Tymber Dalton - Contractual Obligation

“As long as it works, that’s all I care about.”

“Be careful what you wish for,” he cautioned. “Trite but sage advice.”

“I just want my dad off my back.” She quickly scanned her e-mail on her phone. If she did it around her dad, he tried to take her phone away from her, scolding her to relax. “I have a business to run, you know. And it’s a pain in the ass to try to do it with him riding me to take time off for a personal life when I’m perfectly happy with the business being my personal life.”

She heard her father approaching the kitchen from the living room, and she dropped her voice. “And just because he’s feeling guilty for not taking more time off doesn’t mean I am or will!” She finished her hurried diatribe as her father emerged through the kitchen door.

“What’s going on, sweetheart? You’d better not be working.”

She held up her phone. “Gorden was just giving me grief for checking my e-mail, Daddy. Don’t worry.”

Her father laughed. “Good for him. You’re not supposed to be working.”

Gorden shot her a knowing look. “She’s her father’s daughter, Harrison. In more ways than one.”

She stuck her tongue out at Gorden. She knew he wouldn’t spill the beans, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t give her hell about it in other ways, either.

* * *

On Sunday, they had another great day out on the water following breakfast. By late afternoon, Harper was ready to go home.

Her father, on the other hand, had other ideas.

“Let’s have a long, three-day weekend, honey,” he said. “You and I both need it.”

“I have meetings tomorrow, Daddy. And don’t forget, it’s Doug’s first day.” She looked to Gorden for help. “Right?”

“I’m sure Gorden doesn’t need his hand held,” her father countered before Gorden could answer. “If he can keep you in hand, he can certainly take Doug through his first day unassisted. And you’re the boss. You can reschedule your meetings.”

She didn’t fail to spot Gorden’s amused smile and shot him a glare. “Daddy, who’s running this company now? You or me?”

“Oh, fine. Can’t blame a father for trying.”

“She is right, though, Harrison,” Gorden finally said. “Her morning meeting is with a DoD client. She can’t blow that one off.”

“Department of Defense, huh? Maybe I should sit in on that one, too.” He grinned.

She glared at him. “Oh, no you don’t. My company to run. Remember our deal?”

He let out an exaggerated sigh. “I think you learned too well from me, sweetheart. All right, fine, we’ll go home.” He waggled a finger at her. “But next Friday, be prepared. You’re coming back down here with me for the weekend.”

“Fine. No problem.” It was easier to give in than it was to argue with him on the subject. The truth was, of course, she didn’t mind coming with him to the Boca Grande house. And she loved their fishing trips together. What she didn’t want to do was deal with him pressuring her to relax. That took all the relaxation out of their time together.

Hopefully, in a few weeks, that wouldn’t be an issue any longer.

Monday morning, Doug arrived at Gorden’s office ten minutes early. He didn’t want to make a bad impression on his first official day of work. They had meetings in the morning that didn’t mean a whole lot to Doug, but he paid attention and took notes anyway. He didn’t see Harper much outside of the meetings, but he learned about her by observing her. She was all business, professional, friendly, but definitely no pushover. She expertly maneuvered people into the positions she wanted. She could have been in business decades instead of years.

By lunch time, he was ready for a break and glad that Gorden suggested going out. Gorden took him over to Ybor City, to the Columbia restaurant.

“So,” Gorden started after the waitress took their orders, “any questions so far?”

“Millions. But I see what you meant about her being really intense.”

Gorden smiled and nodded. “Yes. She is a natural for this business. Why do you think her father turned the company over to her without a fight when he lost the bet? It wasn’t a lucky win on her part. She took calculated, well-educated risks that paid out.”

“And yet she wants me to play a role in this charade. Why doesn’t she just stand up to her dad?”

Gorden grinned. “She could, but she’s got a stubborn streak as wide as her father’s. She could also easily go to another technology company and make the same or more than she’s making here. He knows that. She really doesn’t want to engage in a game of boardroom chicken with him to see if he’ll blink first. Instead of playing by her father’s rules, she’s changing the game and playing by her own. The trick is, she’s done it without him knowing he’s now in her court instead of his own.”

“That sounds like a lot of passive-aggressive gamesmanship to me.”

“Not really. She did need a replacement for me. She wanted someone who could, conceivably, work with her during the span of her entire career here. Someone close to her own age, so she wouldn’t have to have someone else trained. It’s a bonus that she can shut her father up in the process.”

“But my contract is only for a year.”

“Oh, don’t worry. She’s counting on you liking the job so much, as well as the pay, that you’ll want to stay on.”

“She’s that confident?” Something about that irritated him a little.

“No, she’s that hopeful.” He leaned forward and dropped his voice. “Just be honest with her. Play straight. Don’t lead her on. Feel free to disagree with her. But if you think you’ll pull one over on her and turn her into a meal ticket, think again. She’ll rip your balls off in the process.”

Doug hoped he hadn’t looked guilty at Gorden’s accidental choice of phrase. Play straight. “No problem.”

* * *

Harper worked through lunch in her office answering e-mails and reading reports from the other offices. It kept her mind off Doug.

She liked the way he paid attention and didn’t look bored throughout the morning meetings, although he had to be almost completely lost at this point. Still, it was only his first day. She hoped after a couple of weeks, once he knew his way around and had settled in, that Gorden would report to her that he’d been a good choice all around.

And if her father grew to like him even more, all the better.

The next morning, Harper had just sat down at her desk when Gorden walked in. “Sorry to bother you, but I need to add a last-minute lunch date to your schedule for today.”

She silently grumbled to herself as she pulled up her calendar on her computer. “Who, when, and where?”

“Bill James, one o’clock, at the Columbia Restaurant in Ybor.”

She sat back in her chair, frowning. “Bill James? As in Keisler Aeronautics?”

“Yes, the one and the same.”

“What’s he want?”

Gorden shrugged. “I don’t know. He called me a little while ago. He’s in town and asked if you had room in your schedule today to see him.” He gave Harper a pointed stare. “Knowing you, this way at least I’ll be sure you’ve had lunch.”

She rolled her eyes and waved Gorden out. “Okay, fine. I’ll be there. Do I need to bring you a receipt as proof of what I ate?”

“No,” Gorden said before he walked out the door, “just take a picture of some food porn and post it on your Facebook wall.”

She laughed. He almost always managed to get the last word in.

Still, she made it through her morning meetings and was at the Columbia restaurant fifteen minutes before the scheduled time. She left her name with the hostess and sat down to wait in the foyer.

Bill James arrived a few minutes later. She vaguely remembered what he looked like from a picture she’d seen in a magazine article about him three or so years earlier. Based out of California, they weren’t exactly a competitor because they made different kinds of aeronautics system parts than Wells Technology, and didn’t deal in software at all except in how it related to their specific components. But they were a big name in the aeronautics industry, although a much smaller company.

He obviously recognized Harper, because he walked over to her with a smile that just screamed, I have plans to screw you, literally and metaphorically.

“Harper Wells?” he asked as he extended his hand.

She stood and shook with him. “Mr. James.”

“Please, call me Bill.”

She was tempted to shoot back, “Please, call me Ms. Wells,” but she didn’t. “All right. Bill.”

The hostess seated them and took their drink orders. “I’ll have to admit,” Harper said once they were alone again, “I’m curious. Why the last-minute meeting?”

He smiled again. This time, Harper detected shades of shark-infested waters behind his guise. “I’ve heard a lot about your company. Seen it on paperwork more times than I can count on a lot of our government contract projects. I wanted to get to know you better.”

Yeah, right. She believed that statement about as much as she believed in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. What he obviously didn’t know was she’d already done some research on his company and knew the only things about it that mattered to her. What she needed to discover was his angle. So she didn’t reply and instead simply looked at him as if she expected him to stumble on along.

Which he finally did when he realized she wasn’t rising to any kind of bait. “Ah, uh, you see, our businesses have a lot in common—”

“Not really.”

That threw him for a loop. “Pardon?”

She was liking him less and less by the second. He was obviously after something and didn’t have the balls to just come right out and state what that something was. She hated people like that. She also didn’t like his manscaping—manicured fingernails, complete with clear nail polish, hair that was perfectly coiffed to best disguise the fact that he was starting to thin on top and held in place with copious amounts of hairspray and other products.

She also didn’t like his cologne. She wasn’t sure what it was, but he wore too much of it. Despite the man’s expensive clothes and a wristwatch that screamed “penis envy,” she suspected inside he wasn’t any better than a shady used-car salesman.

“You guys are a publicly held company,” she said. “We’re private.”

“Well, I meant we both deal with aeronautics—”

“We deal with directional and navigational components and systems. As far as I’m aware, your company doesn’t.”

She couldn’t help it. It was like the doof had brought a knife to a nuclear war. If Gorden had been there, he probably would have already kicked her under the table a few times to get her to ease up. In fact, she realized she’d drawn her legs up under her chair and safely out of kicking range from sheer force of habit.

One of the few times she ever let Gorden get away with pulling the almost-your-dad card with her during work.

Bill James stared at her like he’d just realized the cuddly little puppy he thought he was dealing with had rabies and a bad attitude.

She took a sip of her water to give him time to step in and try again, but he didn’t, so she cut him a little slack. “Let’s cut to the chase, shall we? What are we here to discuss today?”

That time, he was saved from answering by the waitress coming to take their lunch orders. When she left, Harper stared at the man across the table from her.

“I’d like to discuss a business deal,” he eventually said.

“All right. Shoot.”

“We’d like to buy your company.”

Good thing she hadn’t got the glass of water up to her lips yet or she’d have been doing a spit-take across the table and all over him. She laughed. “Say again?”

“This is a serious offer.”

“Seriously out of the clear blue sky,” she said. “We’re not for sale. Sorry.”

“Your company holds several patents that—”

“Aha,” she said, smiling. “You think it’d be cheaper to buy us out than to lease the rights to use whatever it is you want to use. Sorry, no.”

“You haven’t even heard the offer!”

“And I don’t have to.” She put on her best business smile and tilted her head as she studied him. “We are not for sale. Your legal department can talk to our legal department about the technology licensing. We have an entire division devoted to it.” She was beginning to wish she’d brought Doug with her, but he was with Gorden, attending staff meetings back at the office.