Page 40 of Handsome Devil
“Be respectful of Corben, Dane.”
“Is that his name? I forgot. I just call him Sir Stick-Up-His-Ass. You know, in my head.”
“Dane. The handler is one of the few things giving your grandmother peace of mind right now.”
Wonderful.Guess that means I’m stuck with him.
“So, tell me,” I said. “Now that I’ve fired this wayward manager, what would you like me to do with the agency?”
“You’re asking me?” My mother sounded amused. It wasn’t like me to ask for her take on this kind of thing. Dealing with any issue in a business this size was far beneath her.
“Yes. I’m asking you. You’ve been disappointed in me lately. I’d like to make sure I’m headed in the right direction here.”
“And what direction do you think you should be headed?”
“A new and better manager for this agency, obviously. A woman, I presume.”
“Any chance you can install one before the gala? So we can satisfy the rumor mill? Good news to bury the bad?”
“If I promote someone from within, yes.”
“Then promote someone. If she’s not ideal, have her cover for the interim, while you find someone ideal. Either that, or we sell off the agency.”
“Superior?”
“Of course not. Just the west coast office.”
Seriously? Was she testing me or something?
“I assumed you bought this agency because you wanted to grow our presence on the west coast.”
“Since when have I ever given a damn about Vancouver? Your grandmother wants us out west. She’s had a soft spot in her heart for the west coast ever since your grandfather took her to one of the islands on their honeymoon. And you know, she’s getting older. And more nostalgic.”
“Well… then we should keep the agency. And find the right woman to run it for us.”
“Or sell it and invest in something else. I don’t care which way it goes, Dane, as long as it looks good. And makes us money.”
Of course. “Alright, Mom.”
“I’ll see you on the weekend. And… take care of yourself, Dane.”
I kinda choked.
What was I supposed to say to that? That was the nicest thing my mother had said to me in several days. Nowhere in the chaos of an exploding sex tape scandal or me losing staff and respect and my fiancée did my mother utter anything along the lines of comfort or concern.
It just wasn’t Christiana Davenport’s nature to cuddle or coddle.
“I will,” I said carefully. “See you on the weekend.”
I hung up. That actually hadn’t gone as bad as I expected. I’d expected to endure my mother tearing me yet another new one,beforeshe listened and inevitably came around to the fact that I’d done the right thing.
I wondered, should I have waited to fire Janelle Gorman? Let her appear at the gala, then fired her quietly and replaced her quickly with another woman? Could I have done that instead?
Nope. Couldn’t do it.
Once I’d discovered that she was not only an obnoxious human being, one I didn’t particularly want representing one of my family’s companies on any level, but that she was also stealing, I couldn’t leave her here for one more day.
It was my job to fix problems within our businesses.
