by Kent, Julia
The resemblance to Catherine Zeta-Jones was uncanny. Did she ever do any nudes scenes in her films? He'd have to check. No, he'd have to ask Jeremy – he would know.
His khakis and cheap oxford seemed out of place, suddenly. Pausing, he told himself that this was one for Mike – not Matt – to handle. It was safe to stand now, so he did, taking a few steps around his desk and facing her, two feet feeling like five miles. A faint odor of something sweet, like vanilla, tickled his nose.
“You're projecting your insecurities onto me, Lydia.” Wide eyes met his. Aha! He was right. “Just because some part of you doesn't feel like being an administrative assistant is 'good enough' and that people downgrade your intelligence doesn't mean I'm one of those people.” He huffed, a bit incensed on her part, for no reason he understood. “That's the lazy way.”
The slope of her mouth changed, jaw jutting less, tension easing in the muscles. Her brow furrowed and breathing slowed. A little flag of victory waved inside until she said, “I hadn't thought any of those thoughts, Dr. Phil, but apparently you have projected them onto me. Gender politics at work.”
That flag was suddenly white. Shit. Not the reaction he expected. Lydia began scooping up her files, muttering to herself.
He stopped her with a hand on her forearm. Frozen, she didn't move. Didn't breathe. Didn't blink. “How is that gender politics?”
Sputter. Smirk. Eyeroll. “How isn't it? Dave's known for more than a year – no, two years – that I wanted a chance at the social media job. You come in here strutting like the CEO's nephew and bam – instant boss. You're going to tell me my ovaries have nothing to do with that?”
He frowned. “You're conflating two issues. Am I here because of perceived favoritism or because I'm a man?”
“Both, apparently. So you are his nephew!”
“Whose?”
“Michael Bournham.” She raised her eyebrows in a look of contempt. “You know. The owner of this company?”
At the mention of his real name, it was his turn to freeze, the sound of it rolling off her tongue and lips like some sort of answered prayer. He wanted to hear her hiss it in his ear, riding him, sweat pouring onto –
Shake it off, Mike. “I'm no one's nephew.” Fake laugh. “All my parents' siblings are girls who didn't marry or have kids.”
“There you go. Girls. Unless they're all prepubescent females, you sound like Don Draper from Mad Men.”
“I've been called worse.”
“You know what? Forget it. I came in here to explain my new proposal, which I'm presenting to Dave tomorrow, but you aren't any different from the rest of them.”
Gender politics? He had women as vice presidents, on the board, and in high management positions. What was she nattering on about?
She continued, her voice shifting to a sarcastic, sultry tone, the incongruity charging the air. “Shall I get you some coffee? Email the email you ask me to email to some work group? Schedule your lunch reservation? Bring you slippers and the newspaper? Meet your,” she paused, her lips shifting into a pout, her face softening, eyes hard and cold as she whispered in a Marilyn Monroe, breathy voice, “every need?”
With that, she marched out, papers jutting here and there in her hastily-layered stack, hips swaying out of sight as, once more, he cursed his too-tight pants.
Slam!
Nearly hyperventilating, Lydia couldn't believe how quickly that whole scene had fallen apart. She went in there with her professional heart on her sleeve, showing him the results of months of work. Him! The guy who stole her job. And he didn't deny that he might be Bournham's nephew. Damn it!
Hot tears threatened to flood her eyes. Being an angry crier sucked.
No matter how hard she had tried over the years to find a way to rein it in, to not cry when she was angry, or pissed or overwhelmed, Lydia still turned on the waterworks. Involuntary, the prickly sensation of indignation, of fury preceding the tears in her eyes, the swelling of her throat, always meant she would break down. She hated that salty taste that meant she would be incapable of logical thought or speech until she could reign in whatever chemicals coursed through her bloodstream to make her turn into the stereotype of the crying little woman. She despised it. She absolutely despised it.
And there was nothing she could do. She had tried hypnosis. She had tried therapy. She had tried cognitive behavioral techniques. It just was part of her emotional landscape, some sort of coping mechanism built into her psychological DNA.
The complication it caused for her, though, was that she wasn’t taken seriously in a corporate setting. She knew, from her graduate studies, that this was incredibly common. She knew that she wasn’t anything special, that her situation wasn’t unique, but the politics of gender in a corporate setting meant that crying was viewed as a weakness, that she was viewed as weak, as less serious, as someone who would end up on the ‘mommy track’.
As much as she fought that hegemony, the reality was that here she was, sitting in the closet, pretending to get supplies and trying to get the tears out before anyone saw her. It wasn’t the fact that her idea had been dismissed so out of hand, before she could really delve down into the details, could really peel back the deep layers that explained why the kernel underneath this large project was so critical for Bournham Industries. She could accept that. She could (she hated the phrase) man up and deal with that kind of rejection.
It was that she hadn’t even gotten started. Going to Matt with her idea was a test of sorts because she knew that going to Dave was going to be the ultimate battle in trying to prove that she was a serious contender for a job that Matt now had.
Argh! She slammed her fist against the wall, shaking one of the shelves filled with paper clips. Everything fell apart in one decision, in one morning. Ten seconds before Matt Jones tapped on the window of her car and caught her reading mommy porn she was in line for a promotion, or at least a shot at it, and to prove that moving away from home had been the right choice, that she could make her way in the big city. That she was strong, and vibrant, and intelligent, and grounded. And that gender had nothing to do with success.
Yet, here she sat, crying in the supply closet. Her idea was good. The youth market was already oversaturated with advertising. Putting together a network of about fifty different romance novel sites hadn't been easy, but she'd done it. From bloggers like Smart Bitches, Trashy Books and Dear Author to The Romance Man, a really offbeat, unique blog written by a guy with a sense of humor and a penchant for getting to the heart of a story, no matter how ridiculous, to novel sites, eBook retailers like All Romance eBooks or Book Strand.
Lydia had gone through and very carefully cultivated allies in this approach, talking to bloggers, talking to eBook site owners and getting a sense of what drives women in the 26-44 market to buy. It wasn’t just about Fifty Shades. Fifty Shades was a trigger but it wasn’t everything, and she thought there was so much untapped potential for that market, for driving products to them, for speaking to them on their level, not condescending, and not over-sexualizing. It was time to treat those women like they were the intelligent, well read, analytical, and fun loving women that they were.
It didn’t hurt that their demographic had money. Money that could fuel profits for potential clients in her division in Bournham Industries. That was going to be the problem. Dave would view this as some sort of threat to his job and he was going to shoot it down in about three seconds. Matt, being brand new, was going to shoot it down in two seconds. The threat to his job not as strong, though, because how often are you threatened in the first week of employment? Matt didn’t seem to be the type to be threatened by anyone. He had somehow walked in the door and just acted like he owned the place and she was mystified by it, intrigued. Jealous.
Aroused.
She slammed her fist against the wall again and this time a box of binder clips fell off a top shelf and hit her on the head. Why did Matt have to muddy the waters too? Her tears were gone, thankfully replaced by an
internal sense of repulsion as she rubbed the crown of her head, putting the box back in place. Not at Matt, not at Dave, but at herself – that someone who called herself a radical feminist would be falling apart, crying in the closet at work and aroused by her new boss. There was a word for that, too. Gender traitor. No, an even better word.
Sucker.
“Mike that was damn near perfect. We loved the scene in the parking lot, with you and Linda – “
“Lydia.”
“Whatever – it was pitch perfect. We have some great clips we can use from that for teasers and promo. It's like she's writing her own script.”
Mike sized hm up. The excitement seemed over the top for a simple little show. Did they really invest themselves so much in this reality series? Were viewing audiences that easily manipulated? He only had twenty minutes for this meeting; a charity event he couldn't avoid was scheduled for the evening, and he'd removed the contact lenses, washed out the temporary hair dye, and gone back to being Mike Bournham, 100 percent.
With an underfed stick on his arm, to boot. When you have to look like a playah, you have to date the type. Diane was about his age, but looked ten years younger – from twenty paces. Up close, though, the signs of heavy cosmetic surgery intervention were evident. With eyebrows that never moved, lip lines that stayed in place through tight smiles, and a neck that was stretched tighter than a Jackson Pollack canvas, she had the same coloring as Lydia – rich, chestnut hair with perfect waves, and brown eyes that were more the color of manure than Lydia's multi-colored jewels – yet somehow looked washed out. Too manufactured.
Perfect, in other words, for Mike Bournham, rising Fortune 500 CEO and soon-to-be billionaire.
“I can give you fifteen more, Jonah, so get to the point.”
“OK, then.” Calm, slow sip of his iced coffee. A simmer built in Mike, who knew a power play when he saw it. Jonah needed him. Not the other way around. Not quite true – twenty percent spike in sales! – but Mike reminded himself anyhow, because the dynamics right now were slipping out of his favor.
He had quite enough of that already in his life, with Lydia.
“We'd like for you to work on poking her,” Jonah paused imperceptibly, a small grin at the corner of his lips, eyes on Mike, weighing out whether to let the joke be acknowledged. Whatever he saw in Mike's face told him not to. “Like a feminist dealing with a Don Draper-type boss.”
Second reference to Don Draper in one week. And he looked nothing like Jon Hamm.
“Liberated feminist meets '50s throwback?”
Jonah grabbed his smart phone, eyes wide. “I'm totally stealing that! Mike, you're a natch at this.”
“That's why I'm the CEO.” Jonah mistook the sarcastic comment for bonding and grinned as he typed. Oh, brother.
“Here.” Jonah produced a sheath of papers. “New script.”
“Can't you just send me a PDF? My admin can do the printing, and this way I can read it on the road.”
Tap tap tap. The man turned away and buried his face in the glowing screen, then shouted, “Done!” with a flourish, his finger smacking the “Send” button as if achieving orgasm.
“Anything else?”
Jonah grinned slyly. “Any chance you and Linda might – ”
“Lydia.” The slow simmer turned to a low boil. Jesus Christ, man, get her name right. She was part of the series, like it or not. A light bulb went off. “Hold on. How do you secure permission to run these shows if the people who I interact with don't know abut the cameras?”
The grin turned smug. “We ask after the fact. Blur out their faces if they refuse. Most people though, man,” he shook his head slowly, contemplative suddenly. “They don't say no.”
“Their fifteen minutes of fame?”
“Something like that.” He clapped Mike on the shoulder as they stood, the familiarity a bit too unctuous. “I'm sure she'll consider it a privilege when she finds out.”
A privilege.
Right.
Chapter Four
Three hours of yoga. Two hours of careful breathing meditation. One pint of Ben and Jerry’s and she thought that she was calm enough to handle the presentation. She had done the research. She knew how to assemble the various components of social media and, by God, she was having a great hair day to boot.
So, as she smoothed out the skirt and pulled her shirt over it, her curves covered by nicely tailored clothes, she stared herself in the eye in the mirror and said, “Your inner goddess can do this.” Then she grinned maniacally.
Matt Jones had changed everything, that’s for sure. Everything. She had tried to talk to Dave about why the job got filled and he claimed to know even less than she did. That “somebody at corporate had just sent Matt down” bullshit – without a word of warning – left her about 50/50 on whether she was going to believe him or not. Dave could be cagey. He'd lied to her on both personal and professional levels, so as far as she was concerned Dave was an obstacle.
A powerful one, unfortunately.
Dave was the epitome of the corporate ladder climber, an early-30s guy with a Harvard MBA and an ego the size of the tuition price tag. She was taking a huge risk by doing this presentation because if Dave liked it he would co-opt it. In that sense, she was glad to have Matt there because if Matt were a decent guy – where to put him on the continuum from hero to asshole? – as long as he lived somewhere in the middle third, she figured he’d back her up if Dave decided to run with the credit. If Dave didn’t like it, the idea was dead in the water. Although, she supposed if she wanted to go job hunting she could use it as an example of the quality of her work. But really, who was she? She was a twenty-five year old with a Master's degree in a subject that corporate America considered to be hippieland, or worse – threatening.
Men in middle management took her gender studies graduate degree as some sort of threat, depending on age. Anybody under thirty seemed to just find it interesting or novel, or maybe patronizingly cute. Anybody over fifty suddenly got nervous – and sweaty – because what did “gender studies” mean? Then there was that ‘in the middle’ where Matt and Dave lived. Reactions seemed to depend on upbringing, temperament, where they were in the corporate structure and where they were on that continuum from hero to asshole. Dave leaned more towards the asshole end.
If she could get Dave to agree that her project was valid then she had a chance at the director of – oh, shit.
And that was the problem. That’s where Matt Jones had gummed up the works. When she was honest with herself she had to acknowledge a parallel gumming of the works where he made her heart stand still and beat out of her chest at the same time. Where he made her cheeks flush, not with embarrassment, not with condescension, but with arousal. Where he made her hands twitch, not eager for more work, but needing the feel of his skin.
Matt Jones had taken what was supposed to be a simple presentation today at two o’clock and turned it into a very, very complicated issue. In Lydia’s world, everything was typically quite simple. She knew what she wanted, she worked hard, she put her nose to the grindstone and she just did what she needed to do. She didn’t have Ivy League degrees, she didn’t have well-connected parents, she wasn’t some great beauty. In fact, her weight was a disadvantage.
She wasn’t quite fat and she definitely wasn’t close to thin. Stuck in between what people would call zaftig or voluptuous, she wore a medium/large at J. Jill and had a body type that could fit in sizes anywhere from a twelve to a sixteen (OK, eighteen). She didn’t have enormous breasts; they were quite fine and proportionate to her rib cage and to her nipped-in waist. But she had an hourglass figure that was the epitome of a pear with a “great big booty” as Krysta called it, and hips that screamed peasant.
Her mother had always said, “You’ve got hips for birthing, so you need to have four children or more.”
Lydia had looked at her in horror and said, “Four children! Who's crazy enough to have four children?”
The mother of six
had replied,“I guess I’m fifty percent crazier than that.”
For all of her flaws, for all of her insecurities that popped up here and there about her body, she really was firmly centered within herself. At peace with her issues, at peace with her bountiful self, and through her studies, research, and analysis she had come to distinguish between what society said about a woman’s body and what a woman herself could believe. With deep, conscious effort Lydia had worked to carve out a space within that no one else could touch. That no one else could judge. That no one else could frame for her and impose on her and make her feel bad about anything.
Smoothing that blouse against the pooch of skin between her hips, she squared her shoulders, tightened her bra straps, and finger-combed her long, brown silky hair, observing the almond-shaped eyes that stared back at her, the slight pink on her cheekbones, the well-placed lipstick that made her face bright.
All of it said Lydia. And that was good enough.
As he watched Lydia set up her Powerpoint, checking the screen to make sure that the controllers all worked, lining up her notes, he realized just how nervous she was underneath it all. He was rooting for her, both as Matt Jones and as Michael Bournham because, although she had been touchy the other day when she came to him with this project and he hadn’t heard the entire story, he was pretty sure that whatever she was about to dump on his and Dave’s heads right now was smart, well thought out, carefully planned, and ready to be executed in a way that would help the bottom line here at the company.
It didn't hurt that she was so fine to watch, her shapely body bending and twisting, silk and wool and cloth clinging to the parts he loved most, her movements professional, skin so soft and approachable he could barely stand it, a hunger welling up in him that he needed to tame. Dating “toothpicks with boobs” – Jeremy's catch phrase – had become too much of a trend for him. The lush appeal of her body, with a bright mind and sharp tongue to match, was making it harder to control his runaway lust.
