"I already met him. He was in the elevator with me when it stalled."
"Oh, you’re kidding," Sharon said. "I didn't know you'd already met him. He's in the office today for an update, but I want to introduce you formally."
"Okay."
"How are manuscripts, by the way?" she asked as we walked down the hall.
"Some of them are actually pretty good. I have a pile of decent manuscripts that we can talk about tomorrow. But my eyes need a rest."
"Well, this is the perfect time, then."
I followed her down the hallway to the elevator, wondering how I should act around Josh.
We took it to the twenty-seventh floor and she spoke with a receptionist, who waved us through to a hallway and a corner office. Sharon knocked on the door, then opened it and poked her head in. I stood off to the side waiting to be admitted, a little nervous, not really feeling comfortable with having to interact with him, considering he was licking my breast the night before.
"I'm here," she said. "Are you ready for me?"
"Come," came a deep and familiar voice.
Sharon opened the door wide and went inside. She encouraged me to follow her with a wave of her hand.
"Ella said you already met but I wanted to introduce you to our newest recruit. She'll be working with me as my new acquisitions assistant."
I went inside and there, sitting behind the desk, was Josh, looking like a few billion dollars. He was wearing a very expensive black suit, crisp white shirt, and dark gray tie.
"Joshua Macintyre, meet Ella Carlson. Ella," Sharon said, and turned to me, "this is Joshua Macintyre, CEO and owner of Dominion Publishing and now, CEO of the entire Macintyre Broadcasting Corporation."
Sharon smiled brightly. When my eyes finally met Josh's, his expression was pleased, even playful.
"Ella," he said and stood up, coming around the desk to greet us. "So nice to be formally introduced."
We shook hands and I felt like a real idiot feigning we barely knew each other, considering only hours earlier, his body and his very hard erection was pressed against my body.
"Nice to meet you formally, too. Do I call you Mr. Macintyre?" I asked, raising my eyebrows.
"Josh will work fine," he said and shook my hand, holding onto it for longer than he technically should have. His touch sent a thrill through my body.
It was then I knew I was going to be in trouble…
Chapter Fourteen
Joshua
I spent the morning trying to get caught up.
From eight until ten o'clock, I was in a meeting with my assistant manager, trying to get everything in place for my first real meeting with the paper's lead editors to discuss the paper's future. It was exciting, even if it was too much admin for my tastes. I wanted to focus on vision and new hires to get fresh blood and ideas on the paper's pages. I also wanted to improve the web presence of the paper and bring it fully into the Twenty-First Century. The previous owner had been a total luddite and had resisted going digital, but you couldn't fight progress. It meant a different business model than print alone, but it was doable.
I'd spend the rest of the day trying to catch up with the remainder of my family's business – and now my business. The business of broadcasting and publishing.
I met with the manager of the new web-based broadcaster, which represented our response to Netflix. It was exciting but at the same time, not what I really wanted to focus on. I was more into news than entertainment, and in print than broadcast news. The written word felt real to me in a way that television news never did. I loved investigative reporting, although I had never been a reporter. I loved being part of a newsroom, even if only from management's point of view. Chasing down an important story, with national or international significance, was what really excited me. I would keep the broadcast news arm of the business of course, but my focus would be on keeping the investigative and print side alive. Whether people read on paper or on their smartphones or tablets didn't matter. What mattered was that they were reading.
Hopefully, reading my newspaper.
After a quick lunch with my head editor at the paper, I went back to the building and prepared for a couple of meetings to catch up with the latest developments on the book publishing side of the business. I enjoyed that side. Developing an author, publishing the memoir or tell-all of some public figure or important political actor was exciting and had a real impact on the world. But news was and had always been my love.
So, it was that I waited to meet with Sharon, the lead acquisitions editor of the publishing house. She'd sent me an email earlier with a summary of what had been happening in the business since my father's death. There had been some turnover in staff and she was behind but we were in a state of flux at the moment and I had to cut her some slack. I tried to focus on the memo she had written about the upcoming spring release schedule, which was months away, but it was hard. There were a dozen big books slated to be released and one of them caught my eye. It was a romantic comedy / chick lit novel by one of our bestselling authors. Right away, I thought about Ella and her dream of living the single girl's life described by Candace Bushnell, replete with Mr. Big and a cadre of BFFs.
I hoped that we'd be able to carry on from where we'd left off the previous night, but I wouldn't push. Not too much, at least. The taste I'd had of her last night had served only to whet my appetite for more.