Unwanted Heat

I’m fed up and don’t know what more to say as I sit in the chair at the head of the table and listen to my PR department scramble how to fix this. Two years ago this wouldn’t be an issue… two years ago I was pictured in magazines with the same woman at event after event. I was never called a playboy, my sexual preference was never debated and no one believed I had anything to hide. No one questioned my ability to run my company and handle billions of dollars. Just another fucking example of another thing she took from me… how the fuck I was blind for so long is still a mystery. I don’t believe in making the same mistake twice; hell will freeze over before I ever consider trusting someone the way I trusted her. I won’t give someone that power over me ever again.

I shake my head, ridding myself of thoughts of her… I haven’t let myself go back there for a long time and once again I question my own sanity during that time for being as blind as I was. I pull myself back to the meeting, needing to focus on the latest issue at hand and not at past mistakes that I have made. The past will never repeat itself, so dwelling on it will not solve anything.

The conversations around me are about how to fix the story that’s already out there. The suggestions: demand they recant the story, release a statement clarifying the situation, ignore the story. None of these suggestions tell me how to prevent this exact story from occurring after the next event requiring my attendance. Unfortunately, being such a big name in the financial industry and wanting to keep customers happy, I attend a lot of public events. Business is not always done in a board room… sometimes it’s done at charity events, golf outings, boxing events… Hell I even once had papers signed at the opera.

I spend more time at public events than I ever wanted to but I realize public image is everything to some people, which is why having my name dragged through the mud is unacceptable. The people I shake hands with on the golf course need to know that the decisions I make are the right ones and that they should have confidence in me. Articles like this blow my integrity with people and will make them second guess their decisions.

“Enough!” I interrupt the continued chaos. “Do whatever you need to do to make this article disappear but right now we need to focus on how I

can prevent the next article from questioning my ability to manage PFS just because I have a different woman on my arm. If I show up without someone, they are back to assuming things about my sexual preferences which for some reason, they believe has some fucking impact on my ability to manage other people’s money.”

“Parker,” Alex speaks up after being silent this entire meeting. “The solution is clear. Find a woman and bring her to all your public events.”

“Fuck Alex! Did you not hear me when I said I am NOT in a relationship right now nor do I plan to be in one?!?! Where the fuck do you propose I find someone who wants to drop everything and go to events weekly, if not more often with me? Fuck, in the next month I have at least seven or eight events that I need to attend… I don’t even want to go to these things, so how the fuck can I find someone else to go?” “Hire someone,” he answers simply.

“Alex,” I can’t help but fucking laugh at him because I don’t know what else to do. “Yes, that’s the perfect solution. I’ll drive around downtown and find a prostitute, offer her cash to accompany me for the night and then every night I have an event, I’ll pick her up at the same street corner.”

“Well… it solves two issues as far as I can see,” his face is red from laughing so hard at me. “The press will stop calling you a playboy because you’ll only be seen with one woman. And, they will stop wondering what it is you do with all your money.”Belonging © NôvelDram/a.Org.

“Right, because then they will have pictures of me paying a prostitute for her services.”

“Well, you asked for ideas.”

If anyone else at the table suggests I hire a hooker I would have their ass fired on the spot, but Alex is different… he has always been able to get away with things that I don’t let anyone else get away with. Alex has been my vice president for years now but beyond that, we went to college together and have been best friends ever since. He was one of the very first employees I hired when PFS began expanding beyond what I could handle by myself. Alex works almost as many hours as I do and has put it many late nights working side by side with me. I spend more hours with him than I do anyone in my life… well maybe except Carter since he is with me constantly and even has his own living quarters in my penthouse.

He is also the longest standing employee I have at PFS; working for me is not easy and finding good employees is not easy. I have very high expectations from my staff and believe that I compensate them accordingly. I offer above average salaries for all, excellent benefits and significant paid time off for all employees plus the management team receives annual bonuses based upon predetermined goals. Alex has earned a bonus every year that he has been with PFS because, yeah, he is that good. My management team is very strong now but this was not always the case, especially in the early days. It took a long time to find the right group of people who worked well together and more importantly worked well with me.

Melody, my personal assistant, has been with the company for four years now, reporting directly to me for the last year. Prior to her I can’t even remember the number of personal assistants I went through on a yearly and sometimes monthly basis. Alex still jokes with me how I scared away one assistant so quickly she left to get breakfast for a meeting only to drop the muffins off with Carter before telling him that she quit effective immediately.

Melody coming on board has been a godsend, she doesn’t take things personally when I am short with her and she knows exactly how I like things. She has a way of making me more productive by having everything ready for me before I even know I need it.

Asher the head of IT makes up the remainder of what I consider the key members of my management team at PFS. Without him, investments could have gone differently and bad financial decisions could have been made because his staff have ways of finding things out about people and companies that no one else can find out.

“Short of hiring a prostitute, what ideas do we have for moving forward?” I bring the discussion back to the topic at hand.

“Sir, we think it would be in your best interest to find a woman who can accompany you to the majority of these events and when she is not available, to go alone or with a family member,” Mr. Snyder recommends.

“So we’re back where we started,” I sigh. “I go with family members or alone to events and there are whispers, I go with women and there are whispers. You need to come up with a better solution because I refuse to have people questioning my management ability based upon who I do or don’t bring to events. Fucking find me another solution!”