Millennium - 26. Chapter 26

December 2, 1999

 

“I need to see you and Luke,” I told Stef. I’d called him first thing in the morning, before the day’s activity started. There would be lots of last minute negotiations, of firms like ours trying to work out a bid that optimized what the company wanted and was still consistent with what they wanted. We usually knew all that beforehand, it was part of the learning curve. We knew what we were doing, so today would be relaxed for us. All of our experience made life much easier.

“Why don’t you come on over?”

“I need you to come to my room,” I said. “Come join me for breakfast.”

“Well you are certainly mysterious on such an eventful day,” he replied affably. “We will be right over.”

“Only you and Luke. Not Brandon,” I said. He didn’t bother to answer me. I hung up the phone. “They’ll be here shortly.”

“I’m kind of nervous,” Robbie said.

“You should be. You think I get pissed off when people fuck up my plans? You should see Stef.” He chuckled. “But I’ll defend you.”

“Oh great, just what I need. Hiding behind you,” he teased. We’d had an amazing night, an absolutely amazing night, and it had helped us bond, to start to repair some of the damage to our relationship.

The doorbell rang and I checked the peephole first, and then opened it. “Well good morning,” Stef said. Luke looked at me inquisitively.

“Good morning,” I said, ushering them into the dining room.

“Why are there four places set?” Stef asked. Just then, Robbie came out of the bedroom, looking nervous even though he tried to hide it. “And what are you doing here?”

“You seem to have forgotten your manners,” I said to Stef severely. He looked at me, pissed off, and then pulled himself together.

“I did not realize you had transformed yourself into Emily Post,” he said sarcastically. He went up to Robbie and gave him a hug and a kiss. It wasn’t the warmest greeting, but it was better than it could have been. “I am sorry if I was rude. I am perhaps not at my most impervious this morning.”

“That’s fine Stef,” Robbie said. “It’s good to see you anyway.”

“Most men say that,” Stef said arrogantly, cracking us up.

“Luke,” Robbie said simply, and held out his hand. Luke shook it in his mechanical way. We sat down at the table and started to eat.

“I am confused,” Stef said. “You two are obviously happy and glowing, yet there are shards of pottery in your foyer.”

“Robbie put on a show for Dan,” I said. “He got here when Dan did.” I told them all about the brief scene at my door.

“Perhaps you will share with us why you are here?” Stef asked Robbie.

“Carson was starting to slip away, and I wanted to keep him on the hook until tomorrow. To do that, I had to see him. After that, I needed to see Brad.”

“Because of your pledge of equal time?” Stef asked.

“No, because I love him, and I needed him,” Robbie said, staring directly at Stef. It was funny to see Stef digest this, the new Robbie with his self-confidence partially restored. Robbie said that with the same tone as if he’d have said ‘fuck you’.

Luke remained silent. “I am interested to hear how you plan this to work out.”

“It will appear to Dan that Robbie and I had a massive argument, finalizing our split. It was even accompanied by a sacrament: broken ceramics,” I said playfully.

“My wives usually threw it at me, not at the door,” Luke said, making us chuckle.

“I think it’s reasonable that with such a traumatic argument I would be devastated and inconsolable today. It is my intention to remain right here, in my room,” I told them.

“You will not be much help here,” Stef said, mildly irritated.

“Au contraire,” I said. “I think I can still help coordinate all of our plans and bids.” The looked at me, questioning my statement, and I sighed. “I am tired of these games, and I am not sure that I can hide my true feelings anymore. Dan will probably call and check on me and I can fake being sad and pretend to cry a little on the phone. I’m not sure I can do that if I see him in person.”

“What if he wants to see you?” Stef asked.

“If he does that, I’ll turn him down,” I said. “Then tomorrow, after the bids are through and the gala begins, I’ll appear with Robbie, happy as can be.”

Stef and Luke eyed me with irritation, because I was doing to them what Robbie claimed I had done to him. But I’d always followed orders like a good soldier when I needed to, and this time I knew I was right. There was nothing to be gained by me being out and about with the players. It would be better for me to be hidden and despondent. “I think we can work with that,” Stef finally said.

“You’re not much use anyway,” Luke teased.

“Thanks,” I told them sincerely. There was a knock at the door and Robbie got up hurriedly to flee to the bedroom.

“I’m expecting a package, Brad,” Robbie said. What was he up to now? Stef and Luke looked annoyed again. When we were in the final execution stage of a plan, surprises were not welcome.

I went to the door and opened it to find Josh carrying a medium sized box. “You have a package,” he said, grinning.

“Why thank you Josh.” I gave him a big tip as I took the package. “I am too busy to pay you in other ways.” He chuckled.

“Maybe later.” He grinned and left, while I lugged the box in and put it on the table.

Robbie reappeared and studied it. “This is it.” He opened it up and the first thing he pulled out was a really nice watch. It was a TAG Heuer.

“That is an awfully big box for a watch,” Stef observed.

“Is it for me?” I asked playfully.

“You get your present later,” he said, and kissed me. “It’s for Brandon.”

“You bought a watch for Brandon?” Luke asked.

“It has a radio transmitter in it. It’s all very James Bond,” Robbie said, joking, as he reached into the box again. “This part is the receiver, along with a taping system. As long as he wears this watch, everything he says will be taped.”

“What if they figure out it’s bugged?” Luke asked. He was thorough.

“Almost impossible,” Robbie said.

He handed it to Luke, who passed it to Stef who passed it to me. There did not seem to be any way to distinguish it from a regular watch. “It looks like a normal watch,” Stef confirmed.

“I’ll set the base station up here,” Robbie said. “After I test it out, you can give the watch to Brandon.”

“Most ingenious,” Stef said, smiling at Robbie.

“That will help us if he sues us for firing him for cause,” Luke said.

“I actually had a better use for it, but let’s see what we get from it first,” Robbie said.

Robbie tested the watch, and then packaged it up. We listened to Brandon when Stef gave it to him. Robbie had picked just the right watch. If it were any flashier it might have been suspicious, while if it was any less flashy, Brandon might not have worn it. The rest of the day I spent reviewing our bids and listening to Brandon. The boy was truly evil. And every so often, Robbie and I would take a break from listening to Brandon and make love, and it was really nice.

The Alphalogic bids were due at 7:00pm, and the Go Chang bids were due on Friday morning at 10:00am. At 6:15, I sat in Stef’s suite with Luke, Brandon, and Stef. I made sure to look morose and despondent so Brandon would buy into my excuse for staying in my room. “I’ve re-worked the Alphalogic bid like you asked,” I told Stef. “I think you were right to go higher.” I watched Brandon almost panic. I knew from his watch conversations that Amphion had bid very close to our original bid, the one we discussed. I wanted them to go higher.

“Do we have time?” Brandon asked. “If it’s ready, I can run it down to them.”

Stef took the document and pretended to review it, saying nothing, then signed the paper and handed it to Luke. Luke did the same thing, and then handed it to me. After I signed it, I handed it back to Stef. He put it in the envelope and sealed it. “I will deliver this one myself,” Stef said. Brandon really panicked now. He heard us say we were raising our bid, and he knew Amphion didn’t leave much cushion in theirs. “You can go play.”

Brandon pretended to chuckle, and then almost fled out of the room. Stef walked over to the paper shredder and fed the bid into its grinding metal teeth. We wouldn’t be submitting a bid on Alphalogic. We headed over to my suite to find Robbie sitting by the base station, laughing.

“They’ve upped their bid on Alphalogic!” Brandon told Cary Chase urgently.

“By how much Brandon? It doesn’t do me any good if you don’t tell me the numbers,” Cary said.

“I don’t know. I didn’t get to see it.”

“You didn’t open it when you delivered it like you did with all the others?”

“Stef took it down himself. It makes sense. He knows those guys.”

“He probably blew them. We’d better make ours even higher. You can go now, but next time, I want more details,” Cary said, dismissing him. What a dick.

We went to bed that night, confident that they’d go higher still, and kept our fingers crossed that they’d go for the biggest deal of all tomorrow.

 

December 3, 1999

 

“That should do it,” Stef said. “Brandon, will you take this down to Mr. Lu for me? Then I have a few errands I need you to run.”

“Sure Stef,” Brandon said cheerfully. It was only 9:00am, so he was really happy. Plenty of time for Amphion to work up a bid higher than ours. He took the envelope and was in such a hurry, he tore down the stairs instead of waiting for an elevator. We went back to our suite to listen in.

“I see you got the real deal this time,” Cary said sarcastically.

“Shut the fuck up,” Dan snapped. “You did really well Brandon.”

“Thanks Dan,” Brandon said, almost flirting. Were he and Dan fucking?

We heard rustling paper. “They bid higher than we thought.”

“Is it worth it?” Dan asked.

“This is the big deal,” Cary said. “This is the one we’ve been waiting for. It will put us firmly on the map. We’re not going to back down now over $10,000,000.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Dan said. They worked up a bid that was close to $300,000,000, and then Cary took it down to Mr. Lu himself. About half an hour later, we got a call from Mr. Lu notifying us that the Amphion bid had been accepted.

Brandon came up, looking all somber. It was ironic that he was acting somber, and so were we. He was acting somber because he’d wanted Amphion to win, but he worked for us. We were acting somber because we wanted Amphion to win, but we were supposed to want to win ourselves. We’d lost every single deal here to Amphion. “Brandon, I’d like you to head back to Los Altos,” Stef said. “There are some papers I’ll want you to fax up to me at 4:00pm, and you’ll need to give me an update on my e-mails and phone messages.”

Now Brandon’s somber attitude wasn’t an act. He wanted to stay here, to be in on things, to see the end. He wanted to gloat over Amphion’s victory. But the bidding was done and there was nothing for him to do but leave as Stef instructed. We walked over to my room, and found two guys there with Robbie. They were cute, dorky types.

“And who are these handsome young men?” Stef asked, flirting. They smiled and ignored him.

“They’re sound engineers,” Robbie said. “It pays to have friends in the movies.”

“You will have a disk for me by 4:00?” Stef asked.

“Absolutely,” Robbie said.

“May I speak with you for a minute?” Stef asked. “Alone?”

“Sure,” Robbie said.

“Don’t fuck him,” I told Robbie, joking, although I was intensely curious to know what Stef was telling him.

We’d really been busy, all of us working to bring Amphion down as low as we could, and I felt the signs of exhaustion, signs only veiled by the adrenaline rush carrying me forward. Robbie had been a dynamo, both in bed and with his sound project. If his plan worked, it would be a blockbuster.

Around 2:30pm, we started to get ready for the gala. It would take place at 5:00pm, and should end by 8:00pm. That was about as late as you could get people to stay on a Friday night. Robbie and I took a shower together and he made love to me this time, perhaps a sign of his budding self-confidence, or perhaps just to change things up. It didn’t matter to me at all. Sex with him was amazing no matter how we did it.

I put on my t-shirt and my starched white shirt with French cuffs, then put on my pants. I was about to take out my cufflinks when I felt Robbie’s arms wrap around me. He kissed my neck affectionately. “Wear these instead,” he said, and handed me a box.

“You telling me how to dress now?” I joked. “You think you’re Claire?”

“Fine, don’t open it,” he said, grinning.

I took the box and smiled at him, then opened it up. I almost passed out. There, in the box, were two cufflinks just like the other pairs I had. They had solitaire stones, tastefully set in 14 Karat gold, only these weren’t emeralds, or tanzanite, or even rubies. These were diamonds. “Tell me these are lead crystal,” I said.

“Nope, it’s the real deal,” he said.

“Robbie, there’s got to be a million dollars’ worth of diamonds here,” I said, stunned.

“You’re pretty close,” he said, grinning now.

I put them on and watched my wrists sparkle as I moved my hands. They were beautiful stones, so clear, so flawless. The only slight detractor was that they’d been cut flatter, so they were shorter and wider. Perfect for cufflinks, but perhaps not as good for a ring or a pendant. “Thanks, they’re as awesome as you are.”

“I bought the emeralds because they matched your eyes. I bought you the tanzanite because they match mine. I wanted you to think of me when you wore them. But I bought these because they’re strong. And this is going to sound corny, but that’s how our love is. You can throw rocks at it, dent it, bend it, but in the end it is so strong, nothing can break it.”

I felt a tear trickle down my cheek and I wiped it away. “That’s a really sweet thing to do, and a really nice present. Those words may be corny, but they mean a lot to me.”

“You said I had to work to get you back. Am I on the right track?”

I laughed. “Yes you are, not because you spent so much money, but because you did it to show me you care.” I gave him a big kiss. What a sweet thing to do. What a generous thing to do.

“I do care. You’re my world,” he said. “But right now, we have to go fuck up other people’s lives before we get ours back in order.”

We walked out into the living area and stood in front of the mirror. We were a handsome couple, and our contrasting coloring and builds made us seem different enough that we looked like we belonged together. I really couldn’t have picked a more perfect partner from an appearance perspective. “You’re hot,” I said, smiling at him.

“I know,” he said playfully. I looked at the clock: 3:45pm. “Time to make things happen.”

Robbie picked up his phone and called Evelyn to set thing in motion on his end, while Stef had things well in hand at our office in Los Altos. Robbie had just gotten off the phone with Evelyn when Stef breezed in, smiling.

“You have the disk?” he asked.

“Of course,” Robbie said. Stef took it then stopped. His mouth fell to the floor and he grabbed my sleeves.

“My goodness! You are the Queen of England?”

“It’s a bit ironic to hear you calling someone else a queen,” I teased.

“These are beautiful, exquisite! Look at how the color is perfect, and how they seem flawless!”

“Thanks Stef. Someone loves me,” I said, beaming at Robbie.

“Yes he does,” Stef said. “But I must go. I will meet you here before the banquet, and we will see how things are progressing.” He left and I leaned in to kiss Robbie.

“I think you won him over again,” I joked.

“He’s not the one I want to win over.”

“Yeah, but the way you’ve handled things these past few days, you’ve shown him the amazing man he remembered.”

“You know, when you stroke my ego like that it’s just like you’re stroking my cock,” he said playfully. He took my hand and put it on his hardening member.

“That’s my favorite problem,” I said. Before he knew what was happening I was on my knees with his dick in my mouth. Robbie loved to get his dick sucked. Most guys did, but he really loved it, and that made it a lot of fun to do. He came, a small load probably because I’d already kept him so drained. I licked my lips and stood up to kiss him. “You taste so fucking good.”

He blushed. How cute was that? “And you’re one great cocksucker.” That made me laugh, thinking that in the straight world, some might consider that an insult.

At 4:20, things started to get busy. I thought about the time and was so tempted to go smoke a joint, but that was my treat for later. The first call came in for Robbie. He put it on speakerphone, a really nice gesture considering what it was about.

“Well that was fun,” Evelyn said sarcastically.

“How so?” Robbie asked.

“The three of us walked into Carson’s office: David, Bill, and I. We gave him a letter terminating him and gave him his severance pay.” David was the head of security, Bill was head of HR.

“You gave him severance pay?” I asked. We weren’t being so generous with Brandon.

“Hello Brad!” Evelyn said cheerfully, hearing my voice. “We didn’t have concrete proof; at least not enough to withstand a legal challenge, to withhold it, so Bill thought this was better in the long run.”

“Sounds like a smart call,” I said.

“He didn’t take it well. He demanded that he be allowed to talk to you, and he started threatening all of us. He said Brad had put some sort of spell on you, and that he would break it. Once he did, he told us that we were all gone.”

“That’s too bad,” Robbie said sadly. He looked at me worried, but I just put my arm around him. His sympathy could have been construed to mean he had residual feelings for Carson, but I knew better. Robbie was basically a very kind and caring person. He felt bad for Carson because Carson is a human being, and because he used to care about him.

“David reminded him that at least we were doing better than he was at that moment, and he got so obnoxious we had to have two security guards almost carry him out. It created quite a scene.” Evelyn was trying not to laugh.

“What kind of scene?” Robbie asked.

“He was ranting and raving at the guards, but then when the employees saw him being dragged out, they stood up and started clapping. That pretty much shut him up. It’s not every day all of your co-workers applaud you because your ass got fired.”

“I hope they haven’t lost complete confidence in me,” Robbie said.

“It is something you can rebuild,” Evelyn said. If she were here, I would have hugged her. She handled that perfectly. She didn’t give Robbie a pass, letting him think it was all OK. Instead, she acknowledged that his reputation had taken a hit, but motivated him by telling him it could be rebuilt.

“I’m just so glad this is over,” Robbie said despondently.

“So am I,” Evelyn agreed. “We’ll see you next week. We’ll get things back in order around here.” They exchanged a few more niceties, and then hung up.

“It’s over,” Robbie said.

“It’s an end and a beginning,” I told him. “I’m excited to see what new heights you’ll achieve now that you don’t have this hanging over your head.” He gazed at me lovingly.

My phone rang next, and it was Craig from our HR department. “That didn’t go well at all.” He’d had an almost identical squad with him when he went in and fired Brandon.

“No?”

“He completely broke down, sobbing. He was inconsolable. We packed up his things and escorted him out front, expecting him to leave, but he didn’t. He just sat there on the front steps, crying and crying. Finally, a car pulled up and a woman helped him in and drove him off. One of the employees claims it was his mother.”

“He just sat out front and melted down?” I asked.

“He did. It was one of the uglier terminations I’ve seen, from an emotional standpoint.”

“How did the other employees react?” I asked. “What effect did this have on morale?”

“Well of course it is too early to know for sure, but my initial read is that it was positive. He wasn’t very popular, and had very few friends here.”

“Grace will be returning to work on Monday,” I told him.

“We should review…”

I cut him off. “She returns on Monday, and there’s a letter explaining her new arrangement to you and to her. You’ll have it on your desk Monday morning.” He pissed me off. He was one of those HR directors that seemed to think his position gave him final authority over staffing positions, and not just input. I waited for him to acknowledge my directive, and then ended the call.

Just as I hung up, Stef returned from his meeting with Roger Elsie. He was so pissed off his eyes were flickering like fire, and his cheeks were flushed.

“John Bainbridge was in the meeting with Roger and me,” Stef said. Bainbridge was one of Texpo’s Board members, and he was a relatively outspoken homophobe. He’d wormed his way onto the board of the industry association, and he was slowly trying to usurp the entire board’s powers.

“He’s an asshole,” I observed.

“You are correct. They did not think it fit to change their minds about giving Amphion the Venture Capital firm of the year award,” Stef said. He was so mad he was fuming.

“Then we’ll let the members explain it to him,” I said, smiling. We filled him in on Brandon and Carson, then went down to the Gala.