Chapter 133

I knew what Amy was going to tell me about Justin before she said a word the following day outside our school.

“Justin went away with his family yesterday. There’s a family emergency,” she said. “He said he has some important stuff to talk about with me when he gets back.”

“Oh, I hope his family is okay,” I said, doing my best to pretend I didn’t know that there was no emergency.

Justin had sent me a text the night before. He said he wanted to tell his family about Amy before he revealed his secret to her.

He felt the best place to tell them was while they were visiting his grandmother, who lived on the other coast. She wasn’t as prejudiced against Betas as the rest of his family.

I disagreed with his decision to delay telling Amy, but Justin seemed sincere in wanting to come clean with both Amy and his parents.

So far, Amy was okay. She missed him, but Justin promised to call her every evening until he came home.

It was nice to have Amy’s full attention when we were together instead of fighting for a few seconds of her time while she texted with Justin.

I told her about my meeting with the company executives scheduled for that afternoon.

“Wow. Are you nervous?” She asked. “I couldn’t talk to those rich Alphas.”

“I am nervous,” I admitted. The butterflies in my stomach began flapping their wings every time I thought about it.

“Just remember you are their boss,” Amy said and then giggled. “Sometimes it’s hard to believe how much you’ve changed. My bestie is a popular businesswoman!”

“There are times I don’t believe it either,” I agreed as we began to go inside the school.

At lunch, William sat across from me as we reviewed my notes for the meeting. When we were finished, I felt better prepared when Victor picked me up later.

“Are you ready for this?” Victor asked as he drove me across town to my office.

I gave him a thumbs-up and tried to smile.

I was still nervous, but I knew this was something I had to do. It was time I faced these men who thought I wasn’t qualified to be CEO of the company.

I would show them I am my father’s daughter.

We went straight to my office and went over the quarterly reports one more time. I was getting more nervous by the second.

“Let’s go to the conference room and get this over with,” I whined.

“Not yet. You need to be the last person to enter the room and the first to leave,” Victor advised. “This is your meeting. Stay in control.”

The words ‘stay in control’ echoed through my mind as I walked into the room where twelve men wearing expensive suits sat around a long oval table.

The room went silent, except for one immaculately groomed executive with steel-gray hair and eyes who kept talking to the man beside him.

He was Tim Clayton, a close friend of John Cameron and a bad influence on the rest of the company executives. He’d been the ringer leader of the group of men since my first day in the office.

Victor gave me a subtle nod, and I began the meeting.

“Stay in control,” Diana reminded me as I took a deep breath and began.

“If you would all open your folders, we will begin,” I said. Wow, I didn’t stutter.

“Don’t think about your stutter. You’ll psych yourself out,” Diana said. “You’ve got this.”

“I …I’d like to bring your attention to sales figures for last month,” I said a moment before Tim Clayton let out a loud laugh.

“I’m telling you, that dancer had some moves,” he told the blushing executive beside him.

My eyes shifted to Victor. He gave me another slight nod.

“Mr. Clayton, is there anything you’d like to tell the room?” I asked.

“Yeah, why are we here wasting our time?” he said. “Nobody wants to hear what some daddy’s little girl has to say.”

My temper flared, but I kept my voice calm. “I want you to leave.”

“Let your fiancé take over, or we’ll all leave this so-called meeting,” he said. “Nobody believes you’re really in charge. Give up the pretense.”

“I meant you’re fired. Now, get out.” I said, stunning him into silence.

I sent a text to my assistant. “Security is coming to escort you to your office to pack your belongings. Then they will escort you from the building.”

“You can’t fire me.” Tim Clayton chuckled. “I have a contract.”

“Which expired last month and was never renewed,” I said. “I’ve had lawyers go over all of your contracts. And I want you to know I will not tolerate this kind of behavior, even if it means paying severance pay.”

“How dare you!” Tim exploded.

“No, Mr. Clayton, how dare you speak to me the way you have,” I said. “It will not be tolerated by you or anyone else at this company.”

Two security guards appeared to escort Tim Clayton from the room.

“You’ll be sorry for this, little girl,” he declared before directing his anger at Victor. “You too, Klein. We won’t forget your part in this farce. You’ll be working as a janitor when we’re through with you.”

Victor gave him an icy smile. I tried to mimic it as Tim was led from the room.

Despite my shaking legs, I immediately began the meeting again. “Back to last month’s sales figures …what is the first thing you notice?”

The remainder of the meeting was uneventful. The men cooperated, and I collected the information I needed to make decisions on data analysis, risk assessment, and the allocation of resources.

But after Victor and I returned to my office, I collapsed into my chair.

“Tim meant what he said. I’ve never seen so much hate in someone’s eyes,” I groaned. “You’ll need to watch your back. I’d hate for you to lose your company over me.”

“That will never happen,” Victor said. “Let’s worry about you and this company.”

“I am worried about this company,” I replied. “What if Tim inspires the rest to act like him? I expect some form of retaliation.”

“Tim is friends with John Cameron,” Victor reminded me. “I’m sure they will try some dirty trick.”

“Terrific,” I said and put my head in my hands. “I’m getting tired of needing to watch my back.”

Now that I was working with greedy Alphas like Tim and John Cameron, I despised them more than ever.

Why couldn’t they be happy having more than most people? Why did they want it all?

“The other executives didn’t even know me,” I thought out loud. “How could they hate me enough to help John and Tim steal the company?”

“They need to know you better,” Victor said. “You put on a good meeting. I was impressed with the way you handled yourself. But you need to make them feel loyalty toward you.”

“How do I do that?” I asked.

“My father told me to make my upper management feel like they are a part of my inner circle,” Victor said. “He invited them to dinner parties and picnics.”

“I could have a dinner party this weekend,” I said. “Do you think they’ll come?”

“I’m sure of it,” Victor replied. “None of them walked out when you fired Tim. They want their jobs, and they want a strong leader who cares about them and their families.”

“Then I will have a dinner party and invite them and their wives,” I decided.

Victor took my hand and pulled me to my feet. “Let’s return to the mansion now, and you can get Benson working on it. And I want you to change into jeans.”

“Why?” Wearing my jeans sounded great, but what was Victor up to?

“You told me the other day that you missed doing normal things, right?” he asked. “Things like eating hamburgers and fries and going bowling.”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“So, let’s go bowling,” he said. “You can teach me how to bowl. You deserve some fun after firing Tim.”

I laughed. “That sounds great. Why don’t we ask William to join us? He said he wanted to learn how to bowl too.”

“Sure,” Victor said. “I’ll text him and have him meet us there.”

To be continued......

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7 chapters for this week has been uploaded. Happy reading! Thank you all for your support.!

And I will update chapters 5 to 7 next week. Please stay tuned.