"Er, no, sorry Eva - I'm just remembering something a friend sent me on SnapChat. Don't worry about it" Said Amanda, but Eva didn't look impressed. "Look Amanda, this is a place of work, a very serious one, and we don't pay our staff to mess around on social media during work hours. Please refrain from using your mobile at the office, OK, dear? Business calls only. Thank you," she said curtly.
"Yes, Eva, of course - I-I- apologise" she felt her face redden for the first time that day, Eva had finally succeeded in making her feel like a small child, out of place in the big, professional world, as if she was only there to do Eva's bidding, rather than learn from her in order to have a career of her own, and maybe even surpass her one day. But Eva didn't seem to notice, or if she did, was taking the satisfaction of humiliating her junior in quietly. Two minutes later she leapt up, saying, "Oh gosh, is that the time? I need to meet Jeffrey for appetisers and cocktails at Le Reigne. There's an art exhibition by Jan" She pronounced the "J" and Amanda had to laugh, as she knew the "J" was actually pronounced like a "Y". But Amanda thought better of correcting her, after what had happened today, so she let it slide, but clearly Eva wasn't the worldly businesswoman she thought she was, if she couldn't even get a well-known local artists name right. "Right then, I'm off. See you tomorrow." Eva said, and strode off leaving a trail of Chanel No 5 and Elnet behind her. No smile, no "good job", no "hope you enjoyed your first day." While Amanda hadn't worked in many offices, she had tempted during her summers at uni, and had been fortunate to work in some small friendly ones of local accountants and lawyers. Everyone she'd ever worked with had been nice, polite and keen to show her the ropes. The atmosphere at Advertech was completely different. The furniture exuded class, the staff were all dressed trendily, and rushed around carrying iPad Pros, talking hurriedly into their Bluetooth headsets. No one seemed to make eye contact, and she had received a few polite "Welcomes" but no one else apart from Alex and shook her hand, or paid her any mind at all. "I guess this is just how it is in advertising," Amanda thought, but felt slightly disappointed by the experience so far. She didn't know what she was hoping for, but it wasn't to be tied to a stroppy manager who seemed to have taken an instant dislike to her, and was now using her as a glorified intern to make tea, do the photocopying, and enter pointless numbers into a spreadsheet. Still, she wasn't a quitter, and tried to remain positive. Thank god she wasn't in poor Robyn's shoes.
She glanced over to Robyn's desk where she was still anxiously typing on her computer, piles of paperwork spread out between 3 computer screens. Alex emerged from his office, and motioned Robyn to come inside. She quickly grabbed her notepad and dictaphone while looking stressed, reading the taught look on Alex's face perhaps as a sign of another long night, and followed him into the office.
The rest of the office floor had now thinned out, only a few of the engineers remained glued to their desks, in the exact same position they had been in since Amanda had walked in at 9am that morning. Eva had amazingly allowed her to "start late" on her first day, normal start time was 8:30, but Amanda guessed she should be there at 8:15 just in case. Despite the day she'd had, Amanda wanted to continue working for the company. Maybe things would improve tomorrow, and she could try getting Eva over to her side. For now, she'd rejuvenate with a big salad, a glass of Chardonnay, a quick shower, and then a good, restorative night's sleep. So she gathered her things, stole a quick glance back to Alex's office where he and Robyn were still hard at work, then slipped out the door to the company's suite, went down in the glass lift - and stepped out the main entrance into the cool, Bristolian night.
Chapter 4
Day two at Advertech was filed with orientations with various people in the company. The CFO gave her some interesting background to the company on and how he had raised £30 million in venture capital, and how the company had a market cap of £300 million and was poised - all things being equal - to become the leading ad platform in just under 5 years. That would set them on par with Yahoo and AOL, and their goal was to exit to Google, or float on the stock market. The CFO explained that he had founded the company a few years before, and had brought Alex on to be a cofounder and develop the tech, because he was a genius, and the only person remotely qualified in the UK to do the job he had done. Amanda was impressed. She hadn't realised Alex had single-handedly built the company's technology from the ground up, by assembling a team of world-class engineers. She'd been given 250 shares, which being the young person she was, didn't pay much mind to how much they could be worth so far in the future - when the company did finally go public or sell to Google. But from what the CEO was saying, she had the potential to become very rich. If she stayed with the company. If she left for any reason, her share options would become void. And she'd have to stay 4 years with the company to receive the full amount allocated to her, 25% vesting at the end of each year. The thought of staying at the company for four years put her off slightly. She was still young and hadn't taken a gap year to travel in between high school and college, as several of her friends had done. She was desperate to see the world, and particularly wanted to go to Paris, New York, Dubai, and Sydney. Now all of a sudden she felt chained to her job, and the responsibility of being an adult was slowly sinking in. Her freewheeling student days were over; now she was a proper adult, in the real world - and all the responsibilities that went along with it.
Her loving parents had set her up with a small one bedroom apartment in Bristol overlooking the waterfront, and she still had a small Ford that her dad had given her for her 17th birthday, even though she didn't manage to pass her test for another 6 months. She knew she was a little bit spoiled compared with some of her other friends who had worked two jobs just to pay for college, and were still struggling to live above the breadline. Amanda on the other hand, had a wardrobe full of nice clothes, the occasional designer handbag and pair of shoes, and was definitely not used to going without. Her mum's favourite way to spend time together was to go to the designer outlet village just outside of Bristol and drop a couple of hundred pounds on her only child. Amanda just put it down to the fact that she didn't have any siblings, which is why she was a tiny bit spoiled. And anyway, it hadn't hurt her character - that was a myth. Instead, it had given her the confidence to go out and succeed in life - because she didn't have to worry about little things like paying the water or credit card bill. Mummy and daddy took care of that for her. At least they had done, until she'd gotten a job. After she'd called her parents to tell them she'd got the job at Advertech, her dad had said, "That's great honey, I'll let you take over your bills now, OK?" It was a slight punch to the stomach, as Amanda hadn't been expecting it. She also wondered slightly if her dad's business wasn't going so well, and that worried her. He'd always made a lot of money from his management training business, but he'd been hit by the last few years of recession. Amanda realised her dad was right, whatever the reason, she did need to learn to be responsible with money and stand on her own two feet. She wasn't afraid of hard work, and despite what Eva thought about her durability, she intended to make her mark at Advertech and in the world - and of course, that meant getting to be extremely wealthy in the process, so she could add a few more designer bags and shoes to the mix. She had her eye on a crocodile Hermes of which there was a 10000 person waitlist. When she had that bag, she'd know she'd succeeded in life, at least financially.
Better get back to work, she thought to herself after staring at the same line on her Excel spreadsheet for over 20 minutes. Then her calendar notified her of her next orientation session, this time it was with Alex. She tried to suppress a smile when she realised this, but couldn't get it off her lips. Eva, who had practically ignored her all morning noticed and asked in a rather sarcastic tone: "Having fun are we? Great, there's lots more to come after you're done. Who's your next orientation with by the way?"
"Um, it's with Alex" she stated, looking at Eva to gauge her reaction. Sure enough, Eva rumpled her nose at this news, like she was smelling something unp
leasant, didn't answer, but instead turned back to her computer screen - almost as if Amanda hadn't answered her question at all. "Very bizarre" Amanda thought to herself, "Clearly there's something going on there. I'll have to find out what it is. Maybe she's got a crush on him, I can't really blame her I suppose. Or maybe there's some other dark secret between them, he he, I'm bad" she thought to herself. Of course, she didn't really think there was a dark secret between the work colleagues, surely they wouldn't still be working together if there was? It was more likely that Eva had a soft spot for her boss. It was common for underlings to have crushes on their superiors, Amanda had studied in psychology - lots of people found authority to be very attractive, and sexy, indeed, and watching Alex move around the office, checking in on engineers and support staff alike, she could see why.
He cut a striking figure, adorning his 6ft 4 frame in tight-fitting indigo jeans, trendy loafers, and a silky pin striped shirt tucked in. This complimented his broad shoulders, firm looking chest, and - she couldn't help but notice - his firm, slightly curved posterior. She could also smell his lemony fresh after shave whenever he walked by her desk, which wasn't very often as she was on the other side of the office. But whenever he did, she felt her stomach tighten - although so far today he hadn't acknowledged her at all. Now she was due to go spend half an hour with him, one on one. She grabbed her Moleskine notepad, a biro, and sprayed her breath quickly with a mint spray she'd placed on her desk, ran a quick coat of lipgloss on her lips, and headed over to Alex's office. She felt Eva's eyes train on her as she made her way over to the glass fishbowl he sat in at the far corner. But she tried to brush off the negative feeling from Eva; and arranged her face into a polite, but not over-eager, smile.
"I'm here for my orientation with Alex, Robyn?" she said to his secretary, who looked tired and pale - no doubt from working until midnight the night before. "Er, sure, Amanda - you can go on in" she said without looking up, clearly in the middle of something. Amanda was half-expecting her to use an intercom like they did in "Mad Men" announcing her arrival, and was almost a little disappointed, but she reminded herself it wasn't the 60s any more and so went over to knock on Alex's glass door - even though he could already see her stood at at, as, like the rest of his office, it was completely made of glass.
He was on the phone to someone, but opened the door for her anyway - again, with no sign of acknowledgement. She hovered awkwardly for a second, while he shut the door behind her, and she could again smell his aftershave as he moved passed her. There was something so manly about it, it was a definite turn on. Then he motioned for her to sit on a giant brown leather sofa, not unlike the one in reception, except it was well worn in the centre, almost as if it had been used as a bed, and Amanda wondered how many nights the cofounder slept at the office working on the company's technology. She also wondered if, like Don Draper, he ever had company...
"Look just take care of it." he said into his phone, then abruptly hung up. But when he finally turned his attention to Amanda, he didn't seem to be in a bad mood. His green eyes twinkled, and he pushed his sandy blond hair out of his eyes and gave her a smile. The laughter lines around his eyes crinkled, and as he looked at her, she felt like the only other woman in the world.
"So, Amanda..." he began, "How are you finding it so far?"
"Yes, great! Really well, thanks for asking!" she enthused, "The technology is so impressive, and everyone's been really nice and professional," (apart from Eva) she thought but of course didn't say.
"Good. Well, I won't bore you with all the details about how and why we started the company. You seemed to have a pretty good grasp of that during the interview. Let's talk about you. What are you interested in doing from a marketing standpoint? What path would you like to follow here at Advertech? There's certainly the opportunity for tremendous growth, and don't let the fact that you are fairly recently out of college hold you back. We operate on a meritocracy, so as long as you put the work in and show potential you'll be promoted."
"Oh, that's great to hear Alex. For marketing the company, I think we absolutely have to make a big splash at the next big industry trade event in Barcelona - the only problem is, we've left it a bit late to start planning for it - so maybe we could research it this year, then figure out what we want to do for next. As for me, well, I'd love to stay with the company and grow, maybe open an office for you in another country, as I'm dying to travel."
"Excellent, great idea about hitting up AdWorld in Barcelona. In fact, I've been invited to present at this year's event, and we will need some staff on the ground to field questions after my talk. So you can accompany me, let Eva know. As for your idea about opening an office for us - well, you've got a lot to learn before that can happen - but I appreciate your ambitious nature. That's exactly what we look for Advertech. Keep doing more better, is our motto. Live by that and you'll be fine"
Amanda's mind started racing. Did he really just say that she'd be accompanying him to Barcelona next week? And did that mean just her and him, or would other staff be attending as well? What will I pack? Ohmigod, I wasn't planning on travelling for work so soon! But she kept the smile on her face, like it was all completely normal. She supposed it was in the world of business - jetting off at the drop of a hat to other parts of the world - and if you were a CEO or cofounder of a large tech company, you would be in demand as a speaker at industry events. But that didn't explain why he'd asked her to attend. Was it because she was in marketing? But then, why not ask someone in sales. Or someone who had been with the company for more than 5 minutes? And would Eva think he was showing her favouritism already, and hold it against her?
"Don't worry," he said, almost reading her thoughts, "I'll handle Eva if she gives you any flack about coming to Barcelona. She can be a bit of a dragon at times but she's a very hard worker, and knows her stuff. Plus there isn't anyone else in marketing you could report to, so we have to keep it like that for now. You seem to have a strong personality yourself, so I'm sure you'll be able to look after yourself just fine," he said giving her a smile, that if she didn't know better, could have been perceived as flirtatious.
"Haha, um, thanks - no, no, Eva's been lovely, thank you. I'm looking forward to Barcelona!" she gushed, then immediately regretted sounding so keen.
"Good. Well, I've got a full plate as usual so better get on. It was nice talking with you, Amanda. Please send me a rough schedule for Barcelona, and make sure you find us a decent restaurant to eat at. We'll be staying the night. Ask Becky on reception to book the hotel."
"Er, yes, will do. Thanks, Alex" and with that she got up, walked out of his office, and headed straight to the ladies room to compose herself. Once inside the windowless cubicle, she yelped with glee. "Overnight in the same hotel as a gorgeous CEO of my company. And dinner together! I can't believe it" she thought to herself. Not only was she attracted to him - she had finally admitted it to herself - she also had a strong desire to prove her worth to him in the job. This would be the perfect opportunity to run her ideas by him. And who knows, if they hit it off, maybe it could lead to more....
"Amanda, he's married" she immediately scolded herself. "You're wicked even thinking he may cheat on his wife with you." but she continued to beam and had to splash her face with cold water to get the smile off her face, fortunately she'd remembered to wear non-smudge mascara that day. She wasn't sure why, but she had a feeling he liked her. Really liked her. And she couldn't wait to see where this was going to go.
Chapter 5
She walked back to her desk where Eva gave her another off-look, and said "You were gone a long time. Get lost?" in her usual sarcastic tone. But Amanda didn't take the bait, instead said in an even tone: "Yes, well, Alex and I are going to Barcelona next week for AdWorld. He wants me to make the arrangements with Becky and Robyn, then accompany him to his talk in case there are any questions about the company to field".
"What?! But I normally attend Alex on public relations. Hmph, I will have to hav
e a word with him about this. Why would he want to take you?"
"I'm not sure, Eva, he didn't say. I guess he thought it would be good experience," Amanda countered, again, keeping her tone neutral but enjoying how wound up Eva was getting. She was glad Alex had her back, and this made her feel like Eva could do or say what she wanted to try to undermine her, but she was sure Alex would come to her rescue if it became too unbearable. He's pretty much said so.
Stil, Eva let the conversation drop, perhaps sensing that there wasn't much she could do about it - like it or not. Amanda got the impression that once Alex made up his mind about something, he wouldn't allow his staff to change it. And this was precisely how he'd managed to become so successful in life. But Amanda also knew that Eva wouldn't let her get away with being favoured over her for the Barcelona trip entirely, and so she wasn't at all surprised when 5 minutes later, Eva stalked over to her desk and dumped a thick pile of paperwork on top of it. "Sort that by the end of the day please,"
"Yes, Eva," Amanda replied dutifully, and turned to her work, still smiling inwardly. She was on a natural high, and nothing was going to knock her off this cloud, especially not Eva and her filing.
Romance: Alien Romance: Having The Kings Baby (A Paranormal Science Fiction Shifter Romance ) (Sci-fi Alien Invasion Abduction Romance) Page 124
