Mergers & Acquisitions

by Jennifer Griffith

  “Five? Has it really been five minutes since we met?” There was no line for this ride, as Ryker had arranged. He and Phoebe had already disappeared down the dark canal in their little gondola. The ride’s conductor had one of those dead-eyed stares into nowhere as we approached. We climbed down the little step into the unsteady boat and sat on the red vinyl bench.

  Aero glanced at his watch. “Closer to eight minutes, actually.”

  “Time flies when you’re having fun.” Had I really just implied that I found being with him fun? Geez. This sounded like flirting. Had my professionalism just fallen into the murky moat and floated downstream?

  Speaking of absent professionalism, Aero still had hold of my hand. Every second he touched me felt like time was stopped instead of flying. I glanced down at our clasped fingers, and he pulled them away.

  “Sorry about that. I guess it was just for show. For Ryker.”

  The current broke, and everything in me went cold for a second. Until I looked over at him again, that was. Holy moly, this guy. His smoldering gaze, his amazing hair … he looked like a modernized Jay Gatsby, but that was no excuse for going so berserk over him in the first few seconds of meeting him. It was like I’d been propelled into a movie meet-cute, or a reality dating show where the woman instantly defined her physical attraction to him as love.

  Well, this wasn’t love. And I shouldn’t be flirting. Or handholding. Or getting stunned by electrical currents shooting out of ice-blue eyes. This was business, and ought to be treading carefully, especially with the Ryker account on the line. By firing Marsha What’s-her-name and hiring Aero, Ryker had recently shown he had the backbone to change up his representation team. BGG would never want me to do anything to endanger their relationship with Ryker.

  So I pasted on a compliant smile to mask the bubbles going pop-pop-pop inside and making me grin.

  The boat bobbled to a beginning and began sailing us past the black curtain into the tunnel, which played romantic music from a bygone era.

  Uh, that was not helping. I was a sucker for pretty much all the romantic music from bygone eras.

  “He calls you Jilly. Is that your name?”

  Oh, right. He had introduced himself, but I hadn’t. “Jillian Price. I work for BGG. It’s my fourth year there, and I’m finally getting my own accounts and my feet under me. This is the first time I’m coming up for air and noticing the world since before law school, really.”

  “Ryker’s account is yours?”

  “It’s actually the whole firm’s, but since I’m low on the totem pole, they send me on his more whimsical meet-ups, especially the ones on Saturdays when the higher-ups have their kids’ soccer games to go to. Not that they leave their laptops or their phones or their work at home, they just have to be physically present in the soccer stands or plan on paying alimony and child support, and they know it too well.”

  Wow, I sounded so jaded. However, it was true: BGG was a life-sucking venture. For the last few months all I had been able to think about was escape plans.

  “But hey,” I said. “We’re in the Tunnel of Love. Should we be talking about work? I know Ryker well enough to know there’s a chance he’ll ask us to report on our conversation and it had better not be about business.”

  “So that’s the way it is, huh?” Aero didn’t sound too versed in the business of child star agenting and management. I wanted to know how he’d gotten this gig, but since I’d just demanded that he not talk shop, I’d better change the subject soon.

  “The client is always right, especially when he’s never been wrong.” I exhaled and leaned against Aero as we rounded a bend. I might as well, since centrifugal force demanded it— plus it gave me a sense of his shoulder’s strength. Carrying Ryker, even if only metaphorically, would require strong shoulders. Yep, Aero qualified.

  “Tell me about yourself, Aero Jantzen. That’s a Dutch last name, right?” I liked knowing about surname origins. It had started when I was an art history major in undergrad because it helped me with identifying painting origins during tests.

  “Yes. My grandfather came from The Hague in the 1960s. He always liked the movies, and even though he didn’t get into the industry— he was a banker instead— he and my grandma immigrated and brought their business with them. She brought me up and I’ve been working at New Holland Savings since I was ten and doing janitorial work there at night.”

  “Wait. You’re not a Hollywood agent?”

  “No. What makes you think that?”

  “Um, because you’re Ryker’s agent?”

  “Oh, that. I guess that would lead you to believe that. But we’re not talking business, right? Tell me about yourself.”

  We sailed past the Swept Away’s first romantic nudge display: a little scene of two animatronic dogs rubbing noses over a big plastic steak. Someone, maybe Donny Osmond, was singing “Puppy Love.” Ah, love. And meat.

  “About me?” I struggled to come up with something, anything, not work-related. Stupid BGG had taken over almost every aspect of my life for the past forever. I often didn’t know if it was day or night or what season it was. Well, I could blame some of that on Southern California’s eternal spring. “Me? Uh, I like art. I’m collecting.” As of this morning, I could’ve added. I had a few things before, thrift store finds or friends’ work, plus the bargain basement prices of the BGG clients whose day job was a bigger creative pursuit, but nothing potentially real until now.

  Speaking of the potential of my new acquisition being real, I suppressed the urge to check the time. I didn’t want to miss Grady Ingliss.

  “That’s great. My grandma used to paint, I think, but she gave it up to raise her family. There’s all kinds of art around the house, huge paintings and miniatures. I grew up hearing the stories and histories of the art.”

  “Really? I studied art history in undergrad. Then I realized there were no paying jobs in it and bailed before going after my master’s in it. Instead I took the LSAT, and the rest is history.” History was right: life lost to the time stream, a series of years with nothing but piles of files to show for it.

  “What do you mean, no jobs? Galleries make money.”

  “Uh, no.” What was he smoking? Galleries did not make money. Unless they hit a jackpot, like got a rare painting or sculpture that was a draw for the public, charged exorbitant entry fees, and then had a serious clientele and a steady stream of desirable artwork to sell— or a bottomless pit of money patron to bankroll them— it was a hopeless profession.

  “I’d think with the BGG connection, there would be artists lining up to get their work put in galleries.”

  “BGG represents actors.”

  “But most creative people have crossover creativity. They choreograph, design clothing, come up with perfume lines, paint. Don’t tell me you didn’t already know this.”

  “Why, exactly, do you know this?” I wished I could see his face, those blue eyes, and how sincere they were, but the darkness of the tunnel we’d reentered prevented it. Still, I had my other senses, and they were all tingling, dang them. He smelled like black licorice, a scent I’d never realized before now made me a little crazy.

  “I’m a banker. An investor. BGG has a few BFFs that overlap with New Holland’s. I’m obviously not going to name names, but I may have overseen capital infusion into a few creative ventures involving a very successful shoe design that supposedly ‘Revolutionized Running.’”

  Great honk. Had his bank’s capital startup loan made the Bad Blue Shoe line possible? It was the hottest thing in workout wear these days, and that was because the ads claimed Viarni Hoffstettler herself designed them. A total sucker, I’d bought a pair myself, and they were in my locker at the BGG workout sector.

  “A gallery, huh?” The word rolled around in my head like a marble on tilting glass. “But usually if someone is great at one angle, they aren’t nearly as good at another. Case in point, Michael Jordan’s foray into baseball.”

  “That’s sports, s
o it doesn’t count as a comparison.”

  Okay, maybe not. We sailed past another vignette, two love birds perched on a power line with animatronic butterflies flitting past them against a deep blue sky. Love Creates Eternal Spring, read the cloud created by the skywriter’s plane behind them. Ah, love. And pollution.

  “You should think about it.”

  “Maybe I will.” Maybe I would. Aero might actually have an idea there. It did a little dance in the area behind my ribcage. Besides my other acquisitions that were small potatoes, I’d picked up a few oils and watercolors here and there from clients when they offered them to BGG employees. Nothing I’d say my soul really resonated to, but definitely stuff someone would like. Especially if they were already fans of the artist in another venue. Fandom had its obsessive side. One of the painters whose work was in my closet at home had more followers on social media than live in the entire nation of France, so yeah. There was a potential buyer for that little piece of oil on canvas.

  “Hey, this is business talk again.”

  “No, it’s hopes and dreams talk. That’s different.”

  “What makes you think an art gallery constitutes my hopes and dream?”

  “I’m in investing; I specialize in hopes and dreams. When someone comes in with an idea, I’ve learned to read how much of an emotional investment they’re willing to make.”

  “And the more intense the emotion, the more likely you are to invest?”

  “Uh, not exactly.” He laughed a little as our gondola clunked and bobbled us around a dark corner and took us past a new scene, this time one of a library. In it a pair of teenagers perched behind a shared open book, broad enough to cover both their faces. A mechanized gear moved their arms up and down, revealing and then hiding their smooch behind the book. A wry-smiling librarian turned a blind eye as she held up a romance novel she was reading too. Love Story read the title on the placard above the scene.

  It should have read Public Displays of Affection at the Public Library. Oh, well. Love and books had to be better than pollution or meat, I guessed.

  “Then how do you decide whether to risk your money in someone’s hope or dream or whatever?”

  “This is straying back into business again.”

  “No, this is straying into the human psyche. It will help me get to know you and give me something really good to report to Ryker.”

  “You’re not telling Ryker about this, are you?”

  No, I wasn’t.

  Aero Jantzen gauged me with those blue eyes, apparently found my sincerity adequate, and then continued. “It’s not about the emotion, it’s about the plan. There’s a delicate balance when it comes to an entrepreneur’s emotion. If I read too much of it, I know the passion will flame out. If it’s not enough, I know the business person won’t have the fuel to keep the plan’s fire alight long enough to make back my investment. I’m careful with our bank’s clients’ money. I don’t mess around.”

  “So you employ psychological tests.”

  “Basically.” He turned to me just as we rolled out of the lighted area, and I caught a glimpse of his mouth tugging to one side. His mouth was as beautiful as his eyes. He was smiling at me as if he found me attractive and engaging and irresistible— or so I let myself wish because it was so true from my side of the equation. Maybe the music and the librarian and the puppies had affected my brain, because a kiss rose up from my soul and perched at the tip of my lips, ready to jump onto his mouth. I bit it back.

  “But,” he said, “there are occasions where I just follow my gut. If I believe in the person, and my instinct says to help him or her with the project, I’ll pull the lever and invest, even if it doesn’t make logical sense.”

  “Have you ever been wrong on those?”

  “Some of them haven’t panned out yet, but for the most part, no. My gut has been a good guide.”

  “Interesting.” Very. In fact, a lot about Aero Jantzen was interesting. He seemed to like his family. He loved art. He had ideas. He cared about stuff.

  It was nice to meet a person like him, I must admit, after being in what I’d term a compassion vacuum for the past however long, where everyone seemed only to be interested in helping someone based on what it could do for them, their careers, their bank accounts, their prestige. BGG was morally exhausting. Yeah, I had to figure a way out.

  This gallery idea of Aero’s had me thinking. I mulled it over as effectively as I could under the wafting and hypnotic effect of that scent of black licorice. Even if Aero here didn’t think a gallery would become a complete money pit, I knew how risky it was, especially without a big name draw. A big name in art, that was.

  We sailed around a sharp corner, beneath a waterfall that parted just for us but which left a chilly spray against the skin of my upper arms. I shivered. Gears clicked into place in my mind. Something had happened in this tunnel— something inside me.

  “Hopes and dreams, huh?” I whispered, looking up at Aero’s incredible eyes.

  “My specialty.”

  Our gondola lurched to a stop. A big, flat metal plate rose up in front of our boat, and though the water rushed past and our boat bumped repeatedly against the obstacle, we’d stopped.

  “Uh … ” I looked at Aero. He gave a single-shoulder shrug. Now I didn’t suppress the time-checking urge. I had less than two hours to get to Grady Ingliss’s place, and I still hadn’t really talked to Ryker about the business he’d claimed he wanted me to meet him for today. This was not good.

  “Do you think it’s broken?” I craned my neck to look for the ride operator to come and fix this thing and get me on my way.

  “Nah. Ryker probably just asked them to delay it— since he and Phoebe didn’t just meet.”

  Made sense. Fifteen-year-olds needed a place to isolate their girlfriends, I guessed. And if they were big name movie stars, they could commandeer an amusement park ride for their make-outs.

  But this had better not go on too long.

  I wasn’t anxious to leave Aero. He was the best thing to happen to any Saturday morning I’d had in years, with the possible exception of my Mars Yuber, if it turned out to be real; however, being in the dark with Aero was liable to make me forget the time— and my professionalism altogether. This spot just officially became the most dangerous location in all of Thrillsville for me and my sense of propriety.

  Cool mist from the waterfall humidified the air, with bigger drops pelting us now and then. Aero’s strong shoulder brushed against mine, and I caught another big whiff of his cologne. I shivered to keep myself from getting a little too tingly from it. This guy gave me all the right chills.

  “Are you cold?” Aero slid his jacket off, not waiting for my reply, and placed it over my shoulders, and I think my senses all melted onto the floor of our gondola, where they pooled and left me disarmed.

  The jacket smelled like Aero, the black licorice straight from heaven’s candy shop. Even though I wanted to wad up the fabric and press it to my nose, inhale to the very depths of my lungs, I got a grip on my impulses. Instead, I tugged it around me and said, “Thanks. I was.” How had he known?

  A minute stretched. I checked my watch again, worried more about where my pounding heart was leading my thoughts than about being on time for Grady Ingliss now. Darkness, this gorgeous guy, romantic music, the sound of the water, the way he smelled, the touch of his shoulder pressed against me— it was all combining to mix up my thoughts and doing a number on my defenses.

  “We might be stuck here a while.” Instead of grimacing when he said this, Aero stretched out, crossed his ankles and reached an arm around me. The gondola was indeed a little cramped, so I could see why he’d need to stretch his arms a bit. I fit supernaturally well in the crook of it, like I was made by the Creator to nestle there.

  No. I should not be thinking these thoughts about a guy I’d just met.

  A maintenance worker sloshed by in waders. “Sit tight, folks. Working on this.” That confirmed suspicions. The water ca
me up past his waist. “Relax. We’ll be a bit, but Miss Phoebe is safe.”

  It made sense that the exec’s daughter would be the worker’s top concern. He waded away with a flashlight and a pipe wrench.

  Aero turned toward me. “We might as well shoot the breeze to pass the time.”

  Okay. I was up for that. “What, like a get-to-know-you game? Two truths and a lie?”

  “Sure. Or Random Questions.”

  I loved Random Questions. I didn’t realize that game had made its rounds to other places in California besides where I’d grown up. We played it all the time in high school on bus trips and things.

  “You start.”

  “Okay.” He tapped a finger on my shoulder a few times and then sat up a little. “What dumb accomplishment are you proudest of?”

  “Easy.” I didn’t even have to think for this. “Competitive eating challenge, Phoenix, Arizona, three summers ago. I beat the clock and the cheeseburger limit.”

  Aero appraised me and nodded, a little smile forming. “Nice. Your turn.”

  Now I had to think. “Something you will never do again.”

  “Easy. Cut my own hair. Total junior high disaster.”

  I could picture it. “Oh, man. I did that, too. Had to join Accidental Mullets Anonymous until it grew out.” It really had looked terrible, especially on a girl.

  This went on for fifteen minutes or so. I learned that Aero had built kites to fly on the beach when he was a kid, once took a hot air balloon ride even though he hated heights, and would rather eat a raw egg than a fresh tomato.

  “Who doesn’t like tomatoes?” I about fell off the seat of the gondola, and then I shoved his shoulder a little. It was the first time I’d touched him without being coerced by that teenager, and it felt natural, friendly … flirtatious. “Please. They are the mainstay of the pizza food group.” By now I was blushing with the touch, hoping he wouldn’t react adversely.

  He didn’t. He shoved my shoulder right back with his own. “I didn’t say anything about tomato sauce. Fresh tomatoes have the slime factor I can’t get past.”