"I think we're okay with the new operating terms and policies," Mr Robert asked, seeking confirmation from the shareholders while I still tried to comprehend the situation. All seemed in harmony with her and Ms Williams stated, "It has occurred to me that Panaché is known for its teamwork. So, I'm hoping we all bring more success together, fiercely. Let's put additional efforts to show what Panaché can do, in every nook and corner of every country on this planet."
Her broad smile, more than required greedy words, revealed her selfishness effectively making me get nervous about everything. As we closed our files, I waited for Robert to make the closing statements so that I could rush over back to my team to see what they were up to. Robert clapped his hand and said, "All the best to you Ms Williams and the board, let's get back to our schedules, that's it for today. Thank you."
I hurriedly gathered my belongings agitated and wouldn't have taken a step forward to go out of the room when, "Mr Robert. If you don't mind, may I have a word with the design team?" She asked.
Great! I remained motionless.
Robert stated, "Oh! right! I almost forgot to mention that Ms. Williams will be your newly joined team lead of your design team, too. She shall assist you with your future projects…"
Assist? Us? Should I just laugh or take all that bullshit seriously? What was the purpose of an operating officer joining the design team? This was completely absurd.
While Robert was saying, "and Ryan, guide her with the workings. She'll breeze through this..."
"If a COO works along with the design team, why then give her the title of the same? She can either be a COO or a team member of the design, logically speaking," Eric inquired.
"I agree with Eric, Mr. Robert. You already know how important our design team is to us and we've worked really hard for many years to mould everything to fulfil the expectations of this company. Now you expect us to get along with someone, who we only met a few minutes ago," Hazel chimed in.
"And most important. What experience does she have in this field and knowledge to sit with us at the same table?" Eric asked.
"This isn't a dog fight where she can bully anyone she wants in our office and expect us to act sheepish. The design team involves our hard work and we can't give it all up to a newly joined team lead all of sudden. It's about the rights we are talking about and are not ready to take newbies in our team. Our standards are way too high for a person like her with no experience of even designing the smallest piece of cloth," Eric clarified brutally.
Even though I agree with all of them, Eric did go too far in his criticism about her, but her dead stare appeared to be misleading. There was an awkward silence in the room, and Robert didn't answer any of their questions either; instead, he stared at Ms. Williams, waiting for her to respond. "I appreciate you introducing me to the board, Mr. Robert. I'll handle them from here. You may take your leave now," she said, motioning to him.
Robert tried to persuade her to accompany him, but her tone was authoritative, "Mr Robert, I know how to deal with people. Return to your work immediately," still saying it all with a smile.
"Well, if this is how you're commanding your subordinate, how can you expect us to work with someone who mistreats their employees this way?" Hazel asked, to which Eric replied, "Standards and trust, which I do think she can't afford."
When she heard Eric's sentence, she quickly turned to us and asked, "I can't afford it? Is it true Mr. Eric Martin?" While she was taking her files, she smiled and continued, "Okay, it's time to be a bitch of a person now. But before showing you your places, let me show what I can do and how good you all are in this field for that pride of yours. Being in such respectable positions, when you don't keep your tongue in proper check, you all sound like a bunch of loser kids. So, you better think before uttering any of those words to me Mr. Eric Martin. I am not going to waste my energy giving it back to you with words, but you will get to know about me pretty soon and at that time, you will understand who can afford what or who can't."
Her actions completely enraged Eric, from what I saw. We tried to stop him, but he pushed my hands away and said, "Ryan, I can't take this man and won't work with a stranger who appears all of sudden with that attitude. I can't stand still while someone crosses my boundary of respect."
"It appears to me that you don't deserve to sit at the same table as me from those words. Anyway, your assistants should be able to provide you with your schedules soon. And Eric, if you're still willing to go with what I say, you can continue to work here or else you are completely free to leave my office. Listening to your tantrums is never going to happen from now on and that's not going to change in my company," she said boldly then walked away, saying, "You better work your ass off or I'll shove your ass with your own designs," followed with a wicked laugh. Eric's face was changed expressionless as he observed the manner in which she exited.
"Who exactly is she? A devil on earth?" Hazel asked, holding her head in frustration.
"All right, guys, Bitch Alert! But why am I actually liking it?" James said, and it instantly annoyed us. "It's pretty cool, isn't it?" he still didn't stop.
"Cool my ass! Who does she think she is? The chairperson of the company? Guess what then? Pack your shits together before this company shuts down," Eric hit the table and left.
What the hell was happening here? It left me speechless with all that conversation which happened in a blink of an eye. Everyone left the meeting hall, except Mark and I, still not knowing what to do. As I moved my hands in front of his face, I realised he had gone into his dreamland. Without any hesitation I hit his head with the file and said, "Stop zoning out now. Let's get back to our work before that bitch lady enters the room again."
"WHAT THE FUCK?"
When I checked our schedules, I was bewildered. "A show? In two months, in Paris?" Mark asked, who had lost his shit completely.
"Haute couture? No way. Fuck, she is telling us to create a whole new bloody collection. Today I'm going to break her face, going to jail but at least with satisfaction," Eric marched out the door, but James stopped him.
"Do you certainly think she will take notice of you? Or even let you into her office?"
"Anyway, she will not scrap this plan or grant us more time for sure. Rather than arguing with her, let's just get it done, somehow," James stated.
"I believe James is right; she will not listen to us even if we try. Let's get started. What do you think, Ryan?" Mark asked.
I was concerned about them not going to lie, but we didn't have any other options either. A sense of responsibility weighed heavily on my mind and I didn't want to give the impression that I lacked confidence in my field. So, I told them, "Let's meet in an hour then."
"We'll get through this."
I requested Eric bring all the department heads, production crew, and marketing team to a single meeting. While Eric and James went to get everyone to the meeting, I asked Mark, "Get our financial officer on board with us," and he left right away. Everyone was working round-the-clock for our new collection with huge dark circles printed under their eyes. Sleepless nights, running around the building to get things done, and barely eating whatever we could get our hands on through the day. Worst of all, whatever ideas we brought in to them rebuffed the table immediately and it was all because of Ms Williams, one hell of a person. She drove us crazy, where we were sick of listening to the same tantrums like; next alternative, not a trend breaker, badly structured design, material not good, unrelated to the theme, and the list of miniature mistakes kept going. It subjected us to even more rejections than James had his luck with the girls. It was nice to see us working collectively as a team after always bickering with each other but at the same time, we cursed her for putting us under pressure and not allowing us to live peacefully.
Ms Williams came to the studio on the day of our first trial shoot to check on the models and see how things were going. She was standing straight across from me, having a conversation with the stylist. Although she was talking to them, she always had eyes on me which kept staring towards my direction.
What the fuck did I do?
Her brow furrowed, and she gave me a menacing glare. She walked towards me after finishing her conversation with the stylist, and I practically felt my heart stop beating. "Who are those guys?" she inquired, gesturing towards someone who was behind me. When I turned around, James was leading all the guys for the trial shoot.
I replied politely, "Interns and spot boys."
Her brows remained furrowed even after I informed her, they were a part of our team and immediately was scanning the staff with her naked eye. She came to a halt after noticing a man wearing a mask over his face, while me still being clueless. He was standing behind James, holding the spotlight for support but suddenly he joggled it towards James. Her reflexes were faster than mine that she dashed over to him without wasting a second, making a shock pass my body. She grabbed him to the side, where they both fell between the chairs. I was absolutely dumbfounded, but she was strong enough to get back on her feet after that fall. They instantly had him pinned to the ground even before she had ordered her personal guards to arrest him. She gestured for her bodyguards to bring him closer to her and gave an aggressive slap on his face, making his lips bleed because of her ring before he could say anything.
Jesus Christ! That was painful for sure, I imagined.
She pulled his hair and asked, "You think you can play that easy with me?" as they forced him to kneel. She smacked his head against a nearby table without giving it a second thought. He fell to the ground after his head bounced hard. Clenching his teeth and he moaned in agony.
What the fuck was that?
"Your biggest mistake in life is to take up the decision of entering my company. Whether you have the balls to do the job that has been assigned to you is the second half. Tell your boss to hire someone who can at least stand up in front of my guards."
"Wasn't it just how you guys felt the other day?" Eric asked, completely unintentionally, making me recall the first impression of Ms Williams. James hasn't gotten over the scene of him under the spotlight, as everything happened in a flash of light. "Did I just see death in front of me and return back from it?" James wondered out loud.
"Asshole, you were fucking saved," but I just nodded in agreement.
She whispered something into the ears of her female guard. As they were about to drag him out, she asked, "Since I received such a wonderful gift, I'd like to send one to your boss too. Would you like to have a broken leg? No, let's break your hand as well, it sounds really interesting to me."
The guy pleaded with her, holding her legs tight, and she said, "I will screw you up and never let you stand on your own, back off."
"PACK UP, NOW," she said, and when the directors tried to talk to her about the schedules, she just stared at them. Her grey eyes are so intensely focused that a single glance from her shut all of their mouths. "Just a part of our lives it's become, hasn't it?" I asked, as I looked at the background. "Even though I feel the same way, these are really disturbing," Mark agreed.
All the dramatic scenes that you see in movies started happening to us; random people sneaked into our company, some of our designs were unofficially revealed to the market, and our share price had nearly crashed down badly. Things were not going as planned, but we managed to keep everything running, giving our best. Ms Williams had been monitoring us since the first incident, and there were always guards around us.
"How about a ball theme?" I consulted others because we needed to come up with new designs for our new haute couture collection.
"We design a couple of ball gowns then?" Mark said. Except for one, the other members agreed with us. Eric, "Before making a decision as a group, ask your COO for confirmation. Don't come back later and yell at me for rejecting your idea," he said.
She must have had sharp ears as Ms Williams entered with a few bulky bodyguards in our meeting hall with no notice. Examined the faces of those in the hall and checked their IDs in detail. James opened his eyes wide when he noticed a gun tucked behind her skirt, making him slowly slide his chair backwards in fear. He lips synced, "THERE IS A GUN ON HER BACK." She pointed to a corner in our meeting hall and asked her guards to check it.
"Does the term "mannerism" or the act of "mannerism" appear in her dictionary?" Eric muttered to James, who was already shivering after noticing the gun. Eric muttered as she left after speaking with the other directors, "I wish someone would kill this bitch soon."
###
Ms Williams took a break from looking at her laptop screen after working for three hours straight. She casted a casual glance at the CCTV monitor while stretching her neck as it had become quite sore. That's when she noticed a man wandering around the meeting hall area looking unsure about his movements. Despite her casual glance, her brain picked up on the fact that he was not wearing a security guard uniform or an ID which was a compulsion inside the company. He was completely dressed in black, and she couldn't see his face at all. Bowing down head as he walked towards the design team hall gave her a deep suspicious feeling about the situation. She tried to track him down by gaining access to other cameras around and intended to follow his moves. But his face was hidden, and he entered the design team hall before she could figure out who he was. She promptly checked where her design team was and realised that the camera inside the hall had not yet been resolved. Her gut intuition kept convincing her that something bad was going to happen. Instantly she drew the gun from the table cabinet and instructed her safeguards to check on them right away. Even though she had guards sent, she herself wanted to go have a look and went directly to the meeting hall where everything was usual as ever. Not able to find anything there, she went around the entire second floor of the building and speculated it to be completely empty, with no trace of anything suspicious.
Just when everything seemed alright, suddenly everyone heard the fire alarm sound ring loud. James and Eric got all nervous and Eric shouted " God! What more can happen now, a fire? That was all that was left." James pulled him and rushed towards the emergency exit for evacuation.
The floor started to blow up with smoke, where she was clueless about what caused the chaos. Soon she started to cough and her throat was choked up because of the air she was inhaling. Trying to find the reason for the smoke, she started to go around but the smoke was way too cloudy and irritated her eyes and she could no longer see anything. She tried to move by holding on to the stairwell, but while moving, she was suddenly grabbed from behind. It looked like that person dragged her into a pantry room before she could grasp what was happening to her.
It was barely visible, and the smoke caused her vision to blur even more than expected. Her hands were cuffed down with the other person's bare hands and she struggled to break free from his grip. She must have got the indication of the person being a man because of the grip he had on her body. But then suddenly she felt a warm sensation inside her shirt. The man's hand has started to move slowly towards her navel making her feel anxious. She wiggled her body in an attempt to get away from him, but he drove her in even closer and said, "DON'T MOVE."
Ignoring his words, she made a concerted effort to move away. His body was strong like a shield, and he smashed her towards the wall besides, putting his entire weight on her body proudly. "Dar-Lin! It's been a long time," he said as he kissed her neck. She bit her inner lips and drew her head back.
"You have the same seductive body as before. Ahh, it makes things tough for me," he said, inhaling the smell of her deeply. He abruptly removed the gun from her back and asked, "You thought this would scare me, Dar-Lin?"
He bit her shoulder and said, "Don't forget who taught you how to use a gun." She couldn't think of any way to get away or call for help, feeling helpless. He decided to play with her even more because one of his hands was free, triggering her every possible way. Moving the gun from her neck seductively to her navel in a slow pace, asking, "Do you know why I came here today?" He threw away the gun. She began to breathe heavily, to which he replied, "To watch you cry," and laughed sarcastically.
He reached his hand inside her skirt, hoping to get near to her inner thighs. She seized the air and said, "Don't," meaning it. Trying her best to not to give up her body to him, his soft touch in her inner thighs moved along with his fingers made her lose the control of her body. "Despite multiple warnings, you chose to come here. Am I right?" he asked, his tone was goofy this time. She moaned and gasped as he rubbed his long fingers inside the place, she had never expected for him to go that far. "If I had known you'd come back with those fucking guts, I would have killed you that day," he said as he stroked his finger inside her.
She was aware of his boner pressing against her. Somehow, she gathered her senses and attempted to move forward, pushing him, but he pulled her back and grabbed her neck tight.
"What the hell are you doing here? Are you going to shamelessly rebuild the same old game?" he asked.
She didn't dare to return his gaze, but he grabbed her lips and tried kissing her mercilessly. He gave her a devilish smirk and said, "I missed you and this body of yours. So, yes, baby, I'm looking forward to seeing this new version of you; it'll be fun, I'm sure."
"If this is what you want, I'm not going to give it to you," she said.
"I know you will. And I'm not going to sleep at your feet. Let's reset the game for the better."
He slowly bit her ears and said, "It's just a welcome surprise," before disappearing into the thin air.