She gives me a long look, and for seconds I think I’ve pissed her off. But apparently any joke at Steve’s expense is a good one, so when she does eventually roll over, she grabs my arm and I fall onto the bed, flat on my face, rolling with her.
I end up on top of her, wearing only my shorts. I have her hands pinned to the sheets above her head. If she weren’t on her back, it would look like surrender. Her tits look delicious.
I put my mouth on one, then the other.
“See?” Becca says, failing hard to resist a smile. “Creep.”
I use my mouth to shut her up. I free her hands, and we make out for a while, bare chest to bare chest. We roll freely, and within minutes we’re basically in a cocoon. I’m hard as a railroad spike, and she’s writhing in invitation, but this is the wrong time for an encore. We’ve got a long trip, and I have a meeting in three hours. I’ll be lucky to make it as it is.
We extricate ourselves. Rebecca won’t reveal enough of her feelings to say it, but I know she doesn’t want to stop. If she weren’t Rebecca — with all her damage and internal walls — she’d say so. She’d beg me back to bed.
I try to rationalize a shower, and once I’ve done that, I tell myself it’d make no difference if she joined me, and we could do it standing with her palms against the tiled wall.
But there’s no time for any of it, and I say so. I get more sarcastic jibes in return, asking me why if time was so tight, I didn’t wake her up earlier instead of watching her sleep like a creepy stalker.
We dress in the same clothes. It’s a little gross, but Becca’s right; I didn’t tell her to bring anything because I wanted to surprise her. I have some basics in my case, but that’s not fair if I change and she can’t.
My limo takes us to the airport. I’ve called ahead, so the plane is waiting. Once we’re airborne, we have tons of time again, but neither of us suggests that we close the door and use the couch as a playground. With some time passed between our morning roll and now, it feels almost presumptuous.
The time passes, and I stuff down the strong bodily need that keeps rising every time I catch her eyes. She’s still wearing the dress that aroused me so much last night. She called down for a kit and got all the makeup off her face, but she’s gorgeous enough, at least in my eyes, that the look is still stunning. It’s hard to believe she’s able to get anywhere or do anything in her personal life. Wouldn’t guys be hitting on her constantly?
I guess that viper’s tongue keeps her safe.
We pass the flight with business. We kick the tires of my education idea again, and although I can’t tell her that I’ll pitch it to the Syndicate when it’s ready, I do tell her that funding shouldn’t be a problem. The idea I gave her last night is rough for sure; it’s the shape of something that we’ll have to pick at for months before the first steps can be taken. And the resulting process will likely take years. There’s plenty to figure out, pro and con.
She still wants to understand her role. I tell her that we need to figure that out, too, but that I think she’ll be in charge of advocacy, starting with raving fans. She’ll build the marketing funnels (to attract talent rather than sell tickets, though there will be a day for that, too), communicate with the interested people, and build the fan base.
“Fans? For an idea, in education of all things, that doesn’t even exist?”
And I say, “If anyone can do it, Rebecca Presley can.”
But not yet, obviously. There simply isn’t anything to do. I tell Becca that we can continue to talk and sketch the idea, but she vehemently shakes her head. We’ve talked enough, and in Becca’s world, where she grew up, “talking” wasn’t the same as “earning your keep.” She’s being paid a million dollars, so she damn well needs to do something.
“Well,” I tell her as the plane begins its descent into Austin, “you could start building email lists for this education initiative.”
She shakes her head. She’s too smart to fall for that; building lists at this pre-pre-pre-point is busywork. We know nothing about the market, our user base or the talent we’ll need. Lists built today would be obsolete by the time we need them.
“Something real, Evan, or I give the money back, and my association with LiveLyfe has to end. I joke about a lot of stuff, but I’m serious about this one. By the time I met Steve, I had money. But I grew up dirt poor. In Festus, Kentucky. The place is an unwashed butthole.”
“I know. It was on your blog. You’re terrible at keeping boundaries.”
With a dead-straight face, Becca says, “So you know. But what I don’t think I’ve written about is this: When I was in my late teens, I had a few boyfriends who wanted to ‘save’ me. I guess I attracted a type. They were poor, too, because all of Festus was poor. But they set me up like a charity, offering me jobs in their daddy’s stores that I wasn’t qualified for. Sometimes they flat-out tried to give me money. I hated it, even then, broke as I was. I don’t like getting something I haven’t earned, Evan. I don’t like to be taken care of.”
“Of course,” I say, even though she’s just given me a hell of a challenge. I need her help on the education thing. That’s not bullshit, and no matter what Rebecca thinks, talking the idea out is valuable. I want her mind on it, and the more I think about the engagement this thing will need, I doubt that I can do it without her. But finding a job for her to do at LiveLyfe right now that will feel like neither charity nor nepotism — a job she’d be good at and want to do? I don’t have jobs like that just lying around.
“You seem to think I’m good at some stuff,” she says.
“I do. You are.”
“Well, other than this educational thing, what matters most to LiveLyfe?”
Almost instantly, I have an idea. The answer is simple. There are two main goals: increase usage of the platform, and make the platform itself more useful to users. The second goal belongs to the developers, but the first half is right in Rebecca’s wheelhouse.
We need people spending more time on LiveLyfe, using it to do more and more things.
That doesn’t just require features. It requires mindshare and bonding.
I tell Rebecca what I have in mind.
She loves the idea but tells me it comes with one condition.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
REBECCA
EVAN KISSES ME HELLO WHEN I greet him at the office the next day. I wasn’t sure what to expect: are we people who’ve fucked twice, or something more?
My heart flutters at the kiss, but it comes with hesitation. I’ve regretted it before when I’ve felt good about men in the past. I’m a weathervane that’s somehow always pointing in the wrong direction.
I lean in, matching the embrace. It’s brief but real. I wouldn’t initiate it, but Evan does. There’s presumption in the gesture, but it’s the kind I can live with.
We hold for just a few seconds. It’s sweet, but not sloppy.
I blink as we separate. I feel fizzy inside, like a freshly shaken soda.
“Ready to get to work?” he asks.
“I guess that depends. Did you get me carte blanche?”
Evan sighs. That means no.
“I told you, Evan. I’m only going to work on a LiveLyfe bonding initiative if I have free rein.”
He looks uncomfortable. “I can’t give you free rein, Becca. But—”
“Then no deal.” I don’t like how petulant I sound when I say it. I don’t mean to cross my arms; it’s knee-jerk, like when I screamed at him for saying he wanted to take care of me. I’m a minefield. Why a balanced guy like Evan would want to be on kissing terms with me is a mystery.
“Let me finish. I can’t give you totally free rein because that’s impossible in a multinational, multi-billion-dollar company. You understand that, right? Everyone from top to bottom can’t just be told to stay out of your way. What if you decide to buy Wells Fargo?”
“Well, obviously. I didn’t mean that kind of free rein.”
“It’s a continuum. You don’t
get authority over my entire staff. You need a budget. You can’t just suck whatever you want from the corporate account.”
“Also obviously. I meant that—”
He raises a hand to stop me. “I’m just trying to make a point. You’ve already admitted that true carte blanche isn’t an option. My challenge is to figure out how much freedom I can give you between either extreme. And not to be an asshole, Becca, but you’re not always the easiest person to predict. If you can be straight with me about what exactly you’ll accept as a limitation and what will piss you off, maybe we can find our way. But if you tell me one thing and then snap—”
“Set me a budget. Whatever you think the project is worth.”
“I don’t know what the project is.”
“Neither do I. But I don’t want to be micromanaged. If you want me to do this, then you need to trust me. I built what I have by following my nose. I’ll figure out what shape it’ll take as I work on it. The budget can be my constraint. If I have a hundred grand to find ways to bond people to LiveLyfe, I’ll find a way to work with a hundred grand. If you think it’s worth a million, give me a million. If the result you’re after is worth ten million to the company, then let me spend that much. I’ll work whatever you give me.”
“The result is worth billions. Increasing user time spent on LiveLyfe by a significant percentage? That’s huge. The question is whether whatever you do is a small or large part of that result.”
I wave the discussion away. “You pick the budget. That’s not my business. But then tell everyone to stay out of my way and let me use it.”
“You’ll need some supervision, Becca. I don’t mean a middle manager following you around with a big coffee cup telling you to fill out TPS reports, but something. A check-in here and there, probably with marketing. There are some great people in marketing here in the Austin office.”
“No, Evan. I don’t like people keeping tabs on me. I don’t like the feeling of someone watching over my shoulder and telling me whether what I’m doing is good or bad. I work alone, my way, or not at all.”
“But what you’re doing is marketing,” Evan protests. I can tell he doesn’t want to insist outright, but I can also tell he strongly disagrees with my pitch. “At the very least, you’ll want to coordinate with Deborah about the branding angles we’re already taking, and—”
“I said no, Evan.” I see the look in his eyes, so I soften my demeanor. “This is just how I need to work. I understand if that’s not how things work at LiveLyfe. I won’t be offended if you say no — but I’ve been thinking of shutting my sideline gigs down to focus on this.”
“You’re shutting down the site? But how will the world know about Steve’s tiny dick?”
I don’t smile. I want to, but this is serious.
“I mean it, Evan. Please. Tell me now if this will work, because I don’t want to kill my sidelines if this job at LiveLyfe isn’t going to work out.”
Conflict crosses Evan’s face. He doesn’t want to agree, but it’s also become abundantly clear that he doesn’t want my focus elsewhere. He might joke about me shutting down my operation, but I know he’ll be glad for the lack of distraction. The “increasing LiveLyfe branding” project is a trojan horse for Evan; he wants me to do it just so I’ll be around the office all day, and available whenever he wants to pick my brain about the education plan.
We’re at an impasse. He doesn’t want to let the crazy Rebecca Presley off the leash inside his company, nor does he want to lose me.
He doesn’t want to lose me.
I hear the words as I think them. I feel stupid letting the thought clang with its double meaning, but I let it clang anyway. The thought warms me, like a blanket fresh from the dryer.
I wait. Evan matches my stare, but he said yesterday how pointless resistance feels against the depth of my eyes.
Another big exhale.
“Fine. We’ll work up a budget, and you can spend it however you’d like. Just …” Evan pauses, seeming to wonder if he should say what he’s thinking. “Just please try not to break anything in my company while you’re running around helping it.”
I reach out. I put my palm on his cheek. “Of course not.”
“I’m not comfortable working this way.”
“I know. It’s just how it has to be for me. No interference. No check-ins. Nobody sniffing around.”
“Okay.”
“Do you promise?”
Another long moment. Another sigh. Evan knows how much this matters to me. Of all the shitty boyfriend stories I’ve told him, the biggest always revolve around one thing: asshole men breaking their promises. Right now, knowing what he knows about me, I might as well be asking Evan to swear on his grandmother’s life. He might have been able to dodge before, but not if he agrees to this. The promise matters that much.
“Yes,” he says.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
EVAN
I SEE MY MISTAKE THE second Callie says, “What?”
It’s the kind of “What?” someone says when they know exactly what was said but can’t believe the idiocy behind the words.
“You don’t know what she’s working on?”
“Um …”
“How can you not know, Evan? You understand how this is supposed to work. First project approval and assignment, then budget. I wondered why the hell you were bringing this project to me personally. The project manager usually handles it. But I guess that can’t happen because there is no PM on Rebecca’s project?”
“It’s different with Rebecca. She’s a pure creative. You can’t give her too many instructions, or it’ll hamper her ability to do the job.”
“I thought her job was as a consultant for God knows what, for a million-dollar retainer?”
“This is something new.”
Callie seems unbelievably exasperated. I don’t even disagree. I know perfectly well that Callie is right, that this isn’t how things are supposed to work and that I’m a blind, foolish idiot. I don’t have a single solid argument.
“Evan …” The word is almost pleading. More exasperation. She’s not mad at me, either. She just doesn’t understand why I want to sabotage the company. “I’m not talking about giving her directions or squashing her creativity. This is about oversight and accountability. You want to authorize this much expenditure and not so much as check in to see how she’s doing? It seems okay to you that nobody’s making sure she does things according to protocol, that she’s not breaking confidentiality without meaning to, or any one of a dozen other things?”
I don’t want to answer. Callie is asking if I “want to authorize this much expenditure.” She’s going to be even more upset when she connects the dots: I already have authorized it, behind her back, several days ago. It wasn’t just broken protocol; it was also a subtle slap across Callie’s face. I’m undermining her position and weakening her hand — things she needs to do her job. But what choice did I have? She’d have said no if I had asked. At least I’m letting her know the money is already transferred so that she can keep track of it.
Callie sighs, shuffling papers. I know there’s nothing about this project on the papers. It’s a nervous tic — straightening her desk whenever it feels like things around her are falling down, just to exercise some control.
“Evan …”
“She’s right for this, Callie. You have to trust me.”
“It’s not about trust!” Poor Callie. She looks somewhere between wanting to throttle me and wanting to cry.
“LiveLyfe can afford it,” I say.
“It’s not about that, either!” Papers find their stacks, so Callie can finally meet my eyes. I’m trying to sound sure, but I’m not. I know she’s right. I don’t know why I agreed to Rebecca’s terms. “Do you know what I did yesterday? I reviewed all of our insurance policies.”
“Now that sounds like a good time.”
“I wanted to know what our libel exposure is. Defamation of character, that sort of thing.”<
br />
“Why?”
“Because our competitors hate us. Because at the first chance of a lawsuit, we’ll get a dozen.”
“That’s why we have lawyers.”
“For things that are defensible!” Callie calms herself. “Evan, you know the bad press we’ve been getting lately. People are talking antitrust.”
“That’ll never stick.”
“You act like this company is ironclad, but it’s far from it. We’ve got enormous cash reserves, true. But what happens if public favor turns while we’re getting attacked?”
“Callie …”
“Don’t act like it’s not a possibility. You have a history of burying your head in the sand. You even asked me to call you on it when you did it. Remember? Well, you are right now, Evan. We’re exposed on some of the deals we’re extending, and whatever secret things you’re doing with your billionaire buddies …” She shakes her head. “You think that we’re huge. That even if bad things happen, it won’t be enough to dent us. And you know what? You’re right. But you know how fast things change in social media, and a big black eye in public could trigger a downward spiral. Even if we don’t slowly die over the next twenty years, you can forget about funding your little sideline projects. We’ll be too busy digging.”
I consider what Callie is saying, mainly because I typically dismiss her predictions out of hand as fears that the sky might collapse any minute. It’s her job to be conservative and paranoid, and I think she overreacts. But this time? I still think she’s giving me the worst of all worst cases. Nonetheless, it rings true. I’ve been flippant. Rolling the dice for no good reason.
“Look, I know you like her. But you know she talks without thinking. You’ve set her loose in LiveLyfe’s innards. If she says the wrong thing — even accidentally and with the best of intentions — it’ll go viral. People are lining up to take shots at LiveLyfe.”
“It’ll be fine.” But I’m not sure. Becca herself would admit that she speaks without thinking. That she has no filter. That she gets triggered and often regrets her actions when it’s too late.
The Founder (Trillionaire Boys' Club Book 7) Page 13
