A Curve Ball Called Love

At that moment, Tiffany felt a shiver run down her spine. This was it. Along with her, Maggie and Kenneth were the only other big account holders. The only other people on track to making partner. Her competition when it came to moving ahead in the company, but she’d never really worried about Maggie. She’d been at the company a little longer and had brought in more business than Maggie. But when it came to Kenneth, it was a different story altogether. There was the fact that he was a white man and that alone gave him a little too much advantage over the plus-sized black woman —or any woman of color for that matter. She took a long calming breath as a few people left the boardroom leaving the thinned herd behind.

“Now,” Virginia started when they were alone. “Along with the few partners in this room, I believe that we also know that for a long time Douglas Ingram has been a shareholder in this business. Until a few weeks ago, he was a minority shareholder but as you all know the public relations business we have been trying to keep the lights on has been successful but it hasn’t been enough to offset the magazine’s cost,” she explained.

“It’s a magazine… these things sell themselves,” Moira Kelly said matter-of-factly.

“Not as much as they used to. Online publications are killing us,” Tiffany chimed in.

“But Entity has an online publication too,” Moira pointed out.

“Yeah, what she said.” This was Jonah again. “What’s the big deal here?”

“Entity originally started as a paperback so everything we’ve done in terms of bringing the magazine’s online presence up to industry standard was more of a reaction. Something to counter the growing online market… because of that, the journey has been hard and the campaigns to drive up our sales have bled us financially. Advertising hasn’t been as good as we would like, so, we had someone—a partner—bail us out.”

There was a deafening silence that followed. It was almost as if everyone knew what was coming.

“Let me guess, Douglas Ingram is the partner who bailed us out?” Moira asked after a long silence and Virginia nodded.

“Dear Lord, what does that spoiled kid have to offer this company?” Jonah asked.

“Well, for starters, three hundred million dollars,” Virginia pointed out. “That should be enough to keep us going for the foreseeable future and he’s also bringing with him access to some very moneyed clients. So, there’s that.”

“I’m still waiting to hear where all this is going,” Maggie said in a soft voice.           

“Douglas Ingram is a billionaire playboy with an unlimited check book. This could just be his next play thing,” Moira said in a soft voice.

“Oh,” Maggie said in a low voice.

“Yes. Before the bail-out, Douglas owned forty-nine per cent of all of Entity’s business but now, he singlehandedly owns seventy-five,” Virginia went on.

“Dear Lord!” Jonah shook his head.

“He wants to be more involved in the business and with seventy-five per cent, he has every right,” Virginia said and the room erupted in a series of murmurs. “Now, I know that this is going to be hard on us but as a major shareholder, we have to accommodate him. We have no choice.”

“That boy was probably accompanying his father in the Cayman Islands when I was working three jobs to pay my tuition and now he’s going to order me around?” Jonah asked.

“It hasn’t all been bad. He’s been involved in a lot of charitable work,” Moira said.

“Yes, but he’s also been involved in a lot of benders.” Jonah looked down at his phone. “I Googled his name and the first three results are all about how he’s known for bottle service and get this, he lost a hundred and fifty grand gambling and he just shrugged it off like it was nothing.”

Jonah was clearly irritated.

“Well, for him it really is nothing,” Moira pointed out. “The man’s net worth is more than most countries with natural resources.”

Jonah shook his head.

“I don’t like this, Virginia. I’m sure there’s something we can do to get another investor,” he said as he looked at Virginia.

“Well, that is an option but the truth is simply that we cannot ignore the fact that Douglas Ingram is now majority shareholder,” one of the other board members said. “We need to be discussing what we should be doing now. Right at this minute.”

Virginia nodded.

“Tiffany has worked with some of the worst bad boys and party girls and still managed to clean up their image well enough for us to have them as advertisers for years now,” Virginia said as she looked at Tiffany before turning her attention to the rest of the board members. “She got a man who was once the most hated person in America to somehow look like the victim and now we’ve had Hill McGregor as a sure advertiser for the last couple of years.”

There was a murmur that suddenly swept over the room.

“It’s quite clear that Meyers is the bad person whisperer,” Jonah pointed out. “Clearly, she should be the one to handle this.”

“I thought so too,” Virginia went on. “Tiffany, you’ll work with Douglas Ingram. Find a way to make him a little more relatable.”

Tiffany nodded even though she was not so sure how that was going to go. It was not exactly an easy thing that the board was asking of her. It was perhaps going to be the hardest thing she’d ever had to do and that was keeping in mind that she still had to work with Xavier Morrison and people who were perhaps even worse than him. But she couldn’t ever compare Xavier to Douglas Ingram.

“Until then, what do we do about it?” Jonah asked. “Because whether we like it or not, the man isn’t about to stop with his partying or anything of the sort.”

Virginia took a long, deep breath but before she could say anything, the board room doors burst open and a tall dark-haired man walked in. Tiffany couldn’t help but notice how attractive he looked in his dark slim suit.

“I would like to know why people in my company are having a meeting about me without even offering me the courtesy of inviting me,” the man demanded.

“Douglas, welcome.” Virginia was forcing a smile.

He’s kind of cute in a Christian Grey kind of way, Tiffany thought as Douglas went on to create a scene, demanding to know why he wasn’t invited for the meeting. I think I could even see myself with him. Having dinner, maybe drinks…. His face is so perfectly chiseled.

His arrogance was a little off-putting as far as Tiffany was concerned, but she couldn’t deny the fact that he had the build of an ancient Roman god or maybe even a gladiator. Even under that suit, Tiffany could see his perfect form.

“Douglas.” Virginia finally managed to raise her voice enough to drown him out. “Why don’t you join us? This meeting wasn’t supposed to happen without you and since you’re here, let’s just talk about the way forward, shall we?”

Douglas looked around the room before he sat down. Tiffany could already tell that it was going to be a longer weekend than she hoped for. Between dealing with the new arrogant boss and making one of the worst clients look good enough for the next publication, she was barely going to make it through in one piece.