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That ‘sweetie’ seems to have broken the spell. She whips her head up at me, a new fire in her eyes. “Don’t call me sweetie,” she hisses through clenched teeth.
Then she retucks her blouse, sweeps the loose tendril of hair behind her ear, and stares directly at Dax, then Liz. “We have a lot to talk about. We should get started,” she proclaims, almost too loudly.
Then, she motions for me to sit at the table like she is in charge. And honestly, from the rigid stance of her body and the fire spitting from her eyes, one would think she actually is the person in charge here. It’s kinda scary. And hot.
I like a woman who isn’t afraid to back down.
I sit meekly, not daring to say a word.
Instead of sitting by my side like she usually does, she sits in the chair opposite mine. Then, she looks around and realizes she doesn’t have her laptop or any of the paperwork she needs for the meeting. So, she pushes back from the table and walks deliberately into her office, back ramrod straight, gets her things, and returns.
Liz and Dax just watch this entire exchange. Once Lana is settled back into her seat, they take their seats.
No one is quite sure how to start until Dax speaks up.
“Nice to see you again, Lana,” he says, a twinkle in his eye.
“Wait, when did you meet Lana?” I ask, confused.
“When I asked her to go out for drinks last week,” Dax confesses.
My eyes flash to Lana. “You went out with my brother?” I accuse, disbelief in my voice. If my brother touched her, I’ll kill him.
Lana doesn’t say anything. She just crosses her arms and gives me a death stare.
Dax laughs loudly. “She turned me down. Now I see why,” Dax says, shrugging.
“Asking my EA out is directly against the company rules,” I say heatedly to my brother.
He just looks at me with an annoying smug look, not saying anything. My first aches to reach out and wipe that look off his face. I know what he’s thinking.
That it’s okay for me to break the rules, but he isn’t allowed to do the same.
Thankfully, Liz sees where this is going and breaks into the conversation.
“So, I want to talk about the Albott proposal,” she says quickly to change the subject. “Lana sent me the financials to look over. She has some concerns.”
That grabs my attention.
“The Albott deal is a multimillion-dollar deal. I want to hear everything you found,” I say, leaning forward. All business now.
Lana glances around the table. “Well, I spent the better part of last week looking into the company. On the surface, the deal looks great. Mr. Albott is anxious to sell. He claims that he wants to retire and spend time with his wife, traveling. They already have tickets to cruise around Europe. Normally, I would wonder why he is insisting on closing the deal so quickly, but that explanation made sense and didn’t send up any red flags.”
I interject, “And when we visited, the employees seemed happy and content. We visited each of the departments and spoke with management in each area. I was overall impressed with their operation.”
“If I’m not mistaken, this deal is unlike others we typically do. This company isn’t in trouble. We are buying it outright because Ethan wants to grow our IT cybersecurity division, correct?” Liz asks.
“You haven’t met Ethan yet,” I explain to Lana, “because he has so nicely decided to take a sabbatical. He left all of his work unfinished and took off with no warning.
Liz has a pained look on her face. “I think he has some things he’s trying to work through,” she says in defense.
“That may be. But he took off and left a mess for us to clean up. His irresponsibility is costing us time and money. And now, you and Lana are telling me you have some concerns about this Albott deal.”
Lana speaks up, “Yes, we have concerns. As I said, on the surface, everything looks great. They are hugely profitable. Cybersecurity is a growing need in our country, so I can see a strong future to grow even more.”
“So, what is the problem?” Dax asks.
Lana nods to Liz. Liz passes out copies of a spreadsheet. Several line items are highlighted. “When Lana was going through the financials they sent, some numbers weren’t adding up. They sent over the P&L statements, bank statements, balance sheets, and tax returns. But when she took an added step to add up totals on bank statements, she realized that it wasn’t adding up correctly. Something was missing.”
