Alex Reid (Rich & Single #1)

by Lexy Timms

  “I have more than a minute, Mr. Reid. What is it you want to talk about?”

  Alex tipped his head back against the cushion of his chair and stared up at the ceiling. “Your withdrawal from our company came as something of a surprise, Mr. Prescott. I was hoping that you might be able to explain what prompted you to leave and if there’s anything I can do to change your mind.”

  “Ah, that. Well, Mr. Reid, I assure you that I don’t have any complaints with your company. It’s served me quite well over the last few years. But I wanted to try my hand at being more involved in my own finances and where they’re going. I’m sure you understand.”

  No. He really didn’t understand. Businesses like his existed precisely so that people like Mr. Prescott didn’t have to worry about where to invest their own finances. Their whole job was to take care of that worry. And if the reports about Mr. Prescott’s financial requests were accurate – and Alex had no reason to doubt that they were – he was very sure that Mr. Prescott, of all people, was one of the last who should be wanting to withdraw from the protection and advice of Reid Enterprises.

  “If you don’t mind my saying so, Mr. Prescott, deciding how and where to invest is more of a headache than you might think. Reid Enterprises is here to help you set up something you don’t have to worry about. You’ve been with us for years; you know that we’ll help you make money stress-free. So why put yourself through that kind of thing when you don’t have to?”

  The older man was silent for a moment, like he was thinking about how to answer. Alex sat upright again and glanced at the clock: 3:35. Nowhere near time to pack up and head home unless he started pulling lazy boss privileges… which was, unfortunately, never going to be his style.

  “To be honest with you, Mr. Reid,” Prescott said finally. “I’m finding that I’m not very fond of retirement. There’s just not enough to do. Oh, sure, I can go play a game of golf, or go out to dinner, or what have you, but none of it really matters in the long run. That’s why I’m taking control of my own investments.”

  And when he ran his financials into the ground, what then? Alex supposed it wouldn’t be any problem of his. Reid Enterprises wasn’t so desperate for finances that they couldn’t survive without the account, no matter how large it was. And yet he felt like he had a responsibility to someone who had been part of his company for so long. He couldn’t imagine retiring. What was he supposed to say to a man who was likely having the same reaction to inactivity that he would?

  “We’re happy to give you a more hands-on position in your finances here at Reid Enterprises, if that’s what you’d like to do. You can do the research yourself, and we’ll find investment opportunities that match what you’re looking for. It’s better insurance if the market suddenly takes a dive.”

  “You really want me back that badly, huh?”

  Alex felt his cheeks heating. Blushing was an incredibly rare occurrence for him, but it had been a long time since anyone insinuated that he or his company needed them. He was glad he was on the phone and not sitting in front of the man.

  “You’ve been a loyal client. We’d hate to lose you over something like this. And even more than that, I want to make sure that you don’t make a choice you would regret. I’m sure that we can work out a compromise to your satisfaction.”

  The silence on the other end made Alex wonder for a moment if he’d made a misstep. Maybe implying that Mr. Prescott could do anything wrong with his own finances had been a bad move.

  “My wife, I know, would prefer if I did come back to Reid Enterprises.”

  His wife was a smart woman. Alex smiled, let it be heard in his voice. “Well, you know what they say about disagreeing with your wife. It’s not bad advice, Mr. Prescott.”

  “You’ll be willing to give me a little more of a free hand? The team will listen to my suggestions?”

  “Absolutely, Mr. Prescott. You have my word on it.”

  “I’ll consider coming back. Give me another day to think it over, and I’ll let you know.”

  “Of course. We’re not going anywhere.”

  He heard the older man laugh softly under his breath.

  “You know, when I picked up the phone I was determined not to listen to you.”

  “I’m good at what I do.”

  “You are that. Have a good night, Mr. Reid.”

  “You, too, Mr. Prescott. Give your wife my regards.”

  Well that, Alex thought with some relief as he hung up the phone, was one obstacle out of the way for the day. He was confident that when Prescott called back he would have changed his mind. If nothing else, thinking it over for the night would give him a chance to talk to his wife about it again, and she would give him the last nudge he needed in the right direction.

  Of course, there was still enough left to do that he doubted he would be getting out of the building any time soon. Alex considered the pile of paperwork in front of him and the pages opened on the laptop screen, and decided that he needed to go back over the personal assistant applicants he’d bookmarked. This time, he would actually make the calls.

  Chapter 10

  In the end, there were three women Alex called about the personal assistant position. All of them seemed more than thrilled to have been contacted. He set up interviews for three days in a row, just after the brunt of the work day had ended, though well before he habitually went home.

  The first interview was on Wednesday.

  “Your profile gave your availability as greater than forty hours a week,” Alex said, looking across the desk at a Mrs. Rachel Conlon, who had her hands folded tightly in her lap and her knees pressed together like she was almost afraid to be sitting in front of him. Very nervous, for an experienced personal assistant. “Is that still true?”

  “Well…” She flashed him a smile as nervous as the rest of her demeanor. “I admit that I’d rather not be working more than forty hours a week. I have a child at home, and he gets back from school and his daycare program at seven every night.”

  Strike one. Actually that strike was going to knock her out of the running. He needed someone without kids. He liked pretty, but he had made a promise to himself that he would try not to sleep with his PA.

  “What are your strengths?”

  “I’m well organized, with an eye for detail.”

  A generic answer, but not terrible. Alex tapped one finger against his knee. “And your weaknesses?”

  He saw her smile falter. She wasn’t going to be good enough. He could see it already. The companies she’d worked at before obviously hadn’t put her into an environment like the one she’d be dealing with at Reid Enterprises. He needed someone as competent as he was – someone who could take over all the mundane little tasks that seemed to suck all the time out of his day, and leave him free to focus on the bigger issues.

  “Well,” she said. “I suppose that I do require a little more time to get things finished sometimes, but I can assure you that I don’t get them wrong.”

  “Quality is a positive, but I need quality with speed. How capable are you of increasing your standards to match that?”

  She flushed. “Well, Mr. Reid, I’ve always been a strong learner.”

  A flash of spirit at last, but he still suspected she was going to be less than adequate for his purposes. It was too bad, because he wouldn’t have minded being finished with the search then and there. Except that he knew himself, and he knew he would have interviewed the other two even if Mrs. Conlon had turned out to be perfect, because he needed to know he was getting the best.

  “I appreciate you coming out to speak with me,” he said, rising from his chair.

  She followed suit, and he reached across the desk to shake her hand.

  “Unfortunately,” he said as he withdrew. “I don’t think that our company is the right fit for you. Ms. Campbell will show you out.”

  He sat back down and watched as Mrs. Conlon turned and left, the door shutting behind her. The résumé he’d seen had looked
good on paper but he needed someone who wasn’t going to buckle under pressure, and she very obviously wasn’t it. Alex returned to the investment portfolio he had been updating before she came in.

  * *

  When Alex got back to the house that night, he was surprised to find one of the contractor’s trucks still in the drive. He pulled his own car down to the end of the house and went inside to see what the progress was looking like on the gym and the apartment for the future personal assistant.

  “Mr. Reid.” Mr. Larson was just fitting the last mirror into place with the help of a younger man who was most likely his son. He stepped back and eyed it critically, then turned to look at Alex, dusting his hands off on his jeans. “Can I help you with something?”

  “Nothing in particular. Just came down to see how things were going. It looks good.”

  It did look good. The floors had been laid, and waxed, and though there were a few dusty footprints on them now they gleamed otherwise. With the addition of the mirrors it looked, Alex thought, a bit like a dance studio, and probably would until the gym equipment was brought in on Friday.

  “Oh, well, thanks. Wasn’t really too hard a project, as these things go. But Jake and I are glad you’re happy with it.”

  The younger man raised a hand in a wave from where he still stood over by the mirror.

  Alex acknowledge the gesture with a nod. “How’s the apartment coming?”

  Mr. Larson smiled. “Now that’s a little messier. But I think you’ll be pleased with the progress.”

  Alex followed him over to the set of rooms next door. The walls had already been knocked down, leaving most of the space open with the exception of the bedroom. It was spacious, which was good. Alex wouldn’t want an unhappy assistant. Or one who felt cramped in their living quarters. Happier employees did better work, and Alex took it as a point of pride that he treated his well.

  “The kitchen will be tiled, of course,” Larson was saying, “and carpet for the rest. Beyond that, we still need to fit the electrical and the plumbing, but it’s coming along nicely.”

  “It looks like it is. As always, Mr. Larson, I trust your work.”

  “Glad to hear you say it, Mr. Reid.”

  He walked back toward the gym with them and stood for a minute, watching as they began gathering up their tools. The work was finished ahead of time, and if they kept on track the apartment would be as well. Alex mentally planned a bonus for them. “Well, gentlemen, I think I’m going to call it a night. Have a safe drive home.”

  “Will do, Mr. Reid. Good night.”

  Alex answered their goodbye waves with another nod and headed back to the main part of the house to finish some work of his own before bed.

  Chapter 11

  “So, Mr. Blake,” Alex said, folding his hands on the desk in front of him and leaning forward just enough to convey interest without sacrificing the upright strength of his posture. “Please tell me about your experience in this field.”

  “Of course, Mr. Reid,” the applicant answered, voice steady in a way that Mrs. Conlon’s hadn’t been. “As I noted in my résumé, I started as a busboy at the Ritz-Carlton, and worked my way up to front desk agent and then concierge. From there, I went on to work as a personal assistant at three upscale businesses over the course of four years.”

  The man sitting across from him hardly looked old enough to be the busboy he’d mentioned in his résumé, let alone a four-year veteran in the field of personal assisting with time as a concierge besides. His résumé said he was twenty-three, which Alex supposed he could believe if Caleb Blake had both a very young face and an extraordinary work ethic. The man’s résumé, however, suggested that perhaps he did not. Good personal assistants were hard to find; they weren’t let go after hardly a year by three consecutive bosses. No one was let go that quickly by three businesses in a row without a very good reason. Alex crossed one leg over the other and tipped his chin down, locking his stare on Mr. Blake’s face. “And you think that résumé qualifies you to work for a company like Reid Enterprises, Mr. Blake?”

  “I think four years’ experience in the field and nearly eighteen months as a concierge at a very busy hotel before that qualifies me well enough for a job as a personal assistant almost anywhere, Mr. Reid.”

  “You mean to tell me that you moved from busboy to concierge over a period of less than two years at a hotel as upscale as the Ritz-Carlton?”

  As upscale as chain hotels ever managed to be, anyway. But even a Super 8 wasn’t going to move someone from service staff to concierge – if they’d had a concierge – over such a small time frame. Alex didn’t believe it.

  The applicant’s brown eyes met his. “I do, sir.”

  Alex huffed a breath out through his nose and sat back in his seat, amused. If nothing else, the guy had balls. It wasn’t the worst qualification for a PA in at a place as fast-paced as Reid Enterprises, or for a boss as demanding as he was going to be. Certainly Mr. Blake was more suited than the timid Mrs. Conlon. His handshake had been confident, even if his suit was a little less than perfectly tailored. Giving him a chance might be worth the headache of his résumé’s accuracy, or lack thereof.

  That was one issue related to hiring that Alex had pawned off on someone else. Ms. Campbell could do background research just as well as he could, if not better.

  “A hypothetical situation, then, Mr. Blake. You’re working on a project for me and it’s on a deadline, which is rapidly approaching. As you’re finishing, you get a phone call from a prospective client who has questions about their portfolio. At the same time, a long-term and well respected client that I have told you to never keep waiting shows up for an interview. What do you do?”

  For a moment, the man’s expression froze. Then he smiled. It was just a little too wide for Alex’s tastes, as though he was hiding something behind it. “Well, Mr. Reid, I would have to take care of the phone call and the client first. The project is important, but live people are more so. I’d refer the prospective client on the phone to one of the financial advising teams downstairs, who would be more than able to answer his question, and then go ask the client waiting for the meeting if there’s anything I can do for him while your secretary checks to see if you’re in your office and ready to accept clients.”

  It was, admittedly, a good answer. “How are you at multi-tasking?”

  “I’ve actually done a lot of reading on that and the consensus seems to be that multi-tasking actually makes people less efficient because you can’t give your full concentration to anything, so I try to focus on one thing at a time and do it as well and as quickly as possible.”

  He wasn’t stupid, Alex had to give him that. “One more thing. I have a time-sensitive document – physical – that I need from a business across town before the end of the day. How would you deliver it?”

  “I’d have them fax it, Mr. Reid.”

  Alex did not have time to point out the lack of a fax machine in his office, though he would have liked to, if only to see the look on Mr. Blake’s face; a light knock on the door cut off any further conversation before it could begin.

  “Come in, please, Ms. Campbell,” Alex said.

  The secretary stepped into the room, glancing at the man sitting across from Alex with something like disdain in her expression. She must have finished her research, then. Alex smiled.

  “The documents you wanted, Mr. Reid,” she said.

  “Bring them here and set them on the desk, would you?”

  He saw the flash of alarm cross Mr. Blake’s face. A quick study, then. Ms. Campbell set the documents she’d printed down on the corner of the desk and stepped back out again.

  Alex made a show of picking the papers up and rifling slowly through them, raising his eyebrows at various bits of information contained in them, though none of it actually surprised him. “So,” he said, laying the papers down again and looking directly across at the man he was interviewing. “It seems you’ve padded your résumé a bit.”
>
  A bit was something of an understatement.

  “Would you like to explain how that came to be, Mr. Blake?”

  He watched the man’s Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed past a throat that must suddenly feel very tight.

  “Well. I actually was a busboy at the Ritz-Carlton. And then a front desk clerk. But I never made it to concierge. I just said that so that I could get jobs as a personal assistant. The first one I interviewed for was one of the only jobs in the area where I was trying to get work, and I really needed it.” He set his hands palm-up on the desk like he might reach across it in supplication if he thought it would do any good. “I really need this job, too, Mr. Reid. I’m not lying about that.”

  “Three personal assistant jobs in four years. That one is true. But it’s not a very encouraging statistic. Most people who find a good personal assistant refuse to let them go so soon, if at all.”

  “My first couple attempts weren’t quite as good as my employers wanted them to be. But I got better each time. I’m a quick study.”

  “I’m sure you are,” Alex said, voice dry. “But I really don’t see why I should give any kind of job to a man who fudged his résumé and lied about his experience to more than one employer, let alone something as high in the hierarchy of my business as a personal assistant. For all I know, those aren’t the only things you’re lying about. You could be a corporate spy. Or a con man who just wants access to the company’s internal computer network.”

  “I swear I’m not.” Mr. Blake leaned forward over the edge of the desk. “Look. Just give me a chance. Probationary. You won’t regret it. I promise.”

  Alex considered the option. It wasn’t entirely without merit, he supposed, though it was a little like taking a badly-behaved dog in and hoping it wouldn’t bite you. Most people didn’t change their behavior overnight. Most people didn’t change their behavior at all; they didn’t have the drive or the fortitude to see it through.