- -
- 100%
- +
“Who’s Pence?”
She looked at him, expecting to see ridicule in his eyes. But there was only compassion.
“He’s the reason I don’t do workplace relationships. Or relationships at all, for that matter.”
“Ah. Why?”
Without knowing why, Becky found herself wanting to confide in him.
“He was creative director at the agency where I interned during grad school. He was my mentor, and then he became...more. Much more.”
That was the understatement of the year. But Mark didn’t need to know how bad things had gotten—or how far she’d run to get away from him.
She shrugged her shoulders. “The whole thing left a bad taste in my mouth. So I decided to focus on my career instead. And now here we are. Competing for the promotion that should be mine.”
Mark smiled ruefully and lifted his coffee mug. “Indeed we are. Although I have to admit I’d rather be competing to see how fast we can make each other come.”
Becky raised an eyebrow. “You don’t want this job?”
“Of course I do,” he said with a heated smile. “And I’m going to get it. But I’d also like to hear you screaming my name again. Creating killer ads makes me hot.”
Becky couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled up. “Well, that’s nice to know. But I’m afraid I can’t help you. I’ve got an equally hot campaign to finish.”
Mark slowly got out of his chair and walked over to where she stood. “Okay, but just so you know, I’ll be thinking about you,” he said, dropping a kiss on her neck.
Her blood sizzled at his touch, and she found herself hoping he’d keep going.
Instead he turned and walked away. “Sweet dreams,” he called.
Grabbing her still-warm coffee cup from the counter, Becky started the trek back to her office. Sleep would have to wait. She had a campaign to perfect—and a devil of a man to vanquish.
* * *
Mark took a deep breath, straightened his black sport coat, and walked into the crowded conference room. He had timed his entrance carefully, so that he was almost late but not quite. He needed every tool in his arsenal to keep Becky off balance.
“Nice of you to show up!” David boomed.
“I was just putting the finishing touches on our concept,” Mark answered. “Nothing less than perfection will do, after all.”
“That’s what I like to hear,” David said. “Now, since you’re so sure of yourself, how about you go first?”
Mark took a deep breath, then snuck a look at Becky. She was sitting quietly at one end of the giant conference table, her emerald-green dress the only bright spot in the overly industrial room.
She looked at him mockingly. “Yes, Mark, why don’t you go first? We’re dying to hear what you’ve come up with.”
Mark looked at her, then looked at David.
David nodded encouragingly.
He took a deep breath as he strode to the head of the table. This is it, he told himself. Time to knock their socks off.
“I’ve spent a fair bit of time around women,” he said. “I like to think I know what makes them tick. In fact,” he said, turning to write on the whiteboard behind him, “the way I see it, women want three things... First, they want to look good. Which, for most women, means being skinny. Second, they want other women to be jealous of them. And third,” he said, writing the number three with a flourish, “they want a man. Not only that, they want a man of their choosing. And they want him to drool over them. Which, if we’re honest, brings us back to number one. But there are plenty of yogurts promising to make women skinny. To stand out, we need to say something different.”
He turned the first board over, so the whole room could see a woman in a cocktail dress being admired by a host of attractive men. Once he was sure they’d seen it, he read them the headline.
“‘Eden. The yogurt for the woman who knows what she wants.’ That’s our tagline. We’ll use it in connection with women in all kinds of situations. At the beach,” he said, flipping over boards sequentially, “in the dressing room, hailing a cab. In every scene men will be staring, openmouthed, at the female.”
When he’d finished a momentary silence filled the room. He glanced from one face to another but couldn’t read what anyone was thinking. This crew would be awesome at poker.
Finally he looked at Becky and cocked an eyebrow at her. The concept had come a long way since the last time she’d seen it.
She cleared her throat.
“So your message is pretty much: ‘Eat this, be skinny, get men to lust over you’?” she asked.
He shrugged his shoulders. “In a nutshell. It’s taking the bikini-clad woman in a beer commercial and turning it on its head. Men get to be the hangers-on.”
“Huh... But what about women who aren’t interested in men?”
Mark turned to look at her, expecting to see spite in her eyes. But instead he saw genuine interest. “That’s a good point,” he said. “But I think this idea has legs. It could cover different topics.”
She walked around the room, grabbed the marker out of his hand and began to write down ideas. “Like instead of men it could be openmouthed business associates admiring her. Or cyclists left in her dust.”
“Oh, I see where you’re going,” he said. “That could be cool.”
She grinned at him, and for the first time since they’d returned to New York he got a glimpse of the happy, gorgeous girl he’d shared a night with in Vegas.
He grinned back. “So, what if—?”
David cleared his throat.
“I like where this is going—but, Becky, didn’t you have a concept to present, as well? This is a competition,” he said.
Becky blinked, and the laughter in her eyes disappeared.
“Right. Of course. Mark, can you clear your stuff out of the way? I’ll grab my boards.”
* * *
A few moments later Becky took center stage. And when she did she was magnetic.
“So, on my team we got to thinking about what women really want. And we think it goes deeper than just being skinny or attracting the right man. That’s what our mothers wanted. But we want more. We want to be recognized as the strong, independent beings we are. We want the superhuman feats we accomplish every day to be recognized. After all, today’s woman works like a dog at her corporate job, putting in twice as much effort for half the pay, then heads to the gym to ensure she stays model-thin, then goes home to run a household. Today’s women are incredible. We think it’s time for a marketer to sit up and acknowledge that.”
Then she flipped a board over.
It showed a business-suited woman standing in a superhero pose on top of a conference table as her colleagues clapped.
“‘You save your world every day before lunch. Choose the only yogurt high-powered enough to keep up with you,’” she said.
She flipped more boards. One of a soccer mom pulling a dirt-covered boy from a vat of quicksand. One of a runner flying ahead of the pack, cape billowing out behind her. And another of a lab-coated woman punching an oversize germ in the mouth so her patients could get away.
After she presented the last board she looked up and smiled. “Every woman deserves to feel like a superhero. Because she is one.”
Her team applauded.
Mark had to stop himself from joining in.
David looked at Mark, seeming to be waiting for something. Oh. Right. He was supposed to be shooting holes in her concept.
“What about all those young hipsters who don’t feel like they’re accomplishing anything yet?” he asked.
“Well, we could have smaller situations. A woman stopping a cab before it can get away,” she said.
“Or wowing a crowded club with her dance moves?” he suggested.
“Or saving a cat from a snarling dog?” she chimed in.
“Or what about—?”
“I hate to break this up, but we’re not in a brainstorming session,” David broke in. “We’re supposed to be making a decision about which concept to present to the client.”
Mark snapped his mouth shut. Damn it. He’d gone from shooting her down to making her case for her.
Thinking fast, he smirked in David’s direction. “I think the choice is clear,” he said. “Superheroes are great—if you’re seven. I think most women would rather fantasize about a good-looking man than dress up in a Spandex suit.”
The look Becky shot him was murderous. But before she could open her mouth David held up his hand.
“You have a point, Mark,” he said. “But there’s something in Becky’s idea, too. Let me think for a minute. Everybody be quiet.”
Instantly the conference room was deathly quiet.
David moved to the front of the room. “Mark, put your boards back up.”
“Sure,” he said, reaching for them.
“Just do it. Don’t talk about it,” David snapped.
Mark blinked, then did as he was told. This man could give any dictator a run for his money.
David paced back and forth, picking up boards, shuffling the order, then shuffling them again. After what seemed like an eternity, he finally spoke.
“All right. Here’s what we’re going to do. I want you to merge these campaigns. They both have their good points, but together they’d be stronger. So,” he said, smiling broadly at Mark and Becky, “I want the two of you to work together.”
Shocked, Mark stared at Becky.
She stared back, panic in her eyes.
“Together?” she blurted. “But we were competing.”
“Not to worry,” David said, patting her on the shoulder. “You still are. We’ll just have to think of a different way to evaluate you. From now on consider yourselves partners as well as competitors.”
THREE
David’s words echoed in the now silent room.
“Partners?” Becky squeaked.
David looked at her, a frown working its way between his piercing blue eyes. “That’s what I said.”
The whole idea was insane. How could they possibly get anything done when they were both focused on winning the competition? Plus, it meant spending a lot of time alone together. Too much time.
“This is a lot of work,” she said. “How are Mark and I supposed to get it done without the help of our teams?”
“Well, Becky,” David said, looking at her with more than a little disdain, “if you want to be a creative director at this agency you’re going to have to learn to be resourceful. Figure it out.”
Mark cleared his throat.
“I don’t see any reason why the teams can’t help us blow the campaign out after we’ve finalized the concept,” he said.
David clapped him on the back. “Now, that’s the way a creative director thinks. Becky, pay attention to this guy. You could learn a thing or two from him.”
As Becky seethed, David gave his full attention to Mark. “You two have the weekend to get this nailed down. I expect you in my office at nine a.m. sharp on Monday morning to present it to me. Any questions?”
Mark looked over the top of the bald man’s head at Becky. “You?”
She had plenty of questions. Like, why was David such a Neanderthal? What did he see in Mark? Why the hell had she decided to be a copywriter, anyway? Surely there were better ways to make a living. Picking up the city’s garbage, for example.
But neither of the men in the room could provide the answers, so instead she just shook her head.
“All right. I’ll leave you to it,” David said. “Jessie, would you come with me to my office, please?”
The redhead nodded and followed him from the room. Everyone else followed her lead, and soon they were alone.
Becky collapsed in one of the deliberately uncomfortable metal chairs. “Now what?”
“Now you let me take you to dinner,” Mark said.
Good Lord. The man never let up.
“Dinner? No. We might be partners, but we don’t have to be friends.”
“Who said anything about being friends? This is just dinner. You gotta eat, right?”
He looked at her with that damn eyebrow quirked and she felt her resolve melting. She was hungry. And they had a lot of work ahead of them. It made sense to fuel up before they got started.
“All right. Dinner. But I’ll pay. And I’ll choose the place.”
“You’ve got a deal,” he said, smiling triumphantly.
“Good. Meet me downstairs in fifteen minutes,” she said.
That gave her time to come up with a game plan for winning the promotion...and keeping her clothes on this weekend.
* * *
Mark paced in front of the glass doors that marked the entrance to SBD, dodging tourists with every turn.
He’d arrived at the designated spot on time. Unfortunately Becky was nowhere in sight. Just like a woman, he found himself thinking. Probably trying to figure out how big his bank account was. Then he caught himself. Where had that come from?
Surely David couldn’t be rubbing off on him already?
Just then Becky burst through the doors. The killer green dress was gone. In its place was a pair of worn-looking jeans and a baggy rust-colored sweater. And damn if she didn’t look just as good.
“There you are,” he said. “Where are we off to, chief?”
She looked up at him and he noticed her face was scrubbed free of makeup. Without it, she looked all of nineteen.
“That’s for me to know and you to find out,” she said. “Come on.”
He followed her as she wound her way through the congested city streets, ignoring the pressing crowds as only a seasoned New Yorker could.
“So, are you from here?” he asked.
She seemed to hesitate before answering. “No. But I like to pretend that I am.”
He wasn’t sure what to make of that statement, so he ignored it. “Then where are you from?”
“Detroit,” she said shortly.
“Ah. Where the weak get killed and eaten, huh?”
“Or pushed to the end of the unemployment line,” she said. Then, seeming to realize that she was being rude, she smiled up at him. “How ’bout you? Where’s your magic come from?”
“Oh, here and there,” he said. “I moved around a lot.” From boarding school to summer camp to anywhere else his mother had been able to think of sending him that kept him far from home.
Looking around, he realized they were standing at the corner of Fifty-Third and Sixth. Tourist central.
“Hungry for some overpriced deli sandwiches?” he asked.
“Nope. Just spicy deliciousness,” she said, pointing to a food cart.
“Really?”
“Don’t look so surprised. It’s the best halal cart in town. And it’s cheap.”
A few minutes later, when they were seated on a bench with their plastic containers on their laps, he had to admit that she knew what she was talking about.
“This is good,” he said between bites of lamb and rice. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for a street food kind of girl.”
“Really? What do I seem like? A steak and champagne enthusiast?” she said with a sarcastic grin.
“No, more like a vegan foodie.”
She snorted. “We don’t have vegan foodies in the Midwest. Just a bunch of overweight carnivores.”
“So what brought you here? To New York?”
Her expression closed. “The bright lights and big agencies, of course. Just like everybody else.”
She took a big bite of lamb and rice, then abruptly steered the conversation back to him.
“So. In all your moving around you never made it to the Midwest?”
“Nope. I have an aversion to corn fields.”
“Where did you live, then?”
“Well, I lived in New Jersey until I was ten,” he said, hoping that would be enough to satisfy her.
“And then...?”
Man, was she persistent. He sighed.
“And then my mom married a rich man and moved to Connecticut.”
“Didn’t you go with her?”
He laughed bitterly.
“Well, I had a room in her house. But I wasn’t really welcome there. She was too busy with her new family. I spent most of my teen years seeing how many boarding schools I could get thrown out of.”
Her eyes went round. “Why?”
Thanks to the years of therapy his mom had forced him to do, he knew it was because acting out had been the only thing that got his mother’s attention. But he wasn’t going to tell Becky that.
Instead, he shrugged. “Why does a teenage boy do anything? But I saw a lot of the East Coast. Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine...everywhere fancy pants rich people live.”
Becky snorted. “I would have hated you when I was a teenager—you know that?”
He looked at her, genuinely surprised. “Why do you say that?”
“I was the kid doing extra credit projects and sucking up to teachers, hoping they’d help me when it was time to apply for college. I thought kids like you were idiots.”
“And what kind of kid was that?”
She looked at him, her eyes flashing with remembered anger.
“Kids who spent all their time screwing around, knowing they could buy their way into college even if their grades sucked. You would have been one of the people making my life miserable because I couldn’t afford to waste my time partying with you.”
He sat silently for a long minute, unsure of what to say. She was probably right. After his mom had married Bill money had lost all real value. No matter how much he’d charged to his stepfather’s accounts, or how outrageous the purchase, no one had blinked an eye. Except...
“Not me. I went to all-boys schools. Girls were rare and always appreciated, no matter how geeky. Besides,” he said, brushing her hair back from her face, “even if you were a nerd, I’m sure you were a gorgeous nerd. I would have been just as desperate to get in your pants then as I am now.”
She rolled her eyes, looking pleased nevertheless.
“Whatever,” she said, looking down at her phone screen. “Whoa. It’s almost seven already. What do you say we go back and get our war room set up? That way we can start fresh in the morning.”
“That’s a good plan. You’re just going to move your stuff into my office, right?”
Becky froze. “I...uh...thought we should set up shop someplace public. With more space, I mean. Like, you know, the conference room.”
“Why? Are you afraid to be alone with me?” Mark asked, half hoping that she was. He’d love to know he had that kind of power over her.
“What? No. Of course not. I just thought we might need the whiteboards or something,” she said, pointedly not looking at him.
“I’ve got plenty of whiteboards in my office,” he said. “I don’t know about you, but I like a little privacy when I’m working hard. And everybody can see into the conference room.”
She picked at her fingernails. “I don’t know...”
He couldn’t resist the urge to tease her.
“I promise to be on my best behavior. I won’t show you my underwear even if you ask me to.”
Becky laughed at his reference to the first time they’d met.
“Okay. Deal. I won’t show you mine if you don’t show me yours,” she said. “But you’ll have to help me move my stuff.”
* * *
By the time they’d finished moving her desk, laptop dock and giant monitors, dark had fallen and the lights from the skyscrapers that surrounded them twinkled like stars.
Becky gazed out of the window and sighed.
“I could get used to a view like this,” she said.
Mark came to stand beside her. “It is pretty sweet. Definitely beats the view I had at my last office.”
“Oh? Where was that?”
“Los Angeles,” he said.
“Oh. Yeah... I can see how you’d get tired of looking at palm trees and bikini-clad babes,” Becky teased.
“I was a contract worker. Which meant I was one small step away from sitting in the basement with a red stapler. The only thing I had to look at was fuzzy cubicle walls.”
“Ah. At least I’ll always have Ryan Gosling to keep me company,” she said, motioning to the poster she’d tacked to the wall by her desk.
“If you get tired of looking at him I’m happy to pose for pictures,” Mark said.
Becky stepped back. “Now you want to be my eye candy, huh?”
“Nope. I just want you to want me to take my shirt off.”
If he only knew... But she wouldn’t. She wouldn’t even kiss him—at least not again. That morning in his office had been an aberration.
“Dream on, buddy. I don’t sleep with the competition.”
“I know, I know,” he said. “But you can’t blame a guy for trying. You know, if you slept with me I might not try so hard to win.”
“Yeah, right. I’m pretty sure you don’t give up that easily,” she said, giving him a sideways smile.
Then she turned away. It was either that or give in to the temptation to rub her hands over the hard planes of his chest.
“I’m going to check my email and then head out for the night,” she said. “You?”
“I think I’m just going to head out,” he answered. “I need to hit the hay so I’m ready to rock tomorrow. See ya in the morning.”
Becky waved vaguely in his direction as he left and fired up her laptop. She didn’t really need to check her email—that was what smartphones were for. But she did need some time to get used to her new surroundings and wrap her head around the situation.
Truth really was stranger than fiction. If she’d set out to write a book she’d never have come up with anything as screwy as this. It was almost reality-show-worthy.
She could see it now: Flung: Where One-Night Flings Compete.
Giggling, she peeked at her inbox. She was surprised to see it was flooded with messages of support from the whole creative team. The guy in charge of the agency might be a sleaze, but he sure did hire good people.
She was just about to close it up when she saw a name that froze her heart.
Pence.
What did he want?
She considered deleting the email without reading the message, but knew that was the coward’s way out. Taking a deep breath, she clicked on his name, willing herself to stay calm.
Hey Babe
Saw you at AdWorld, but I knew you wouldn’t want to talk to me so I didn’t say hello. Couldn’t stop thinking about you, though. You look good. Done good, too. I’d like to say I’m surprised, but you learned from the best—me.
Did you know my agency is pitching to Eden, too? I’d say may the best man win, but we both know who that is—me.
I’m sorry I’m going to have to crush you. But, hey, there’ll always be a job waiting for you here! Oh, and Chelsea hit the road, so there’s a room for you, too.
Pence
Becky read it twice, unable to believe what she was seeing. Unfortunately the message only got more infuriating the second time around.
Could the man be any more repulsive? Was he really inviting her to take his wife’s...er...his ex-wife’s place over email?
Unable to contain her rage, Becky screamed. Her shriek echoed in the mostly empty office, carrying her pain right back to her ears.
She slammed her laptop shut and got up to pace.
There was no reason this should affect her so much. She’d outgrown him. Outstripped him. She was twice as good as that scum-sucker had ever been on his best day.
Seeking confirmation, she grabbed one of her awards off her desk, stroking the golden statue. She was good. Damn good. And nothing that man could say would convince her otherwise.
But still she heard the echoes in her brain. “No-good hack,” they spat. “Bed-hopping social climber,” they hissed. “As terrible on paper as you are in bed,” they screamed.
Unable to help herself, Becky chucked the award across the room. It landed with a dull thud, the thick red carpet seeming to reach up to protect it from damage.
Becky caught the sob before it could escape from her throat. It was time to go home.
* * *
Becky turned the key in the faded red door that marked the entrance to her third-floor walk-up and trudged up the stairs.
This morning she had felt so confident. So alive. She’d been sure that the world was hers to conquer.
Now? Now all she wanted was a giant glass of wine and the oblivion that came with sleep.
Without bothering to flip on the light switch, Becky stepped into the kitchen and opened the tiny fridge. Wincing at the glaring light, she pulled the Pinot Grigio from the top shelf and took a swig straight from the bottle.