She wiped the tears from her eyes. “Don’t give up,’” she told herself.
Ramsey was a jerk, but she believed there were lots of other people that weren’t who needed her service. She would be calm and go about her day like the incident never happened. Life wasn’t great at the moment, but it could get better.
Later that day, Samantha attended her regular yoga class. Thankfully, she had paid for it previously. She needed the relaxation of the class after her experience at Phillips Corp. She sat, she stretched, she followed the instructor’s lead, and she focused on the present moment. Her mood improved as a result. She was pleased that the class had a no refund policy because it forced her to attend, or waste the money, which she certainly wasn’t going to do. In a relaxed state, she could put everything in perspective and focus on the good things that could happen to her.
It wouldn’t be long before she had saved enough to move out of her parents’ house. It wouldn’t be long before she would be back on her feet. So what if she’d never get a loan or a mortgage? Who needed them anyway? It’s not like she was ever gonna buy property again, anyway. It was best to celebrate the smaller victories. One of the victories she wanted to have was fundamentally linked to Phillips Corp—she would not be brought down by one man. She would go in there, register a complaint, and have done with it. It’s not like every man in the building was a pig. She had pride in herself and her skills, and that would carry over into a sense of professionalism. But she wouldn’t be massaging that Ramsey bastard any time soon, that’s for sure.
She took a cab home feeling better about the day.
Chapter 4
Gordon did not especially want to be ousted from the board of his own company. He admitted to himself that it was, in fact, his father who had done the majority of the leg work. His father had started the business from nothing and built it into an international conglomerate of businesses. Well, that was the public understanding of it anyway. The Family Brand was a core part of the marketing strategy of Phillips Corp, and any exaggerations of its founding moments only served to feed the beast of a myth that people literally bought into.
Frank Phillips had borrowed a million dollars from his father, Phillip Phillips, which was a great deal of money at the time. It had taken Frank so many years to pay it back that the exchange rate for a million dollars had changed drastically, so drastically that he had only repaid a fraction of what he had borrowed.
Gordon also knew the reason that he had never met his grandfather was that, on the night of his thirty-fifth wedding anniversary, Phillip Phillips had snorted so much cocaine off the breasts of prostitutes that he had suffered an immediately fatal heart attack. Of course, nobody outside the family knew this; that would spoil the brand.
Gordon thought of himself as a reasonably competent businessman. He certainly hadn’t run the business into the ground, as so many billionaire trust fund inheritance people that he knew had. He had hired James Ramsey to do the really hard work. It was, therefore, Ramsey’s fault that the company was on the skids. But that was the rub of getting to be the CEO. He took the glory. And he took the shit to go with it.
The most effective form of motivation for Gordon was that, if he didn’t work hard to keep the company doing well, his brother would try to take the company. And if his brother had a hook that let him cling on, he would hold on with a mighty force and pull. Gordon didn’t know exactly when impressing Mother had become a competition; he suspected it had always been the case. But he sure as hell wasn’t going let that little runt, his little brother, get one over on him. Since the patriarch had died, it had become a duel to see who would get to be the man of the house, even though the only person in the enormous mansion was Mother. And the pool boy. That unusually well-toned and oft-shirtless pool boy. Was his mom sleeping with the pool boy? Gross. Didn’t bear thinking about.
That was the cross that Gordon had to bear. That was the trade-off for his brother not kicking up a stink about Gordon getting the company. And Gordon could take it if it meant being the one with the real power, the one who gave Mother and Harry their pocket money.
My back hurts, Gordon thought to himself. Didn’t Ramsey tell me about some hot piece of ass who gave massages? Yeah, I could go for one of those. Get the kinks out of my back, the aches and strains of keeping up with it all.
He got the number from Ramsey, who was oddly hesitant to hand it over but had eventually done so. You don’t say no to the boss. Before the phone call ended, he was blubbering about how he had asked her for a handjob, and she had stormed out, clearly very upset.
If she went to the press, if she went to court with this, the company would take a massive hit, one that it could not afford right now. Gordon needed to clear this up, and he needed to clear it up now. He had his secretary dial the woman, Ms. Parker, and patch her through to his office.
“Ms. Parker, I wanted to apologize for the behavior of my colleague, Mr. James Ramsey. This is…”
“Yes, my god. I know who you are. Your secretary told me. I can’t believe I’m on the phone with Mr. Phillips.”
“You know, you can call me G—”
“Please. I’m barely keeping it together as it is. I would feel much more comfortable addressing you as Mr. Phillips.”
“Then, I shall call you Ms. Parker.”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s great.”
“Anyway, back to Mr. Ramsey…”
“Yes, I…remember him.”
“Look, Ms. Parker. That was not acceptable behavior. I’ll let Jimmy know that. I wouldn’t defend what he did by any means, but he isn’t without his regrets. He didn’t want to put you under any pressure by apologizing in person. And I decided to do it myself anyway.”
“Mr. Phillips, you really didn’t have to. Or you could have got somebody else to do it. I do appreciate the effort. Thank you.”
“Look, we here at the company really don’t want to see you leave.” The other side of the line was quiet. Gordon continued. “Please. You have received unreserved praise from every one of your clients here. Can I at least get you to consider a permanent contract at a significantly higher rate than you were receiving before?”
The company did not need negative publicity at this point, and he knew the best course of action was to win the masseuse over to their side. A good apology, a juicy contract, and a pay raise should do the trick. It would be hard to refuse. The lady came highly recommended, and as far as he was concerned, he’d want to keep his staff that liked her services happy.
“I can…consider it, Mr. Phillips.”
“At least give it some thought. We can wait for your answer.”
After Mr. Phillips had offered her a raise and a contract position, Samantha had started dancing around the room. As she hung up, Samantha’s excited gyrations caused her to connect to a chair leg in the open-plan kitchen and dining area. Samantha had the wherewithal and body control to manage her descent, and she was thus able to miss hitting anything and landed on the floor, bracing herself on her upper arm. A nasty fall during a bicycle accident years before had taught her not to brace using her hands, which was a natural impulse.
She couldn’t keep her excitement to herself. Even Ella noticed. “Mom, what music are you dancing to? I can’t hear any music.”