by KB Winters
My home was on the third floor from the top with a sweeping, nearly 300 degree view of the city from the large, floor to ceiling windows. I stopped at the bar off the kitchen to pour myself a glass of bourbon and took it over to the impressive window display, drowning my frustration from the day as I looked out over the city as it transitioned from day to night. It was possibly my favorite time of day. There was something about dusk that I adored. It was the time when the city came alive and people were the most free. Back in college, it would have been the time to get ready to go out and let loose with my buddies. That meant going to bars, chasing pussy, and drinking myself into oblivion until the early hours of the morning. However, over the years my behaviors had shifted, especially more severely after my father’s passing. His death had forced me into a new level of focus, ambition, and drive—one that couldn’t mix with endless partying and daily hangovers.
No, I’d been forced to grow up by the time I hit twenty-three and leave the stupid party animal shit in the rearview—which was probably where it belonged. Although sometimes, especially on nights like this, as I watched the sun go down and the street lights flicker on one by one, a part of me missed the buzz of it all. A night out drinking and having fun, of getting caught up in the music of some local band, and dancing with the hottest chicks in the club, that would certainly go a long way to erasing Megan Louise from my mind.
And yet, there was a part of me that didn’t want to erase her. I knew I’d likely never see her again. Other than her name, I didn’t know anything about her, and from our brief conversation, it was pretty clear that we weren’t likely to cross paths again. That was a shame to say the least. Not only was she beautiful and smart-mouthed, but she had a mind that was equally as beautiful and sharp.
I wasn’t sure what waited for me the next day in the boardroom, but none of my so-called marketing gurus had come close to nailing it over the past few months. Megan’s first impressions were more valuable and insightful than their months of brainstorming and market testing. And I paid those fucks. Very well.
Damn. I tossed back the bourbon allowing it to slid down my throat and hit my belly with a burst of heat and then looked back at the bar, wondering if I should fill my glass again.
I sighed and shook my head. In the end, I left the tumbler on the kitchen counter and went to bed with nothing but the memory of the gorgeous woman to keep me company.
* * * *
Going to bed as early as I did made it easy to get up the next morning, and I arrived at Timeless Timepieces before anyone else—which was the way I preferred it. The silence of the office gave me time to think. When everyone was rushing around, preparing for the day, the office took on a very stressed and cluttered vibe which I found less than productive. During the busiest times of the day, I barricaded myself in my office, only stepping out if there was a true emergency. I had no interest in people recapping their nights before, shooting the shit about the weather or whatever reality TV trash was popular—or the gossip as clusters of people bound together to pour jumbo cups of coffee or dig into whatever snack foods had been hoarded away in the staff lounge.
In the silence, I could think and mentally prepare my list of objectives for the day. The only person in the office was my assistant, Cara, and she was paid extra to be there before everyone else. She was in her early thirties, and while I knew she had a life outside of the office, she didn’t seem to mind the early hours. Or if she did, she never complained to me. As I swept into the office, she hustled over and wordlessly handed me an aluminum coffee cup that was filled with my favorite blend, piping hot with a touch of cream. I gave her a nod and went into my office. I sat behind the desk and sipped the molten hot coffee while my computer booted up.
I returned emails and got adjusted as the caffeine rush hit my system. When I finished, I checked the time and made my way to the conference room where, what was left of the marketing department, would gather in the next twelve minutes. I stepped inside the glass walled space and noticed that the Shock Watches display that had been set up at the symposium now hung on an easel near the head of the table. I smiled as I remembered stumbling upon Megan as she’d carefully inspected the sign. At the time, I’d wondered what she’d been looking at, what she’d been thinking, and I smiled even wider as I remembered the way she passionately told me just that after I’d asked for her opinion.
I was still replaying the entire encounter over in my mind when the first sounds of footsteps and voices filtered into the room. I turned in time to see Marcy, Robert, Cary, and Linda make their way, two by two, through the double doors. They were all I had left. Nearly four months ago in the middle of the Shock Watches preparation, I’d discovered a ring of staff members involved in an inside scheme to skim money from their expense accounts. The whole thing had been a giant, tangled web of deceit, and I was still shocked that any of it had actually happened.
At the time of discovery, I’d been tempted to scrap the entire department and start fresh, but my business adviser, and longtime family friend, Gary, helped me through the investigation process to separate the guilty from the innocent. In the end, five employees were fired and charged with the crimes and one other employee took issue with the entire situation and quit.
The four team members that remained were less than stellar—especially after the shake up, but they were it. A problem I was hoping to repair at the symposium, but other than Megan—I hadn’t been blown away by anything I saw. Although, in fairness to the other contenders, after meeting her, most of what they said went in one ear and out the other.
“Good morning,” I said once everyone had taken a seat.
“Good morning,” they all echoed in unison, making me feel like a kindergarten teacher.
I tugged at the knot of my tie to relieve the pressure. I didn’t want to—and really, couldn’t afford to—lose my patience with them, but their lack of enthusiasm was infuriating. Didn’t they understand that I had about two- point four million other things to do besides baby sit? God knows I paid them enough.
Since the scandal, production had screeched to a halt and attitudes were less than desirable. I had a feeling they all thought they had me over a barrel since beggars couldn’t be choosers. That was true to an extent, but they didn’t need to know that. Timeless Timepieces was at a crucial transition period and couldn’t afford to start from scratch, but I kept a mental tally of everything, and when the time came, they were in for a rude awakening if they only offered scraps in exchange for their hefty paydays.
“As you all know, I was at the UCLA marketing department symposium yesterday. I met with a lot of bright, talented people and received some fresh perspective on the Shock Watches campaign,” I started, still standing at the head of the table.
“Did you ask anyone what they thought about a more Indiana Jones angle?” Marcy asked.
I suppressed a groan. “Not good. Let’s look forward, not back.”
Marcy’s smile fell from her lips. The Indiana Jones idea had been her pitch.
“Did you make any job offers?” Linda asked before I could continue.
“No, not formally, but there were a lot of promising candidates. I expect to set up some meetings in the following weeks,” I lied. Maybe a bluff would lessen their sense of job security and finally spark some real ideas.
Robert, my least favorite of the team, chimed in, “So, what was the general feedback on the campaign?”
I did my best to recite Megan’s ideas, but lacked her enthusiastic delivery and was met with blank stares.
“So we need less electric blue and an action hero to sell them?” Robert scoffed, with a raised brow as I wrapped up the new pitch.
My blood pressure spiked, but I kept my face passive, trying to hone in on the overall idea and theme of the suggested changes. However, nothing I said seemed to translate and the entire meeting spiraled downhill from there, and by the time I was back in my office all I had was a list of crossed out movie stars and a list of other crappy id
eas that probably wouldn’t work anyway. I contemplated letting them all go and starting fresh with the entire department.
“Fuck! That was a pile of shit.” I mumbled as I raked my fingers through my hair, smoothing it back and away from my face.
What I needed was simple—and yet impossible. I needed Megan to stand there and tell them exactly what she told me. From her, they would get it and understand. Even if she didn’t want a job, would she really object to coming in and simply sharing her feedback? Surely, I could find a way to make it worth her time.
I smiled as I leaned across my desk and picked up my phone.
Chapter Four — Megan
I stared at the four walls that had become my self-imposed prison since three o’clock in the afternoon. I glanced at the time on my phone. It had been nearly four hours since I’d checked out one of the on-campus study rooms, which was basically a soundproof booth with transparent walls—which, I had to assume was to prevent people from using them like a one-hour motel—and a long table down the middle. They were doled out on a first come, first serve basis and were booked by the hour. In theory, I could be booted out if a new group came in since I’d been occupying it all afternoon, but the library was virtually abandoned on the Saturday afternoon. Tomorrow would be a different story. That’s when everyone and their brother would need to cram in everything they should have been doing the day before.
I stood up to stretch when my friend Jeanine spotted me from across the vacant library and rushed over to my pod. “There you are!” She pushed into the room and looked down with a raised eyebrow at the stack of paper coffee cups scattered all across the desk. “How long have you been in here?”
“Too long.” I cleared away the evidence of my frequent visits to the nearby coffee shop, pushing them off the table into a recycle bin.
Jeanine brightened. “Okay, then. Ready to escape? The guys want to go clubbing tonight. Apparently there’s some cool, new DJ they’ve been worshiping from afar and she’s in town, just for tonight, at some club on the strip.”
I rolled my eyes and plopped back into my chair. “And you raced all the way down here to tell me that? Really, Jeanine?”
She crossed her arms. “Yes, I did! You’re welcome for trying to rescue you.”
I pulled my long black hair into a low ponytail. “I’m sorry but come on. You’ve known me long enough to know that I’m not really a club girl.”
“I know, but can’t you make an exception—just this once?” She pushed out her bottom lip in an exaggerated pout. I really want you to go.”
I rolled my eyes. “Really?”
She shrugged, her lips returning to normal. “It was worth a shot. How about dinner? Will you meet up with us afterward for some In-and-Out or something?”
“Maybe,” I said. “I just have a lot to do here—French Lit midterm.”
Jeanine frowned. “All right, but you’ve been at this all day. You need a little break.”
I nodded, leaving out the part where I’d been taking frequent breaks to obsess and daydream about Grant, which was precisely the reason why I hadn’t managed to get much more than a paragraph or two typed up on the essay for my French Literature class. Although, I’d thoroughly enjoyed the class over the semester, writing was never my strong point, and with Grant popping in and out of my head it was like pushing through really thick mud.
I was starting to wonder if the teacher would accept a sketched version of the essay instead. I was much better with tactile projects and could probably pump out some kind of drawing within an hour. With writing, the words were in my head but they got tangled by the time they made it to the paper. With art, it was a natural flow, that most of the time felt effortless.
Jeanine stood by the doorway. “Promise you’ll call me later.”
“I will.” I nodded and gave her a small smile.
She waved and scurried out of the soundproof room to meet up with the rest of the crew. I watched until she was out of my sight, and then turned my attention back to the flashing cursor on my laptop screen. The paper was due in less than a week, and it was starting to feel like I had miles to go until I could hit the print button and cross it off my ever growing list of uncompleted homework projects. My senior year was rapidly winding up, and with that, came an avalanche of homework as the professors were bent on some kind of mission to get every last drop out of you before they forked over a glossy degree.
I cranked up the Indie rock band music piping through my ear buds and tried to get back on task. I tapped out a few sentences, then deleted them, and repeated the cycle for a few minutes. After another hour of effort, I had a couple more paragraphs down, but I hadn’t dared to read the entire thing back yet—afraid that it was all crap.
“Ugh,” I groaned, pulling the buds from my ears and tossing them down onto the table before me. It was hard to focus on the words of long-ago French philosophers when I couldn’t get the images of a man who would be more at home among the Greek gods than in a Beret on the French Riviera…although, he probably summered there…in a pair of swim trunks that clung to his thighs and—
“Megan!” I scolded myself, thankful the study room was soundproofed. Although, the walls were transparent, so I still needed to keep it together. Anyone passing by would have a front row seat to my self-inflicted lecture, and that had to look a little weird.
I buried my face in my hands and applied my thumbs to my temples, drawing small circles to loosen the pressure that was threatening to turn into a massive stress headache. What the hell was wrong with me? He was just a guy! I’d never lost my shit this much over a guy before. I’d even made it through junior and high school without suffering the clichéd boyfriend breakdowns that plagued most of my classmates.
Even in college, I’d been able to maneuver the new dating landscape without much of an issue before. Granted, I hadn’t really gone on that many dates, and anything that lasted long enough to be considered a relationship, generally ended amicably within the first six months, and in most cases, we stayed friends when it was all said and done. I hadn’t experienced the heartache and crash and burn that most of my friends had, and therefore had no experience to draw from in regards to knowing how to get Grant and his deep, dark, sultry eyes out of my head.
It wasn’t even just that he’d been so ridiculously good looking. It was everything about him. The way his lips curled into his bad boy grin, the powerful muscles that were so evident underneath his charcoal suit, and I couldn’t even think about how intoxicating he smelled. It was like he’d just stepped out of the pages of a magazine—or was the star of his own action movie. But no, he wasn’t a model—or even a movie star—no, that would be far too pedestrian—no, no. Grant Alexander Christiansen was just a mother trucking billionaire who not only took over his family’s empire when his father passed away unexpectedly, but he also had a huge venture capitalist who had invested in many of the country’s newest, and fastest growing companies in the past five years. Oh, yeah, and he hadn’t even hit thirty yet.
So, I might have done some Googling…
I rolled my eyes at the entire thing. It was too much, really.
Meeting him, and conversing with him would have been enough to stay with me, but the fact that he’d offered me a job with his company on the basis that I’d completely destroyed his newest marketing campaign was insane. I mean, someone should probably do a CAT scan on the man.
The wackiest part of it all was that I was starting to think that my major mistake in the entire conversation hadn’t been ripping apart his ads but in saying no to the job offer in the first place.
Sure, Grant had been over the top. He obviously thought very highly of himself and expected those around him to hold the same opinion, but in some ways, considering his resume, didn’t he have a right to?
I wasn’t sure what kind of job he was really offering me, but working for a company like Timeless Timepieces was something to add to my resume that could open a lot of doors for me down the road.
Of my four brothers, the oldest, Sam, had gone to college and he’d chosen a path radically different than the one my dad had wanted, choosing a sociology degree to help him with social work. It was low paying, but Sam felt it was a fulfilling career. My three middle brothers — Kevin, Phillip, and Robbie were all a little less focused, and while Kevin dabbled with college courses after high school, he ended up dropping out when he met his girlfriend, Sonya. She had a daughter from another relationship and Kevin became a bit of a stand in dad when they got together. However, that mostly meant floundering through a string of restaurant jobs that never seemed to last longer than a year. Phillip and Robbie both still lived at home with my dad and me, much to my father’s chagrin. Phillip and Robbie were a little rough and tumble and always got into something that brought the drama to my dad’s attention, but he didn’t kick them out, no matter how much stupid shit they got into.
When I started the business major, my father was thrilled, but it quickly became evident that it wasn’t a good fit for me, and I switched to psychology, then anthropology, and finally marketing, before admitting that none of it was a good fit, dropped most of my classes and reworked my entire course load to pursue a graphic design degree. Art had always been my passion, but for a few years I let other’s nay-sayings get in the way of me chasing it down. Most people told me that while I had a natural talent, it wasn’t ever going to be something that would pay the bills and that I should go back to a more traditional route. My first day of class after making the switch everything felt right, and I hadn’t looked back since then. That was all I needed to know.
