Page 32 of The Grumpy Billionaire
Interview with the Devil
Mara
Reid’s company headquarters were located in downtown Providence in what had once been the city’s original train station.
He’d renovated the aging building, turning it into a workspace that was ultra-modern inside but on the outside still fit with the city’s Colonial-era architecture and classic New England vibe.
A jeans-and-t-shirt-clad assistant approached us in the lobby. “Hi. I’m Lee. Welcome. Would you follow me please?”
Lee led us from the front entrance through several fascinating common areas before taking us to a conference room on the fifth floor.
His flip flops cast a soft echo through the carpeted hallway as Sheldon and I followed. He seemed like a nice guy—young, smart-looking, thin in that long-distance-runner way.
I’d expected to be greeted by a beautifully styled receptionist, maybe a cool blonde like you see at big corporations in the movies. But then, that didn’t really fit the tech industry vibe, did it?
It certainly wouldn’t have fit the Reid I’d known years ago.
The only occasions I’d ever seen him wear a suit, prior to a few days ago at the State House, were his grandmother’s funeral and prom, where he’d worn a tux with a red bow tie and cummerbund to match my dress—
“He’s on a call. He’ll join you in about ten minutes, okay?” Lee gave us a smile and disappeared again, leaving the conference room door open.
Sheldon whistled. “Can you believe this place? Did you see that employee workout room? I wish Mancini would buy our station. I wouldn’t mind having an in-house cereal bar and a ‘nap room.’ And I heard there’s a basketball court here somewhere for pick-up games. I want a look at that before we leave.”
Sheldon’s nose was practically pressed to the glass wall as he took in the state-of-the-art computers and high-definition, flat screen monitors scattered throughout the work area.
“Down boy. Try not to have a man-cave-gasm while we’re here.” I hoped my flip remark covered my instantaneous horror at the idea of Reid ever becoming my boss.
“Seriously, though. This guy’s my hero. He has got somesweeeettoys,” Sheldon said.
“Well, start your own successful tech company, and you can have it all, too,” I teased. “Anyway, let’s get set up. I don’t want any lag time when Reid arrives. Ireallydon’t want to have to make small talk with him again.”
“Right. I get it,” Sheldon said, moving to one of his light cases to extract a stand and filter. “Keep the opportunity for flirtatious banter to a minimum.”
I whirled on him. “There willbe noflirtatious banter. And, by the way, I don’t appreciate you outing me to Rob.”
Sheldon shrugged. “Sorry, dude. He did his Jedi mind trick on me. I didn’t mean to tell him anything, but he started probing, and I don’t know what happened. I wandered out of his office with no memory of the previous three days.”
I had to laugh. It was hard to stay mad at Sheldon.
“I know. Rob’s like that. Well, you can redeem yourself by getting us in and out of here as quickly as possible. After we do the interview, I’m going to just leave and let you get all the b-roll we need, okay?”
Sheldon set the tripod up at one end of the conference table and attached his camera to the top while I paced the room. He glanced over his shoulder at me.
“Wow. It’s worse than I thought.”
“What?” I stopped, clenching my cold hands together in front of me.
“You are runnin’ scared, baby. You were chomping at the bit to get at those mobsters, but look at you—you’re terrified of this computer nerd. I don’t care what Mancini said the other day… it’s obvious you guys werewaymore than teenage fuck-buddies.”
Sheldon’s last two words still hung in the air as we both turned to see Reid standing in the doorway.
He’d frozen in place, an odd look passing over his face. It was gone so quickly, I wondered whether he’d even heard the mortifying phrase uttered by my soon-to-be-dead favorite photog.
Please, no.
Reid pasted on a cool business-smile and stepped into the room, hand outstretched toward Sheldon.
“No—that sounds about right.”
