Liza and I knew each other, on account of Lord McConnery being a long-time client of the firm, and we were on fairly good terms. I wasn’t sure whether I could say the same for her boss, McConnery was such a hard man to read.
“Hey, Liza,” I said dully. She may have been nice and easy to get along with, but that doesn’t mean I enjoyed talking to her. I tended to describe Liza by saying if you’ve ever seen that internet meme called “The Most Interesting Man in the World,” then Liza is the exact opposite of that.
It was harsh but true. Liza was as boring as they came, and never really stopped talking. Today, however, she was direct and to the point, thankfully.
“Mr. McConnery would like to schedule a meeting,” Liza was saying. “Tomorrow morning. Can you make that, or do I need to tell him to reschedule?”
On the one hand, a lie-in tomorrow morning sounded good, but I knew way, way better than to force Lord McConnery to reschedule. He was like a spoiled child, when he didn’t get his way, he went stomping around and damaged things. Not physically, but as he was well aware, a rich, powerful man can cause much more devastating damage than what a man can inflict physically.
“Sure, I can be there,” I said casually. “Do I need to prepare anything specific for the meeting?”
According to Liza, Lord McConnery was looking to pitch us a new development project, and apparently, he was planning on delivering the full scope of this new project at our meeting the following day. I’d been doing work for Lord McConnery’s firm, High Risers, for years now, and although when he doesn’t get his way he resorts to acting like the fat kid from Harry Potter who gets thirty-six presents instead of thirty-seven and then throws a tantrum, Lord McConnery knew the value of hard work, and I’d received glowing recommendations for the work I’d done with him around the city.
In fact, it was safe to say that there were jobs, clients, and projects that I’d only been offered because of my good working relationship with Lord McConnery and his firm, High Risers. He was well known around the city to be one of the most demanding bosses anybody could find…pretty much anywhere.
And it wasn’t just us, interior decorators, that felt the sting of his whip or were suffocated by his iron fist. It was everyone who worked for him. According to urban rumors on the streets, he asked his lawyers to do things that could get them disbarred, he asked his bankers to approve transactions and trades that were questionable enough to get the FBI, or the Securities and Exchange Commission knocking on their door.
It wasn’t as though Lord McConnery had never been asked exactly why he ran such a tight ship, he’d been asked many times. But his answers were always kind of…vague. He never actually answered questions that he didn’t feel like answering, he just sidestepped them and instead said vague, confident-sounding buzz phrases, like “the only time success comes before work is in the dictionary.” That doesn’t actually mean…anything, but it definitely sounded good for sure.
I wasn’t actually sure how true the rumors were, but apparently, Lord McConnery had been in real estate for more than twenty years.
And the general consensus was that if you could handle working for him, you could handle pretty much anything, a thing that was known around not just Queens, but all of New York. When I turned up to scheduled interviews, and client closing meetings, throwing around the name of High Risers, and more specifically, Mr. McConnery, was like a superpower. If interior decorating was a game of blackjack, then having High Risers in your corner was the equivalent to knowing that you could double down with a sixteen and always be dealt a four.
So being associated with McConnery certainly had its ups and downs, although the downs were most keenly felt. It was almost impossible to have a social life when you worked for Mr. McConnery, no matter how hard you tried. And boy-oh-boy, have I tried! And an admirable try it was if I do say so myself.
I must admit, I didn’t lose much. I’ve never had many friends, at any rate, it’s just the kind of person I am - I move with small crowds. It’s not unheard of, but having a small social group allowed me to last longer than most at the great game of trying to juggle a personal life and working for High Risers. On the streets of New York, it’s kind of like a challenge. Nobody working for McConnery has managed to succeed. Not his bankers, not his lawyers, not his fixers, not his accountants and, proved by my own valiant attempt, not his interior decorators.
I often wondered if there would ever be one to succeed (or indeed, survive) the immense workload McConnery liked to drop on the people who worked for him. But, to be fair, I had much more important things to wonder about. For example, I wondered what McConnery would have me running around doing for him this time.
Well, no time to sit and wonder about what he might expect of me this time! Let’s get the existing projects out of the way to get enough resources on his plans as soon as we get the scope, as per his usual style, the deadlines will be tight and his expectations bordering on miraculous.
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Author’s Note
Thank you to all my readers, especially those who are reading my work for the first time. It is my privilege to have you by my side and I am glad and thankful that you all chose to spend a day or two reading my book.
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XO, K. M. Bishop
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Also by K. M. Bishop
Fake It For Me
Lucky In Love
Indiana Panthers: The Complete Series
My Friend’s Sister
Only You
Redemption
The Touchdown
Hotshot
His Secrets Page 25
