“What if I told you I was a criminal mastermind, in charge of a vast network of people who do my bidding? Would you resign?”
She laughed and the sound was rusty and hearty at the same time. “Hell, no. I have health insurance. So what do you do?”
“I invest in talent,” I answered.
“Talent? Like actors, singers, that kind of thing? Are you some kind of remote Hollywood agent?”
Did I want to answer any of this?
It was late. I was tired. She had to be, too. She’d worked until the end of every day with me for the past two weeks, which was never before eight at night. She’d done this with no complaint and no explanation of why she needed to leave on time. Despite the hours being listed as eight to five in the employment contract.
In my continued effort to know as little about her as possible, I had no idea where she went when she left this office. She had no idea where I went, either.
This completely generic office space, in this completely generic building complex on the outskirts of downtown Houston was our entire world together.
I planned to keep it that way.
“No,” I finally said.
She waited a beat, then nodded once. “Good talk then. Whelp, see you tomorrow.” She stood and smoothed out the wrinkles in her slacks.
I liked that, too.
Anna didn’t press me. There was absolutely nothing she expected from me, including polite behavior.
The relief was stunning. I didn’t have the energy to try with people, so I didn’t. But there was still a part of me that felt their disdain at my behavior. Rightly so. I was rude.
I could have let her leave for the day and that would have been the end of it.
But if after two weeks of employment she still didn’t know what I did, also felt unprofessional. On my part. Because I hadn’t explained the operation to her.
“Sit, Flowers,” I told her. “You need to know what we do.”
She shrugged, then sat down again.
“Seriously, weren’t you even mildly concerned you were working for a criminal organization?”
“You’re too pretty for prison,” she answered unapologetically.
She’d said during our interview that she was not afraid of anything and that was something else I’d found to be true.
Two days into the job, I’d asked her to place a call to the CTO of a nationally prominent tech company and she hadn’t blinked. Simply asked if there was a direct number because she was doubtful the chatbots were going to let her get that far.
“I’m a venture capitalist,” I told her. “It means I find what I think are talented people with good ideas for companies and I invest in them.”
Her jaw dropped. “Wait? That’s a thing in real life? You’re talking about the Shark Tank.”
I sneered. I hated that silly show with its television personalities. “I am decidedly not talking about the Shark Tank. What I do is real.”
She took a moment to stare at the generic mug on my desk. I told myself it was for an afternoon cup of tea, but the truth was, I hated tea.
“You mean if I have a good idea for a company, I tell you about it and you just give me money to make it happen?”
“I do.”
“What if I fail?”
“That’s the risk I take. I don’t back a lot of failures though. It’s what makes me, well,me.”
