Page 35 of The Calendar of New Beginnings (Dare Valley #9)
CHAPTER NINETEEN
M oira was nervous about her meeting with Chase Parker.
Evan had shown her around the center’s temporary location at Emmits Merriam University a couple days ago.
The tour had made her more excited about the opportunity, but there hadn’t been a single butterfly in her stomach from start to finish.
Of course, she’d been on cloud nine from the happy news that her brother and Lucy were dating—the whole family was elated.
Plus, Evan was funny and approachable and kind of geeky, it had turned out, once you got over the whole billionaire genius inventor thing.
Then there was Chase. Totally different ball of wax.
He was coming to town for meetings, and he’d asked to meet her at High Stakes, Chef T’s fancy restaurant in the Grand Mountain Hotel, on Friday afternoon.
Moira arrived in a navy business suit, one she’d made a special trip to her apartment in Denver to pick up. The hostess immediately ushered her into a private dining room and closed the door behind her.
The man she’d researched thoroughly rose from the end of the long table where he’d been checking his phone.
He was tall and ruggedly handsome—the kind of man who still wore his Wyoming rancher heritage in his broad shoulders but who’d found a way to wear the sophistication of an Italian suit with total ease.
Power radiated from him, and Moira fought with the raw awareness he generated in her. Most women found Chase Parker handsome, and she was unhappy to discover she was one of them.
“Hello, Moira,” he said in a baritone voice. “I’m Chase Parker. It’s nice to finally meet you. Evan has been telling me good things about you.”
He didn’t span the distance between them to shake her hand. Unlike Evan, who was eager and somewhat jittery, Chase was the kind of man who expected people to come to him. Moira had rather expected that.
“Mr. Parker,” she responded. As she walked down the long length of the private table, her eyes fell on the copy of her resume laid out carefully by Chase’s phone.
“Chase,” he corrected, taking the hand she extended to him in a firm clasp.
“Thank you for flying out to meet me,” she said. “I told Evan I would have been happy to visit you at headquarters. I know you’re a busy man.”
He gestured to the chair to his right. “Please sit. This project is important to Evan, and given the press the Artemis Institute is receiving, I want to make sure it receives the proper attention from the ground up. We’re here today to see if you might be the anchor. Evan seems to think so.”
She took a seat and crossed her legs. “I’m glad Evan has expressed such faith in me.
Not that I’m surprised. My cousin, Jill Hale, has been working on him.
Plus, we’re the same age, and Evan wants the institute’s director to be young and local.
I fit the bill. But we both know there’s more to running a center like Artemis.
I hope I’ll be able to persuade you that I’m up to the task. ”
She’d thoroughly researched Quid-Atch and concluded she wanted to be a part of a company like that, one with a global reach and vision. That she could do so in Dare Valley was a bonus. The more time she spent here, surrounded by her family, the less she liked the thought of leaving.
His mouth turned up as he settled back in his chair. “Evan said you would call a spade a spade. I’m surprised you’d bring up Jill’s campaign to see you land this position.”
“As a human resources director, no one is more sensitive to issues of nepotism than I am.” Her bland stare did nothing to change the steady regard he gave her. “I want to be hired because I’m the best candidate for the job.”
“I’m glad we can dispense with the small talk then,” Chase said, tapping his finger to her resume.
“You have less experience than I’d personally like to see for this position.
Evan and I have a slightly different idea of the kind of director needed to successfully run the center.
Most of your work has involved only human resources.
I’m more convinced we need someone with more management experience. ”
She’d expected him to raise this concern.
“With my recent employer, Peterson Engineering, I significantly widened the scope of my work. While Peterson doesn’t deal with inventions per se, it does highly technical work.
I had to be fluent in the jargon to be successful.
I managed a staff of seven people directly and had indirect supervision over another thirty.
Beyond approving staff hires, I was personally involved in the decision-making process for every senior management position. ”
“Including your former boss?” he asked, crossing his arms over his massive chest. “I take it she’s the reason you resigned your position before you had a new offer in hand.”
Since Jill had told Evan all about her bitchy boss, she’d had no choice but to paint the full picture. Evan had been sympathetic. Chase wasn’t going to be that easy.
“I did everything possible to work with Taylor, but she wasn’t interested in cooperating. I concluded she saw me as a threat to her position. The situation wasn’t going to improve, so I decided it was in my best interest and the company’s for me to call it.”
“Did you recommend the company hire her when you interviewed her?” he asked, and darn it all if she wasn’t impressed with his line of questioning. She would have asked the same question.
“No,” she said, “I told them I was concerned she wasn’t a team player. I was overruled.” Their decision to hire Taylor had been a slap in the face.
“If your opinion was so valued by management, why didn’t they listen to you?” he asked, turning his phone over when the screen lit up with a text.
She appreciated him giving her his full attention, although right now she felt like the circus lion being nudged about by a lion tamer.
“They didn’t see what I saw,” she said, going for full honesty. “Taylor acted different with me when we were alone, which didn’t give me a good feeling. She didn’t even agree to give me two weeks to transition my work to another staff member before I left, which is customary.”
There was a knock on the door, and Chase called out, “Enter.”
A server brought forward a tray with a bottle of sparkling water, two glasses filled with ice, and a bowl of lime wedges. “As you requested, Mr. Parker,” the man said, setting the tray down beside them.
“Thank you,” Chase said, and Moira was happy to hear him say it. Many of the senior executives she’d known felt so entitled, they’d forgotten the meaning of politeness.
“I thought we could start with some water,” Chase explained as the server poured. “Of course, please order anything else to drink you’d like.”
If they were going to work together, he needed to loosen up a bit. She couldn’t work with such a starched shirt. “Even champagne?” she joked.
His eyes narrowed for a moment before he smiled. “As you wish. I have plenty of martini lunches in D.C. with the Defense Department. Government types never shy away from drinking when a contractor is footing the bill.”
The server was patiently waiting. “I’m good with water to start, but if you could bring me an espresso, I’d be most appreciative.”
After he left, she leaned forward conspiratorially. “Chef T makes really great espresso.”
“Personally?” Chase asked, looking more relaxed now. “I’m surprised he’s not off shooting one of his TV shows.”
“He’s here now, and he knows we’re meeting. Chef T is connected to our larger family.”
“The Hales. Your great-uncle is the legendary Arthur Hale, and everyone expects your brother, Matt, to be voted in as the new mayor this November.”
“We try and tolerate their presence,” she said blandly. “They’re both crusaders for justice in their own ways.”
He studied her. “And are you? Someone in human resources often has to right wrongs done to employees in a company. Have you ever had to fire anyone?”
“Of course,” she said, sipping her water after adding a lime wedge. “If they deserve it, I keep it short and sweet. If they’re being laid off, I keep a box of tissues on my desk, but I still keep it short and sweet.”
“I see a pattern.” His mouth quirked up, and it was hard not to notice the rugged planes of his jaw. Fortune hadn’t airbrushed anything. “I wasn’t sure what to expect after what Evan told me about you. He said you were really nice and funny.”
This time she rolled her eyes. “Showing off my intelligence to an inventor wasn’t really on the table. What was I supposed to do? Talk about the best way to structure a job description or create a human resources manual?”
Chase laughed, and it was one of those loud, gusty ones, which she found herself immediately liking.
“Evan’s eyes would have glazed over the minute you said job description.
I was the one who insisted I write one for my position.
If it were up to Evan, he would have just hired me and let me do whatever I wanted. ”
This time she was the one who laughed. “I have a feeling you probably still do whatever you want—even with a job description.”
“You’re right,” he said, chuckling darkly. “But Evan is the boss, and I try to remember that mostly. He and I?—”
“Are perfect examples of complementary leadership,” she interjected. “Sorry, I got excited. I sometimes interrupt.”
He took a drink of his water. “No, I’m glad you aren’t one of those stiff, inflexible human resources types.”
“Oh, don’t mistake my good humor. If we agree on a job description, I’ll follow it to the letter unless we agree on expanding the scope. And if we have a manual in place for how to run the institute?—”
“You’ll make sure every I is dotted and every T crossed,” he said, interrupting her this time .