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Jim frowned. “Your wife? William, our corporation is about to face one of the most damming periods in our entire history and you’re worried about your wife? If Diana wins the election, we were going to handle all international PR for her entire government. We’ll lose that too. And that’s who you’re worried about?”
William looked at Jim. “Don’t you forget who I am and who you are. Who owns this company, Jim? You?”
Jim should have known he had crossed a line. “No sir. You own it.”
“You’d better start acting as if you understand that,” William said. Then he looked at all of his senior leadership in that room. “I’m going back to Chicago. Bobby and Max will come with me. The rest of you remain here in New York and develop a plan to contain the fallout. There will be fallout, but we have to do whatever we can to contain it.”
“And if it’s as bad as I think it’s going to be?” Jim asked. “Because I’ll be blunt, William. You fucked around with your client’s wife. That won’t go over well with many of our other high-net worth clients. This can get really ugly really fast.”
William had already thought about that too. “If the fallout is worse than what my worth to this corporation can be and I have to resign, then so be it. Put everything on the table. Including my exit if it comes to that. Come up with a plan,” he reiterated. And then he left the board room.
Bobby and Max looked at the others in sheer bewilderment. How could the boss leave his own company? The man that made it what it was today? They didn’t like that scenario at all! They hurried out behind William.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Ready. Set. Go!”
All three lifted their shot glasses and slung the liquor down their throats. And then they laughed.
Joy was in the club with Tess and Cory, and all three were having a blast. At least outwardly Joy was too. But every time she saw a couple snuggling against each other or laughing together or dancing on the dance floor, she felt an emptiness. She missed William.
“This is what we girls need to do more often,” Cory said with a wave of his hand. “All three of us are young, and we’re beautiful. Well. At least I am,” he said and they all laughed at that too. “But for real though. We’re twentysomethings with the world at our feet. We need to embrace our youth way more than we do.”
“That’s all well and good,” said Tess, “but Joy is a twenty-six-year-old married to a forty year old man. He’s not exactly the definition of youth.”
“He’s either still forty-three, or he already turned forty-four,” said Cory. “But I know he ain’t no forty. And I’m not talking about him. You don’t think he hangs out with his peers in New York or in London or in any of those fancy-dancy places he’s always traveling to? Of course he does!”
“Including his lady friends,” said Tess. She’d had more drinks than Joy and Cory. She had a buzz. Which made her more willing to go there.
But Cory could tell that Joy wasn’t willing to go there. “Why are you always bringing up William?” she asked. “He has nothing to do with this.”
“First of all,” Tess said with her finger pointing, “I didn’t bring him up, Cory did. And second of all, the truth is the truth. You’re married to a major man.”
Joy frowned. “What’s a major man?” she asked.
Cory grinned. “Her drunk,” he said.
“I’m drunk, am I?” Tess asked. “Look over there.”
They all looked at the booth across from theirs.
“Why is that gorgeous hunk of brother sitting there?”
“That’s Michael Iverson.”
“And who is Michael Iverson?”
“He’s . . .”
Tess smiled. Joy didn’t want to say it. “He’s the bodyguard that Mr. Skeffington ordered to ride shotgun with you everywhere you go ever since you got back from Bridell. Am I right, or am I right?”
“Yes, but he’s forbidden from spying on me and reporting back to William. Unless there’s danger.”
“But think about it, Joy,” said Tess. “It hasn’t been a year ago when all of us were struggling, and you was struggling most of all, let’s face it. Your ass couldn’t even afford to get your broke-down car fixed. And now you have a bodyguard? Girl bye!”
Cory laughed.
“But he doesn’t report back to William like that.”
