Carrying His Baby

Chapter 2

“Well, tell me what all the fuss is about,” said Hallie, when she finally sat down with Valerie in her office.

Valerie’s office, that is, not Hallie’s. A junior manager, recently promoted, didn’t really rate an office. Almost nobody except Valerie had an actual office, and they didn’t have a cubicle culture. All of them were expected to chip in everywhere, including Valerie, who waitressed at events when she had to, still.

“Aldous Banks is… Well, he’s demanding and he’s compelling.”

Valerie was fretting.

“That’s fine, isn’t it? We’ve worked for demanding clients before. Some of them are real jerks and never satisfied, but nobody’s ever asked for a refund. Even those events, we’ve got more jobs out of them. So why are you so stressed out?”

“No, he doesn’t seem like a jerk. Well, not that way. He has an issue with our serving staff.”

Hallie frowned.

“What’s his problem? We have never had any complaints about that. Our serving staff is absolutely incredible.”

“He thinks they’re not… appealing enough.”

Hallie froze. She knew, because she had done the profiles, that her own profile was in that folder, too.

“Servers are not on the menu, and they’re all perfectly presentable.”

“He has to consider the aesthetics, he said. And they’re not pretty enough, in his own words.”

Hallie’s dark eyes flashed fire.

“Oh, I’ll give him aesthetics, all right,” said Hallie, fuming. “He means he wants tall, skinny, white women with blonde hair and blue eyes to do all the serving.”

“Well,” hedged Valerie, “he did bring up the possibility of getting in touch with a modeling agency and hiring from there for serving staff.”

“And those starved gazelles are going to have the stamina to keep up an entire event? Has he any idea how much strength and… and equanimity you need to deal with a bunch of entitled, spoiled rich brats who think they just need to snap their fingers and we’re there?”

Valerie bit back a grin.

“Like the equanimity you’re showing right now.”

Hallie pulled it in and took a couple of deep breaths.

“Well, you told him to take a hike, right?”

“Not quite…”

“What?”

Hallie was aghast. She had done an event for a modeling agency. There was no way she could make such a high profile event work with a serving staff of models!

“Well, I need you to meet him and convince him that all our staff can be depended on to be perfectly presentable and, you know, not ruin any aesthetic.”

Hallie had thought she was aghast before, but no. Now she was aghast.

“You want me to meet a superficial playboy billionaire who thinks he owns people and convince him to not hire underfed models to be serving staff at the event.”

Valerie considered it.

“That sounds about right,” she agreed.

“Bloody hell,” muttered Hallie and slumped in her chair.

“Why can’t you do it?”

Hallie hated that it came out as a whine.

“Because you’re running point on this event, and I need you to take care of it.”

Hallie angled a skeptical look at Valerie.

“You want me to run this one? Without interfering in it at all?”

“I shall be supervising, of course.”

Of course she would be. That meant that Hallie would run the event and get blame where it was due, while Valerie would get the credit.

No, she was being unfair, she chided herself. Val gave credit where it was due, when it was due.

She just didn’t want to deal with an obnoxious billionaire.

Came with the territory, she reminded herself. She had worked very hard for her promotion, and every penny of that hard-won raise was going towards the deposit on her dream house, though she had yet to find it.

“Fine.”

The look in her eyes worried Valerie a bit.

“Hallie, you know how important this event is…”

Hallie laughed.

“I know, and I don’t want to blow my bonus, so I will play nice. I promise.”

Hallie, of course, had to get in touch with an assistant, who put her in touch with an admin, and finally gave her an appointment. The guy was just too much trouble, thought Hallie. Well, the money would be worth it, she decided.

Just to cover all her bases, she got all their regulars to give her their best candid shots, just to be sure that she had something to show him if he started anything about serving staff’s looks again. As for herself – she gave herself twenty minutes to tinker. She knew exactly what to do with makeup, and how to choose her clothes.

Red, because with her skin, red was excellent. Red silk blouse, cream skirt and cream jacket, she decided. She was tempted to go with red lipstick, too, but chose to play up her lovely almond-shaped eyes instead and leave her lips almost nude.

By the time she made her way to his offices, she was confident. Even the imposing building in which he had his offices – he had two floors, apparently, and she wondered if a wine company that seemed to have made the most of the online boom needed so much physical room – couldn’t quite dampen that confidence.

She was going to be professional, pretty, precise and perfect. She was going to make sure that she got them the job.

She kept that up while she was waiting for him – a good twenty minutes past the time she was supposed to meet him, while the skinny assistant gave her what looked like the evil eye. Finally, she announced, in a snooty voice with a terrible British accent, “Mr. Banks will see you now.”

Keeping her smile firmly in place, Hallie walked into Aldous Banks’s office.

He sure had some view. That was her first thought as she looked out over the Manhattan city scape through the glass windows behind him.

Her second thought was… Well, she didn’t quite get to a second thought. Aldous Banks was handsome in his photos, but he packed an incredible punch in person. She could practically feel the charm pouring off him. He was in his shirtsleeves, and she almost stepped back from the blast of energy that was his smile.

That chin dimple and that smile – the combination should be registered as a legal weapon. That was her first clear thought.

“Miss Holt?”

Hallie snapped herself back. Her spine stiffened.

She had obviously suffered from some kind of altitude sickness that resulted in momentary lack of judgment in that skyscraper, because she didn’t fall for slick good looks and even slicker charm. She had very little respect for people who treated others without respect. Turning down perfectly competent and truly excellent staff because you don’t think they could model haute couture or be on the Sports Illustrated cover showed complete arrogance and she did not like arrogance.

So her voice was ice cold and her tone sharp.

“Mr. Banks. I’m from Serving Excellence, and I hope to allay all your concerns regarding the event today.”

“Well, let’s see if you can do that, Miss Holt,” said Banks with a lazy drawl that put her back up even more.

She breezed through the details that Valerie had told her he needed, and finally got to the portfolio of staff.

“Now, Mr. Banks, I believe you have concerns about the aesthetic appeal of our serving staff.”

“I recommended hiring models from an agency. I can recommend a couple of good ones.”

Oh, she just bet he could. She just bet. He probably got all his arm and eye candy from them.

“I would be happy to. However, the median age of the models available for such an event from the agency is eighteen. They also have absolutely no experience in catering. They also, and this is of particular concern, don’t have the endurance or the stamina required to do this job. I interviewed them this morning, and they all claimed to be perishing with hunger. They were also quite aghast at the idea of handling food. I think hiring models would be a mistake. We cannot afford to have them make mistakes.