“Are you okay?” Jon asked Steph, ignoring Jack and Andrea’s presence, his eyes remained fixed firmly on her.
Steph nodded, although she was still a little shaky and flustered by how things had gone. She glanced back at Jon, then Andrea before beginning to go through the financial points of the proposal again.
“Right,I think we have a point to start negotiations,” Jon said about forty minutes later. “Although I am unsure whether it would just be easier to employ my own legal team. What do you think, Miss Pryor?”
“You could, you certainly have the room to house a bigger legal team, but in order to access the degree of legal expertise that we can offer it would be very expensive and you would have employer obligations to them all,” she said honestly.
“I see, is that your opinion as an employee of Baker, Ross and Riley or as a shrewd accountant?”
“I don’t know about shrewd, but it is my professional opinion,” she told him.
“Umm, okay, then I will not reduce the level of legal services I want from you, but we can renegotiate cost, but Mr Baker and Miss Stewart are surplus to those requirements and until we have completed our negotiations, finalising of roles and transition I would like Miss Pryor to take up a desk here in my current in house legal department to ensure that they know what their limitations will be and when to forward to you. The cost of her time and services will of course be covered by us,” he saidto Jack, irritating Steph with his words making her feel like a commodity rather than a person with an opinion that should be valued.
“That seems reasonable,” her boss replied without deferring to Steph in any way, clearly someone else who didn’t deem her worthy of being included in the discussion.
“That’s not really my field,” she protested, uncomfortable at the thought of being traded, but more than that she was nervous at the idea of being here, on Jon’s home turf.
“I disagree,” said Jon. “I think I would like you to commit to all day Wednesday and Friday afternoons, if that works for you, Mr Baker?”
“Yes, I think we can work around that. Miss Pryor has a reasonable workload that we can redistribute slightly for the duration of this arrangement, don’t you think, Miss Pryor?” asked Jack with his first inclusion of her.
“Yes, of course. I have a very good team.” Her opinion was unnecessary it seemed so she resigned herself to this being a done deal, but she knew that if she secured this contract, another promotion or even head hunting could be just around the corner and right now her only ambition was work related. The way Jack Baker had been prepared to sacrifice her meant head hunting was her preferred choice of moving on up.
“So, we have a deal in principal, but if I can possibly commandeer the rest of Miss Pryor’s afternoon and finalise the amendments, you can have them back for the morning, Jack.” Jon was already making his next move and Steph wasn’t convinced it was professional.
“Sounds fair enough to me, although we are almost at the end of the business day.” Jack glanced at his watch.
“I will of course provide a working dinner for Miss Pryor if we run beyond the close of business.”
Steph definitely sounded like some business acquisition now, causing her irritation to rise further right up to the point where Jon looked directly at her and smiled. Her earlier reluctance to be playing any kind of game with him on his home turf was proving to be well placed if a mere smile had her annoyance subsiding.
“Then I look forward to receiving the revised proposal in the morning.” Jack turned to Steph. “My office at half-past-eight and we will discuss your workload.”
She nodded at him thinking she had no choice in that matter either.
Andrea led Jack out leaving Jon standing opposite Steph.
“Hello,” he said in a low, hushed tone.
“Hello,” she replied with a flush rising across her chest and neck as she whispered her response.
“You really are very intimidating in your day life.” He stepped closer.
Breathing deeply, she managed to reply, “So are you. I have never seen Jack Baker sucking up before.”
He laughed at her observation and shrugged, unbothered by the other man’s sucking up. “Are you mad with me for bringing you here like this?”
She paused, considering how she felt about the charade that had led to her presence. “Yes, a little and I am not something to be acquired and traded, although you have managed to do precisely that with my Wednesdays and Friday afternoons.”
“I knew you were an accountant, you told me and Charlie told me you worked for them, but it wasn’t until I received the email last Friday with your name on that I realised it was you dealing with my contract and after not sleeping all night Saturday thinking about you; you, me and our time together, especially in that office, I decided that I needed to see you, so here you are.”
“I see, so nothing to do with the deal?”
“The deal seemed too good to be true and I thought it would be wise to get your take on it, and I may have invited the accountant along anyway, but as that was you, my hand was forced,” he admitted.
“Why do you need me here on Wednesday and Friday?” she asked, realising that he was stood right in front of her now.
“Wednesdays really are for my legal team to understand their roles and limitations within my contract with Baker and Fridays, well, that was impulsive, but I will get back to you on that one.” He grinned as he reached forward to undo her jacket.
