CHAPTER 2

"Thank you for coming," she said as they stood, eyeing each other. She wasn't near as tall as he was, even with her heels which she slipped back on before he came in.

"I'm sorry about the heat. We had issues with the air-conditioning all week, which you should do something about boss," she smiled.

"Same thing with mine. I've been working on it, and I assure you miss Graham that it will be fixed soon. At least open your Windows,my office has been like a microwave, it's a good thing we decided to meet at your office,mine is way hotter," he replied with a smile as he glanced around her office. It was filled with painting of many kinds, to photographs of a pavalon that had been a gift. And a calendar, filled with pinned schedules. There were mountains of files, tapes and disks placed on a table at the far end of the room. Her secretary brought in a tray, with a jug of juice and a plate of cookies. She waved him towards the couch and handed him a glass of iced cold juice a moment later, after he sat across from her.

"Thank you, it's nice to finally meet you," he said politely. She nodded,as she watched him. She hadn't expected him to look quite handsome and uptight too. He seemed calm,but at the same time reserved and too serious. Despite his serious looks, there was just something very exciting about him, she was sure of it.

  She didn't look like he expected either. She was ways sexier,more good looking, and way more informal. He had expected her to be older, very rude, and more like a beast. Based on gossips, he was made to believe that she was feared by most,not for being rude and proud, but for being tough... A force to be reckoned with. And much to his surprise,when she smiled at him over the glass of juice in her hand, she seemed extremely girlish. But despite her friendly demeanor, within minutes she got to the point of their meeting, and showed him their works and progress till date. And what they hoped to achieve and approve in the nearest future. She showed him and outlined the jobs/ accounts they were handling at the moment and ways they hoped to achieve them.

 The advertising agency was one of the most established in the business, and their client expected it to reflect on the works they delivered. He drank a second glass of juice, and by then the air-conditioning was back on. He stared at her and smirked. "See? I told you that I was working on it." She chuckled, shaking her head as she took a sip of her juice.

  In that moment, he actually decided that he liked her. He liked the fact that she was straightforward, and passionate about her job. She had clear, sound ideas about advertising. By the time he stood up to leave, he felt quite sad that the meeting was over. He liked talking to her, she was tough and precise. She had the body of a female, but the mind and zeal as strong as a man. She was a woman to be respected, feared and also admired.

  Emma walked him to the elevator, a thing she never did for her previous guests. She was usually in a hurry to get back to work, but she lingered for some minutes, conversing with him. Soon she bid him goodbye and went back to her office. He was a good man, smart, quick, funny , intelligent and not as uptight as he looked in his attire. He looked more like a banker than the CEO of an advertising agency. But she liked the fact that he dressed to impress, with expensive shoes, and a suit, perfectly tailored.

  She left the office a little after six and as always, was in a hurry to get home. She hailed a cab outside the office building on stark avenue, and sped uptown to her home. It was after seven when she got home, already sweating from the heat in the cab. The driver had apologized profusely about his car having issues with the air-conditioning. And the moment she walked in, she could hear cherry in the living room.

  She was expecting visitors at eight-thirty, and she made sure the house was as cold as possible, despite the discomfort, for the sake of her aged ancient husky. He was sixteen years old, a wonder he was still alive, and a sweetheart to all that met him. His name was cherry, after the fruit, because he was extremely sweet. He greeted her enthusiastically when she got home, as she hurried into the kitchen to check on the progress. She was relieved to see that everything was almost set,and the Indian dinner she ordered, almost ready.

  Her house man was wearing what she thought was an abomination. Whenever possible, she felt the need to buy him wonderful clothes and fabrics from her journeys. Some turned out great, while some became as abominable as what he was wearing at the moment. His name was Siddharth, and he was Indian. And although he was a little dull at times, most of the times he was quite efficient. What he lacked in appearance and dressing, he made up for it in creativity and flexibility, which she found pleasant. No matter the amount of people she decided to host for the dinner at the drop of a hat, he would manage to do wonderful decorations, and come up with something enticing for the guests to eat. Although this time she decided to hire some caterers to perform the task for him.

 They were in the kitchen doing what they knew how to do best,while Siddharth had covered the center of the dining table with moss, delicate flowers and scented candles. The room had been transformed into a somewhat Indian garden, and he used silk placed mats and a blue napkin. In summary, the table looked fabulous. It was perfect for her party.

"This is just beautiful!" she grinned, and then dashed upstairs to her room to shower and change into something fit for the dinner. By the time cherry got to her room, she was already in the shower.

  Thirty-two minutes later,she was back downstairs, dressed in a beautiful turquoise sari. Thirty minutes after that, there were more than two dozen people in her living room, interacting with one another. They were the usual crop of cinematographers, brand strategist, editors from her agency, a flock of business men, and several others from work.

  Everyone was having a good time, and by the time they reached the dinner table, the conversations intertwined automatically. People conversed like old friends, and Siddharth passed trays of white and red wine and hors d'oeuvre the caterers provided. The evening was already a success before it started. She liked evenings like this, her dinner parties were always more fancy than she admitted, however impromptu the arrangements were.

When the last of the guests left at 1a.m, she went up to bed after thanking Siddharth for his efforts. The caterers had long gone after cleaning the kitchen, and she was sure Siddharth was going to do the same to the house. Cherry was sound asleep when she got to her bedroom. Even though his snoring were always loud, she was never bothered by it, she loved him nonetheless.She took off her sari, and slipped into bed after she wore her night dress. And as soon as her body hit the bed, she was sound asleep.

The alarm went off at six-thirty, and she was up again. She had a really busy schedule at the office. She had numerous meetings with the head of cinematography and his team, and then the digital analysts.

She was in a meeting with the analysts when her secretary buzzed her intercom to tell her that Drake Peterson was on the line. She was about to tell her that she was too busy, but she decided against it. It might be important, she thought. She had a lot to discuss with him, mostly about the budgets. "Put him on," she said.

"Hello miss Graham," Drake said,pleasantly. "Is this a bad time?" He asked, and she laughed. Between the meetings and her busy schedule, there was rarely ever a good time for her to pick calls. She was always busy.

"No, it's okay. Just the usual meetings here and there. We are just trying to conclude cocoa's stup advert before august."

" I'm sorry, I didn't know you were busy, i didn't meant to interrupt your meeting. I just wanted to tell you how I enjoyed our time yesterday." His voice sounded deeper, more sensual than she remembered, and it struck her.... He sounded sexy. She had never been one to honor the office dating policy, if something was growing, she wouldn't mind exploring it. They also spoke about work related things, and she promised to email more information later. She thanked him and was about to hang up when he switched into another gear entirely, he sounded almost boyish.

"I know that you are super busy and this is short notice, but would you maybe like to go out for lunch with me today? My plus one just canceled." Little did she know that he was planning to call his buddy and call it off himself if she agreed to have lunch with him. He had been thinking about her since their meeting the previous day, she really intrigued him, and he wanted to get to know her more.

"Well....I just... I think.." She was startled, and paused to think about it for a minute. Even though they had practically concluded everything work related the previous day, she tried to convinced herself that it wasn't a bad idea to establish a work relationship with her boss and get to know him better.

"Well I was planning to just have my lunch here at the office, today has been really hectic for me. Can we be really quick though? I can get out around one-thirty, but I have to be back to attend the editorial meeting by two-thirty."

"That's okay, I know a very good place just down the road, we could grab something there, will that be okay by you?" He sounded so business like, and she liked how considerate he was. There was a lot she liked about him, and she suspected that she was going to love the working relationship more than she should.

"Sounds good to me, so where should me meet?"

"I'll just wait for you downstairs by one-fifteen. I won't mind if you're late," he said reassuringly, which she was happy about, because the meeting she had at the moment hadn't ended yet.

"No problem,see you then." She hung up quickly and went back to the meeting.

 Jackson was making a presentation, as she glanced at her watch. It was nearly one-fifteen, and she signaled to him to round up. Once the meeting was dismissed, she gathered the papers, dropped them on her desk and sauntered out of her office.

"Are you going off to get lunch?" Brian asked, smiling at her. The meeting had gone well, and she was pleased on how far they had gone with sesame company's work.

"Not really, it's kind of a lunch meeting with the new boss." She was tempted to invite Brian, but she refrained from it.

"I thought that was yesterday?" He arched an eyebrow.

"It's a follow up kind of thing." She wasn't sure if she was trying to convince him or herself as she headed out. Deep inside she knew that her lunch with Drake had little or nothing to do with business. And she didn't mind one bit.