Take a Chance (20 page)

I’ll pretend it’s happening
to someone else,
Jem thought.
Anyway, who cares about the ice swan?

Mark did. He was going to have a cow when he saw that swan. Just the thought made her smile. Her eyes met Cherie’s and they both bit their lips to stop from laughing.

“Maybe we can decorate it with pen drives,” Cherie suggested, trying to keep a straight face as she held up a zipped bag she had brought with her.

“I nearly
forgot about those. Why don’t you all come on out and help me spread them around?” she said to her co-workers.

Eben obligingly picked up the tray with the swan on it as they headed for the door.
Jem walked carefully in her heels the way Cherie had shown her and they made it outside before Evie and Greg saw the marquee squatting beside the edge of the patio and stopped.

“Isn’t this a little over the top?” Evie asked
, looking at the marquee wide-eyed.

“Yeah, the big top,” Greg snorted.

“I wasn’t given much choice,” Cherie said defensively “because Mark refused to change the date to one that had a decent venue free.”

“Figures he’s behind it,” said Greg disparagingly
.

The tone of his comment surprised Jem as she thought Mark was popular with everyone in the office.

“Won’t it be cold inside?” Evie asked, snapping Jem from her thoughts.

“Hopefully the heaters will have kicked in by then,” Jem said and opened the door flap and gestured for them to precede her.

“Wow!” said an impressed Evie as she entered and took in the sight of the marquee looking ready for a banquet.

Eben deposited the swan on the table beside where the caterers would be set up
while Evie and Greg looked around.

“You look like you’ve thought of everything,” Greg said as he eyed the big screen set up at the far end of the marquee.

“I certainly hope so considering I only had since yesterday to organise the whole setup,” said Cherie. “But that is only the half of it. Without Jem and Eben’s hard work we wouldn’t have got this far.”

Evie’s eyes widened
in amazement.

“You’ve done wonders
in the time you’ve had,” she said, passing one of the gas heaters going with a muted hiss, realising the marquee was already comfortably warm.

“Thanks
,” said Eben as he left them to head back inside.

Jem
rolled her eyes at his retreating form for taking the credit on their behalf.

“I
t could have been worse,” Cherie admitted once the door flap shut behind him. “With working for
Duh
-boss I am used to organising things at the last minute. This task just turned out to be bigger than usual.”

“No kidding,” said Greg. He suddenly stopped his perusal. “You aren’t going for that promotion too, are you?” he asked seriously.

Cherie shook her head.

“Uh uh.
Too far out of my comfort zone and I would miss my family too much. Besides that much responsibility would cut down on my time to find Mr Right,” Cherie said.

She was a little unsettled when Evie and Greg laughed good naturedly in response. She had been serious about finding Mr Right as her goal was to be a
stay at home mother and her career was something she was only doing until the first baby came along.

Jem gave her a sympathetic nudge, used to getting flak for being so
career minded instead of settling down and starting a family. Their goals might be at opposite ends of the spectrum in outlook but they respected each other’s choice.

Jem cleared her throat and indicated the bag that Cherie carried with her.

“How about we add the pen drives to the centre pieces and go back inside until people start turning up,” she suggested.

With four pairs of hands distributing pen drives the task was quickly completed.
When they walked inside the kitchen they found Eben directing a group of people dressed formally in black.

“What’s going on?” Evie whispered as they picked up the
ir wine glasses and moved into the family room to be out of the way of the new arrivals. They hovered near the breakfast bar, away from the teenagers as well as Jeremy and Daisy who were sitting on the couches and helping themselves to snacks that had been set on the coffee table before them.

“They’ll be the caterers,” Jem told her since Cherie had stay
ed in the kitchen to go over details.

Greg gave a low whistle.

“All the stops have been pulled out for tonight. I didn’t realise that Mark had so many potential clients lined up.”

“He doesn’t,” Jem
commented absently. “I wouldn’t pass more clients to him than to anyone else.”

“Then how do you explain all this?” Evie chided gently. “We all know he’s invited some of Greg’s and my clients tonight. What’s the bet he’s invited those of other reps too?”

“Mark wouldn’t do that,” Jem responded, silently wondering why she hadn’t thought to query the magnitude of the event. “There’ll be a good reason for all this.”

“Like
the reason he usually winds up with the high end clients?” Greg asked with studied casualness.

Jem was taken aback by the implied accusation that she favoured Mark when delegating
high end clients to the reps.

“
No he doesn’t,” Jem denied. “The last big deal he was up for he passed to you, saying you were more familiar with that aspect of the financial industry.”

Greg snorted.

“Yes. That deal sounded great; a group of independent financial advisors wanting to get a bulk deal on software. But you’ve forgotten the meaning of
independent
. I had to make adjustments to most of the contract with each advisor individually because they had slightly different needs. By the time I had sorted that out twenty times in twenty locations and finally got their signatures on the dotted line Mark had three other clients bagged.”

“And he’s forever in your office,” Evie commented.

“He’s just interested in what I’m working on,” said Jem defensively, not wanting to mention how frequently Mark had asked her out on a date. In their current mindset that would count against her. “At any rate he usually only pops in for a few minutes between clients and games of golf with
Duh
-boss.”

“If you say so,” said Evie, sounding unconvinced.

“If I were purposely giving him the fast, high end deals then why did I ask Cherie to invite you both here tonight when I found out he had invited your clients?” Jem asked.

There were a few moments of tense silence while Greg and Evie considered her question. Jem had always felt she had got on well with everyone she worked with and felt uncomfortable knowing that Greg and Evie
shared an ill-conceived perception of her showing favouritism towards Mark. Did the rest of the reps feel that way?

“That’s an excellent point,” Greg
finally said as he picked up a corn chip from one of the platters sitting on the breakfast bar. “I doubt you favour him over anyone else although I wouldn’t put much past Mark the Shark to ensure things go his way.”

He crunched the corn chip,
decisively changing the tone of their conversation to something less weighty. His action broke the tension and the sight of a small masked figure streaking in their direction stopped Jem from asking what he meant by his last comment. The black and grey creature paused before them. Choosing Jem, Aidan backed up to her.

“I need help,” he said and swished his black cape off his shoulders with his black gloved hands.

Amused, Jem fastened the Velcro seam down his back.

“Why are you dressed like Batman, Aidan?” she asked.

“This is my Batman suit,” said Aidan.

“That explains it,” said Eben
who had just joined them.

The doorbell went.

From the other side of the room the two teenage boys on the couch looked at each other with barely repressed excitement.

“Hey bro, we’re like, on,” said Crash to Sam
as he stood up.

Sam set down his bowl of corn chips and they headed for the door. Jem started to follow them until she saw Jeremy
stick a stalk of celery up each nostril and chase after Daisy who was being happily terrorised and shrieking as she ran.

Jem’s eyes widened but before she could say anything she felt a tap on her shoulder.

“I’ve got it,” Eben murmured behind her.

Jem nodded and
looked back over her shoulder.

“Perhaps we should all stay in the marquee from now on so the clients don’t get to see behind the scenes,” she suggested to an amused Evie and Greg.

“Gotcha,” said Greg.

Jem noticed
Greg ushering Evie out the ranchslider door out of the corner of her eye as she continued walking carefully to the door.  With one hand trailing along the hallway wall to keep her steady she followed Sam and Crash. Behind her the shrieking stopped abruptly
.

You can depend on Eben to
do what he says he will
, Jem thought and surprised herself by realising it was true. By the time she caught up to the Sam and Crash they had already opened the door.

Mark was
on the other side.

“Can we like, park your car?” Crash asked Mark.

“Sure,” said Mark and passed his car key from his pocket.

Both Sam and Crash disappeared outside.

Mark looked at Jem.

“I hope that is what he is going to do.”

“Yes. That’s Sam and Crash... I mean Simon. They’ve offered to be our car valets tonight so we don’t ruin my sister and brother-in-law’s lawn. Come on in,” said Jem and took his coat to hang it on the coat stand by the door.

Jem gestured
for him to precede her to the family room so he wouldn’t see her stumble behind him if she momentarily forgot her toe, heel movement. From there they walked out to the marquee amongst the toing and froing wait staff from the catering company.

Eben
appeared and offered Mark a drink then left to get the wine. Mark looked around the marquee.

“You’ve been busy,” he noted as he
skimmed a vol au vent from a passing tray and popped it in his mouth.

Then he saw the swan and choked. Greg was the first to him and pounded his back. Mark coughed up pieces of vol au vent onto the
plywood floor.

“Are you okay?” Jem asked nonchalantly as she poked the end of a carrot stick into some dip and bit the end off.

“Yes,” Mark wheezed.

“Shame.
I wanted to try the Heimlich,” said Greg.

Mark’s head swivelled and took in the presence of Greg beside him, Evie further back calmly munching a handful of corn chips, with Cherie
standing beside Evie calmly sipping her wine. Upon realising she was the focus of Mark’s gaze Cherie raised her glass in salute then took another sip.

Mark drew his attention back to Jem.

“What do you call that?” he asked, pointing at the deformed swan.

Jem finished chewing the carrot with dip she had in her mouth.

“I call it twisted duck,” she said.

Mark just looked at her.

“What?” Jem innocently said. “There wasn’t enough room in the freezer so the neck had to go.”

“Can we speak privately for a moment?”

“Sure,” said Jem. “Just let me get the vol au vent into the bin. I’m sure you don’t want us to lose any deposit for staining the floor.”

“Lucky you hadn’t chewed it for long,” observed Evie as Jem scooped up the pieces of vol au vent with a serviette and left the
marquee to put it in the kitchen bin.

“Yes, lucky,” muttered Mark
as he followed her outside.

After
Jem dumped the serviette he grabbed her by the elbow and steered her down the hallway and dragged her through the first door he came across.

Inside Jason’s office Jem pulled free of his grip, crossed her arms and watched him. Momentarily taken aback by the presence of wall to wall computers Mark was silent. He walked around, taking in the myriad screens and ergonomic chairs.

“It’s like the bridge of the Enterprise in here,” he murmured to himself.

“That’s what happens when you allow your geeky brother-in-law to design his office from scratch,” said Jem. “But I’m sure you didn’t bring me in here to discuss the decor.”

“No,” said Mark, recovering his composure. He pointed towards the door. “What are they doing here?”

“By ‘they’ I assume you mean Greg and Evie,” said Jem.

Mark nodded curtly.

“They’re here to follow their sales through,” said Jem. “I was surprised you had forgotten to invite them considering you had invited their clients, ones that they had already met and started the sales process with.”

“I haven’t forgotten anything and I can’t help it if they’re not moving fast enough.”

“You’re poaching their sales,” Jem accused.

“No. We’re a team. It’s in Sachs Walls best interest to get clients signing contracts. It’s closing the sale that matters and that is what tonight is about,” Mark told her.

Jem felt as though a blindfold had been ripped from her eyes. For the first time she was angry enough to see the truth beyond what Mark said.

Eben was right
, she thought and realised Mark’s strength was in getting others to do what he wanted and make himself look good doing it.

Mark, unaware of her epiphany, obviously felt comfortable in her presence as he confided “The man who brings in the business and makes the dollars will be the one to get the promotion to head our Asia office in Hong Kong. I am that man.”

He looked at her and smiled.

Jem planted her hands on top of the chair between them and narrowed her eyes.

Where do I begin attacking?

Let’s begin with his most recent misconception.

“Man?” she queried tartly. “You seem to have forgotten that three of our sales reps are females and I am too.”

“Don’t be naive,” Mark said scornfully to match her tone. “Nate’s not going to promote a female to that position.”

“He might not but Martha could,” Jem shot back, clenching the leather of the seat back with her fingers.

“You’re dreaming,” Mark snapped back but then added more casually “You know, I want
ed you to come with me but I might have to rethink that since you’ve undermined me by bringing in Evie and Greg.”

“Undermined?” said Jem incredulously. “You’re the one who has undermined them by trying to hijack their clients behind their backs.”

“I have already explained it to you but I see we’ll just have to agree to disagree on that one,” Mark told her smoothly. “If you want to go to Hong Kong with me you had better not let it happen again.”

He left the room, leaving Jem ready to heave something through the window. Instead she sat down and
clenched her hands in her lap. Some of the earlier, seemingly oblique comments Greg and Evie had made came back to her, now blindingly obvious.

She had naively thought he always seemed interested in where each client was, but now belatedly realised he had used her information to pick the clients
who brought in the most dollars for the least effort.

How could I have been so stupid?

No wonder he was always the top salesperson in the company.

In the past she had ignored the odd niggling comment from the other reps and believed Mark when he told her that it was just jealousy on their part. Now she knew otherwise. Closing the most sales this close to the promotion announcement would make him stand out amongst the other candidates and the repercussions of overtly taking over other rep’s clients wouldn’t matter because he didn’t plan be around afterwards.

The painful epiphany gave her another insight. This whole evening was all about enabling Mark to do better than his rivals. Cherie and she had spent many hours t
o make it happen. Had she helped to set it up so that he would get the promotion over her or any other the others?

Over his dead body
,
she thought.

Jem uncurled her fingers and plotted. She wouldn’t let him get away with this unfair advantage even if
Duh
-boss endorsed it. Too much of his success was already achieved at the expense of others.

To think he talked of the promotion as though it was a done deal.

An idea took form in her head and Jem reached for the phone.

Not i
f I have anything to do with it
.

After making a call she replaced the receiver.

That should even the playing field a little
, Jem thought with satisfaction as Eben appeared to find out where she had got to. She told him what had happened and her plan to level the playing field. He made a few suggestions and offered to help which she readily agreed to.

Just after they finalised details Jem
heard voices at the front door. Eben left to inform Cherie of the plan while she pasted a smile on her face to go and greet the guests. The smile became genuine when she saw that the guests were Garth and Amy Smith, each holding one of the twins. Their daughter Isabella stood shyly behind her father.

“Hi,” said Garth when he saw her. “I hope you don’t mind that we came over a little early. We just wanted to have the children settled before the presentation.”

“That’s fine,” said Jem. “Come in and follow me. You can meet Sonia who’s looking after my niece and nephews.”

Jem ushered them to the family room. Before long Isabella had joined Daisy in a game with Barbie dolls which they were showing to Isabella’s parents upstairs. Jem and Sonia sat on the couch in the family room cuddling one of the twins each. Eben watched Jem kiss baby Jonty’s dark hair as she cradled him with a wistful look on her face.

Sonia looked happy holding Ben. She leaned towards Jem.

“When are you going to have a baby? Jess has a big head start and she’s younger than you.”

Ah. The insensitivity of youth
.

Eben wondered how Jem would respond. He noticed her forcing a smile.

“I’d prefer to be married first,” Jem told the teenager. “I’m a bit old fashioned like that.”

“May I have a hold?” Eben cut in, to prevent Sonia making another ill-conceived comment.

He sank beside Jem on the sofa.

“Okay,” said Jem and handed Jonty to him.

Eben took the little bundle and rested him on his lap, supporting Jonty’s head so that he could look around. Jonty made eye contact and broke into a wide toothless grin.

“Hey, he likes me,” said Eben.

“It’s probably wind,” said Jem.

Sonia watched them.

“You two will make beautiful babies,” she said.

“Excuse me, I think I hear someone at the door,” Jem announced briskly. She stood up and walked to the door without looking back.

“Did I say something wrong?” she heard Sonia ask Eben.

Eben responded but by that time Jem was too far away to hear what he said.

Mark was greeting guests at the door by the time she got to it. He was in his element, charming the executive board members of a hotel chain. With an unspoken agreement between them, Jem escorted the group to the marquee where she introduced them to Cherie, Evie and Greg. She lingered long enough to see that they each received a drink and introduced them to the Smiths before heading back to the door. She rejoined Mark and they worked together, greeting people for the next half an hour and welcoming them inside. 

Despite what Jem now thought of Mark personally, she knew that they worked well as a team, intuitively knowing what the other had in mind and acting
accordingly. Not only that, she knew he was having a successful night on the personal front as well, judging by the looks he received from some of the PAs and secretaries. She would bet he now had a few more phone numbers added to his little black book.

“We’ve got a lot more people here than I thought we would,” Jem murmured to Eben as they
squeezed past a couple of servers with empty trays to get into the marquee. “I’m beginning to think Mark invited everyone in the database.”

“He’s got a short time left to make a big impression,” Eben commented.

“There’s going to be a big impression, all right,” Jem agreed “but it is going to be a team effort.”

While the sales reps worked the room she sailed around the
marquee, ensuring every guest received attention. On one round Eben paused beside her.

“I just want to warn you
that Drongo has escaped from the laundry,” Eben said. “Someone opened the door thinking it was the bathroom.”

“Oh no,” said Jem. “He’s bound to have another go at the food. We’d better find him.”

For the next few minutes they surreptitiously looked for Drongo as they passed tables and made small talk with clients as they went. He wasn’t anywhere to be seen but Jem suddenly heard heaving under a nearby table. She cringed as she realised the sound she heard was Drongo vomiting up the chopped liver she had given him earlier in the vain hope he would be full enough to stay away from the food.

Cautiously she lifted the hem of the tablecloth from the floor and Drongo shot out. She was about to go after him when she saw Eben cut off his escape by snatching him up under one arm, a
small plate of savouries still held in his other hand. Drongo started to struggle then realised there was food close to hand so cooperated.

Jem watched
from the marquee door while Eben opened the exterior laundry door, removed a sausage roll from the plate and tossed it in. As intended, Drongo raced after it, with Eben closing the door smartly after the cat got through.

Jem
grabbed a fistful of serviettes, plopped them on the plate in her hands and walked to the serving table from where she had heard the sounds. Thanks to the circulating servers most clients’ plates were full so no one was hovering around the table. She might be able to discretely remove the evidence and no one would be the wiser.

Relieved that Drongo wouldn’t be around to cause further problems, she crouched down and resolved herself to removing
his last meal. She used the serviettes to transfer the squishy liver to the plate. Luckily it all moved in one piece and had only dampened the plywood underneath.