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Now Nathan’s mouth hung open slightly as he looked at my outstretched hand.
“It wasn’t that,” he said, defensiveness coating his voice. “You can’t blame me for assuming—”
“Assuming that a woman couldn’t hold this title?”
“No!” he exclaimed, his face contorting into a grimace. “Your name—it’s…”
“Lovely?” I finished, smiling sweetly. I withdrew my hand now that he’d made it clear he wouldn’t be shaking it.
It might not be the best move to fluster the new boss on our first official meeting but he started it. He had no right to come in here and act like he owned the place—even though hetechnicallydid own part of it. But why should I treat him with respect if he didn’t have the decency to do the same to me? I might care about doing a good job, but I was not—and would never be—a pushover. That’s how I got this position in the first place after all.
A position that certainly could not be handled by a guy like Will, who practically shook and hid at any mention of a tight deadline or a challenging goal. Sure, he was nice and smart, but that could only get you so far.
“Well, I wouldn’t expect the head of a department to be late.” Nathan’s harsh tone returned, and it took everything in me not to roll my eyes.
“That’s my fault.”
I turned to see Ben’s cheery face enter the room. If these two were trying to play a game of good cop-bad cop they were doing an impeccable job.
“I caught Charlie here in the hallway and introduced myself. You aren’t seriously giving her a hard time for being a few minutes late are you, Nathan?” He chuckled. “You know I can’t get to a meeting on time to save my life.”
Nathan sighed, and for the first time since I entered the room, his hard gaze softened.
“Charlie, I apologize for the mix up. I’m looking forward to working with you.”
“Likewise,” I said, my heart rate still pulsing from the confrontation. I took a few subtle breaths through my nose to calm my nerves and get the shakiness out of my hands.
Nathan seemed every bit the cocky hard-ass I feared he would be. I knew his type. He wanted everything done a particular way and strived for absolute perfection. He would try to micromanage this project within an inch of its life. Not exactly a dream boss when you were the type of person who thrived in an autonomous work setting.
As we all took our seats and Nathan began his presentation, I tried my best to be open-minded about his ideas and project timelines. But the more he spoke, it became increasingly obvious that this would not be the last time we butted heads.
Chapter Five
NATHAN
“What about the QA portion?Your timeline doesn’t give nearly enough time for testing.”
I closed my eyes as Charlie interrupted yet another one of my slides with a question.
“This timeline will ensure we get everything done by the strict deadline we’ve imposed. Getting this completed for our New Year’s launch is of the utmost importance.”
She scoffed. “I thought having a quality product was of the utmost importance?”
I winced as she repeated my words from the beginning of my presentation back to me. “It is. We can have both a quality product and have it delivered quickly. I’m not new to this, Charlie. I’ve planned and seen through every single new release at Pulse.”
“How late do you expect people to work on this? You want us to stay until nine every day just to meet these requirements?”
“If that’s what it takes.”
“No.” She shook her head. “My team doesn’t operate well under those circumstances. Long hours like that, and they’re bound to start making silly mistakes and missing easy errors. Orworse, they’ll decide to take their talent elsewhere. Some people are already tense about the changes.”
“We need to get this done in this timeframe. It’s a nonnegotiable for the board. If your team can’t do it, that’s a problem.”
“My team are some of the best out there.” She narrowed her eyes. “And the reason they stay here and don’t look elsewhere is because of how they’re treated. One look at this plan and they’ll be headed for the door. You can find some subpar replacements, but I can assure you they won’t do as good of a job.”
“You’re being unreasonable,” I insisted. “This sort of deadline is perfectly normal.”
“Normal if you’re okay burning yourself out.” She tapped her fingers against the table and played with a strand of her long hair. “We need to think of an alternate plan.”
