed.
Love Your Moves: A Billionaire Valentine's Romantic Comedy Page 5