Page 6

Chapter six

Noel

B right and early, I'm one of the first cars in the parking lot at JV Marketing. I walk into the lobby and say hello to our receptionist. A man already waiting for an appointment stands up as soon as he sees me. I look at Julie to explain since I don't have any meetings scheduled for the day.

The man speaks up for Julie, “I’m here with the paperwork from your father-in-law, Mrs. Williams. He said you’d be expecting me.”

I let out the breath I didn’t realize I was holding. “Yes, that’s right. Follow me,” I tell him.

We walk down the short hallway to my office and step inside.

“Please have a seat,” I gesture to one of the chairs across from my desk.

He sets a packet on my desk and takes his seat. “You will find that Mr. Williams has marked the necessary places for you to sign. I’m able to explain any of the documents to you. Please take your time,” he explains.

I open the folder to find four pages tucked inside. Reading over the first, I find I’m to vote against a merger with a smaller finance company whose name I recognize from pieces of conversations with Nate. Based on those past conversations, I have no doubt he would have voted against this merger, so I sign it.

The next is in favor of staff salary increases, and the third is mostly gibberish to me about percentages of earnings. The fourth catches my attention. Grant has it marked that I am voting in favor of an NDA requirement for all staff and clients.

I look up to see the man is typing on his phone. He stops when he feels my gaze on him. “All done?” He asks.

I realize he didn’t give his name. “Almost, Mister?”

“Please, call me James,” he says.

“James,” I say and nod. “I do have a question about what all of these percentages represent, and I’m curious as to why clients would need to sign NDAs to invest their money.”

He smiles as though I’m a child asking an adult question. Asshole . I sit up straighter.

He clears his throat and explains, “The board often re-evaluates the amount to charge clients from their investment earnings. Those are the new percentages that have been proposed to take effect next quarter. As for the NDAs, we represent high-profile clients who prefer discretion. Some of them can be well-known to the public. All of the employees at Grant Holdings sign NDAs to keep our clients’ personal information confidential; this is very common with all financial institutions. However, we have recently experienced some of our clients leaking information about who they’ve seen in our offices and when, which has not been received well. In essence, NDAs will keep our clients from using our offices as a place to pick up gossip.”

Well, that makes sense. Satisfied, I sign the last two papers. After placing the documents back in the folder, I hand it over to James.

“Have a good day, Mrs. Williams,” he says and leaves my office.

I power up my laptop and open my emails to find a few that need answers. Then I focus on preparing for the meetings I have scheduled later this week.

My phone beeps. I expect to see Kate’s name on the screen since I haven’t heard back from her since last night. She exchanged numbers with someone at the event on Saturday night, and I thought for sure she’d be full of juicy details about a new fling by now.

However, I’m surprised to see it’s a text from Declan.

Good morning. Do you prefer pink or purple?

Pink or purple what?

The colors…

He avoids the question. I doubt this man is sitting in his office curious about my favorite color.

Purple

I’m almost finished with Velocity’s new logo and will need his approval to move forward, so I pull up the file and add the final touches that I thought about over the weekend. Then I type out an email to send him the logo, letterhead, and slogan idea.

TO: declanadams@velocitylogistics. com FROM: [email protected] SUBJECT: Logo First Draft DATE: July 21, 2024

Good morning Mr. Adams,

Please review the files attached. If you are satisfied with the design, I will order business cards and begin working on your website. Please let me know if you’d like any changes made.

Noel Williams

I press send on the email and check my phone. He never responded to my text, so I’m in the dark as to why he asked about the colors.

I can’t deny that I’m a little nervous to see him, especially since it’s not work related at all this time. My pulse stutters in anticipation of how he will behave away from a professional setting, especially since he didn't let it stop him from flirting at the event.

My email dings on my laptop with the arrival of Declan’s reply.

TO: [email protected] FROM: [email protected] SUBJECT: RE: Logo First Draft DATE: July 21, 2024

Noel,

You are exceeding my expectations. Please move forward with the website and business cards.

Declan

I stare at the first sentence of his email entirely too long. Convincing myself not to read into it, I decide he means the design, and I’m glad he approves. Now my afternoon just got much busier. I let our receptionist know to expect my lunch delivery. Then I set to work on Velocity’s website.

Towards the end of the day, a knock on my office door breaks me from my concentration.

“Come in,” I call out without looking up from my laptop.

“Burning the midnight oil?” Joey asks from my doorway.

I look at my screen to see it’s already 6:00pm. “Shit! I didn’t realize how late it was,” I say to myself as much as to him.

“Are you at a stopping point? I’ll walk you out. Everyone else is gone for the day,” he offers.

“Sure,” I say, “thanks.”

He walks in to have a seat while he waits for me to finish up. I hit save and shut down my laptop. Then I close the blinds and take my bag out of the bottom drawer of my desk.

“Ready,” I tell him.

He stands up and puts his phone back into his pocket as we walk out of my office and through the building.

“How’s everything going with Velocity?” He asks.

“Great! I got approval on the logo this morning, and I’ve been working on the website ever since,” I answer excitedly .

“That’s awesome, Noel. Let me know if you need anything. I’m really glad you’re back,” he says over his shoulder as he locks the front door.

The parking lot is empty except for our two vehicles, which aren’t near each other.

“Thanks, Joey. I’ll see you tomorrow,” I tell him and turn to walk toward my car.

“Hey, actually, Amanda wanted me to see if you’d be up for coming over for dinner Thursday night,” he calls after me.

I turn back around. “Sure, I’d like that.”

“Cool. I’ll tell her to reach out and arrange it, then. See ya,” he says and walks toward his truck.

I smile to myself because I genuinely feel good about accepting their invitation. Climbing back up from such a low place and actually wanting to participate in the world around me is a far cry from where I was mentally just a few weeks ago. Only now can I see just how low I really was.

When I get into my car, I call Kate to check on her. She’s been so quiet since Saturday night. She answers on the second ring and jumps right into a graphic, very detailed account of her new guy. By the time I manage to get her off the phone a couple hours later, I’m half asleep and barely make it through my shower before crawling into bed.