“Yes…?I see.Oh.Right, well – aha.I’ll just see if he’s available for you.”
I sat back in my chair and watched Keaton put the call on hold.He looked up.“It’s someone from West Morson Resort and Spa.They want to talk about the Ridley Angus sponsorship deal.”
I frowned.“Why?”
Keaton seemed to falter.“I didn’t exactly ask them why,” he said.“They just said they were really excited to talk about getting the contract signed.That’s… hasn’t it already been signed?”
“No.That was the deal Ace was supposed to turn down.”I tapped my pen against my desk for a second.Something wasn’t right here.Ace was usually reliable.That was how he got away with his off-kilter behavior.He had never once failed to follow through on an order.Something like this was too important for a slip-up.“Distract them.”
Keaton nodded.He lifted up the receiver again.“Hello?Oh, good, you’re still there,” he said.“Yes, absolutely, I’ll be putting you through in a moment.It turns out that Mr.Harvey is actually still in another meeting.It was supposed to be over by now, but you know how these things are – someone always talks too much.And there are extra things on the agenda you didn’t expect.And in the end, it could all have been an email, am I right?”
I tuned out his voice as I dialed my own phone.I kept my voice low so that I wouldn’t be overheard in the background of Keaton’s call.I turned away to face the windows to shield my voice further.There was already one unexpected downside of having him close by.But one upside: we wouldn’t have been able to conspire like this if he was outside.
“Are you mad at me?”Ace asked the second he answered the phone.
“That depends.Did you call West Morson Resort last night?”
“Yeah, just like you asked me to.I told them we weren’t going ahead with the contract and gave them some shit about their lawyer, just like you said,” he replied.“They were a bit pissed off, but they got the message.Why?”
I flicked my pen end to end across my hand.Back and forth.Back and forth.Thinking.
“You spoke to the right person?”
“I called the number that came with the contract,” he said.“They answered the phone right.They said they were the person who dealt with it.As far as I know, it was all above board.Why?What’s going on?Are they saying I spoke to the wrong person or something?”
Something wasn’t right here.
I put the phone down on Ace without further explanation.I didn’t yet have one to give.I nodded across the office to Keaton.He seemed to be deep into a discussion of summer vacation options with the caller.
“Oh, good news – Mr.Harvey’s meeting just finished.I’ll transfer you now… Oh, yes, thank you, you too.Alright, then.”He concentrated as he pushed two buttons.The light on my own handset started to flash.I pressed the green button.
“Hello, this is Oliver Harvey,” I said.
“Ah, Mr.Harvey!”the caller replied.“So happy to speak with you.This is Leo Couvon from West Morson Resort and Spa.We’re thrilled that Ridley Angus is going to be partnering with us.I’d like to get the ball rolling on the first commercial as soon as we’ve signed that contract, so if you could let me know when we’re likely to expect it…?”
“Hold on,” I said.“Did you speak with Ace Park last night?”
“Yes!”Leo trilled.He sounded like he was getting the deal of his life.Not at all like someone trying to trick us.“I couldn’t believe it when he called.The whole office here was jumping for joy, let me tell you.There’s going to be some champagne for us after Mr.Angus visits!”
I frowned.This was getting stranger by the minute.“I don’t know what you’re trying to pull,” I said.“But we did not agree to your sponsorship.We spotted the trick your lawyers put into the wording.”
“What?”Leo sounded like he needed air.“But… that’s… that’s impossible!”
“I can assure you it is not.Maybe you need to ask some hard questions of your legal team.”
“No – I… it’s impossible because you were the ones who sent the contract to us!”
I waited a second for that to make sense.It didn’t.“What?”
“We were so thrilled to think that a star like Mr.Angus might have recognized us and asked personally for us to partner with him,” Leo went on.“I was very happy to let your side handle everything, Mr.Harvey.I promise you.We only had our lawyers look over the copy you sent.We didn’t touch a word of it.”
It began to dawn on me that West Morson weren’t trying to pull a trick on us.
Someone had pulled a trick on us both.
“I’m going to need to get back to you,” I told him.I hung up the phone while he was still uttering platitudes about not knowing how this misunderstanding had arisen.
“What’s going on?”Keaton asked right away.I could see he was perceptive.Even with only one side of the call, he knew something was up.
