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“She seems it,” I said. “If I am to be completely honest, our company is looking at buying a company that is a few blocks away. Angelo’s. That ring a bell?”
“Of course it does,” she said. “It’s the best Italian place in town, and they just opened a bar and club section.”
I smiled.
“Yes!” I said. “They came to us for the investment money. We had to turn them away since our investments are a bit larger than what they were looking for, but I started up a relationship with the owner. He’s getting up there, and his kids don’t seem terribly interested in running the business when he’s gone. I thought I might franchise it.”
“Oh. Oh, that’s cool.”
I got the impression that, despite what she said, she most certainly did not like that idea.
“Anyway,” I said, “I remembered the address of the place you had on your résumé, and I wanted to check in and talk to someone about you face to face. Especially since I was going to offer you the position. I wanted to make sure I knew what I was getting into.”
“Sure, sure,” she said, and then what I said looked like it hit her. “Wait, what?”
“The job,” I said. “My assistant. I wanted to offer it to you. Here.”
I pulled the laptop bag off my shoulder and opened the flap, rummaging around in the back section for the folder, and pulled it out to hand it to her. She took it carefully and opened it up, a shocked expression on her face. Then she shut it and her eyes went back to mine.
“No way,” she said.
“What? Would it be that terrible working for me?”
“Are you going to play mind games every day about your coffee?”
I laughed in surprise.
“See, that’s what I like,” I said. “You don’t hold back when you have something to say. Even if its pithy and sarcastic. You have a mouth on you, Julia.”
And what a mouth it is,I thought to myself. Big, puffy lips that looked like they would be incredibly soft and yet firm as they wrapped themselves around…
“I am sarcastic,” she said, interrupting my thought before it got way too far away from me. “I thought my sarcasm and my… everything, I thought it ruined my interview. I essentially quit.”
“You can’t quit when you don’t have the job yet,” I said, mirroring what I told Bobby earlier. “Besides, all that shit I put you through, I’ve never had someone react like you did. Like you were above it, but not because you were cocky. Because you knew your worth. It was amazing.”
“It was?” she asked, a disbelieving look on her face. “I mean, yeah. Sure. So, this job. When would it start?”
“When are you available?”
“Um,” she said, biting her bottom lip and looking back toward the pub.
“Look, I don’t want another cookie-cutter college graduate who can run around and get me coffee. You proved you are adept at coffee making, but that’s only a tiny part of the job. This is more than just a simple assistant. You’d be working on high-level stuff, acting in my place sometimes. I’d be trusting you to be much more involved than a secretary or a coffee girl.
And with that comes a big check. A much bigger check than I think you’re going to find anywhere around. Especially in there. This is your chance to try something important and intense, and make a hell of a lot of money doing it.”
“How much money?”
I smiled. “It’s all in the folder,” I said. “There will be a temporary period first, but after that, the pay is, how do I put this,competitive.Highly competitive. Competing to win.”
“Oh,” she said.
“But when I say intense, I mean it. This is a tough job I’m asking of you. Not a lot of free time for a while. And you have to show a willingness to learn. You have to show initiative. You have to be willing to step on toes and apologize rather than wait around to ask permission. Understood?”
“Yes,” she said.
“When you refilled my coffee, you did it why?”
“Because it was empty,” she said.
