Always Be Closing Ch 02 1

I felt on top of the world when I walked into the office Monday morning. My confidence was sky high and my body language let everyone know it. I was excited to walk into Kelsey's office, which is completely opposite to how I felt last Monday.

"What's up, Kelsey?" I asked as I walked right into Kelsey's office and sat down at her desk.

"What is going on?! How's my protege doing this morning?" Kelsey asked as she stopped typing on her computer and turned to look at me.

"Oh my god. I feel on top of the world!"

"I bet! So what happened? Give me all the details."

I told Kelsey about my conversations with Paul. I focused on the business related details like the features BSS were providing, the features we had that he was most interested in, and his concerns with BizTel. Kelsey was impressed with all the details I managed to get out of him.

"So what's the plan for this afternoon?" Kelsey asked.

"Well... Pricing and migration are his two biggest concerns. I figured we needed to figure out how much we were going to have to help them with migration before we discuss pricing." I explained.

"Yes, that's a great idea. Have you talked to anyone from the applications team yet?" Kelsey asked.

"Nope. I've never had to deal with them, so I was hoping you had some pointers."

"Ugh... Honestly my advice would be to not invite them. They always make things awkward with potential customers. I've lost so many deals because one of those pricks said the wrong thing." Kelsey said in a frustrated tone.

"No way. So what do we do here? Should I not invite them?"

"Unfortunately, Cornerstone is too big of a customer. We need to involve the applications team otherwise we're going to get roasted for over-promising things to a customer." Kelsey said with a sigh.

"Who do you recommend?"

"Mack. He's in charge of the applications team. However, he's the worst. So I would be careful how you involve him in the meeting." Kelsey explained.

"What do you mean?"

"Mack is a total nerd. He's really smart, but he loves to point out problems and create roadblocks out of thin air." Kelsey said.

"Great, I can't wait!" I said sarcastically.

"Here's what I would do... Go talk to him about Cornerstone. Tell him to not say anything unless he is directly asked. Tell him that if he blows this chance, I will personally let everyone in management know that he's the reason we didn't land Cornerstone."

"Mack is... above me. I can't just walk in and say that to him." I said nervously.

Kelsey nodded and then picked up the phone and dialed a number.

"Mack, listen. One of my girls, Christine, is going to invite you to a customer visit this afternoon..." She said and then paused as the voice on the other end spoke.

"It's with Cornerstone..." Kelsey said, then paused.

"Yeah, that Cornerstone. So it's a big deal..."

"Yeah, I know. So listen... Don't fuck this up, Mack. Don't say anything unless you are spoken to..."

"Yeah, I know it's going to be a lot of work for your team, but this is a big deal for BizTel..."

"Listen, Mack. I don't care. If you fuck this deal up, I will personally walk into Lyle's office and tell him that you fucked up the biggest deal in company history!"

Kelsey slammed the phone down as she hung up on Mack.

Lyle was the President of BizTel. I knew Kelsey had a good relationship with him due to her history of landing big deals, but the idea she could just walk into his office and get someone fired like that was nuts to think about. Kelsey really did hold a lot of power at BizTel.

"Fuck, I hate that guy. He always drives me crazy!" Kelsey shouted.

"I am suddenly not as excited about this meeting." I said in a joking tone.

"Don't sweat it. Go chat with Mack and come up with a gameplan. I trust you've got this. Let me know if you need anything else. This would be a huge deal for BizTel, so I will drop just about anything if there's something you need to chat about."

"I appreciate your confidence, Kelsey. I will definitely let you know if I need anything." I said as I got up and walked out of Kelsey's office.

A few minutes later I met with Mack. He seemed more interested in how I was able to finally get Cornerstone to agree to this kind of a meeting. Of course I didn't tell him the whole story. I told him that I had worked really hard to build this relationship, but that it was still very shaky.

I also explained that this meeting was going to go a long way in closing this deal. I told Mack that one of Cornerstone's biggest concerns was how difficult it would be to take decades of work building up their BSS based system and migrating it all over to our system.

Mack bemoaned how much effort it was going to take.

"Oh my god, this is going to take my team years to get this right." he would whine.

I would tell him, "Mack, I understand this isn't easy, but closing this deal would change BizTel forever."

He agreed, but it didn't mean he was eager to do the work Cornerstone was going to need from BizTel.

The rest of the day flew by. I was in and out of offices, talking to various people, trying to get all my facts straight. This meeting wasn't only big for BizTel, it was going to go a long way in determining my long term financial stability.

I was nervous walking into the Cornerstone offices. Not only because I understood the gravity of this meeting, but because I hadn't heard from or seen Paul since our encounter Friday night. I didn't know what to expect. Maybe he had regrets? Maybe having the weekend to contemplate his indiscretions changed his mind about doing business with BizTel.

When we arrived in the lobby we were greeted by the same receptionist.

"Hi, welcome to Cornerstone Systems. Can I help you?" she asked in a bubbly tone.

"Hi, I'm Christine Braxton from BizTel and we're here for a meeting with Mr. Rhodes." I replied.

"Ah, yes. Let me call him and let him know you're here."

The receptionist picked up the phone and dialed a number and waited for someone on the other end to pick up.

"Hi, Mr. Rhodes? BizTel is here for your meeting this afternoon... Okay, I will let them know."

The receptionist gently put down the phone and announced to us, "Mr. Rhodes will be right down."

The wait was agonizing. I couldn't stop thinking about how awkward things were going to be.

It was just a handjob!

I'd tell myself.

I began pacing around the lobby, pretending to look at the artwork on the walls. Mack almost certainly knew I was freaking out on the inside.

Finally, the door opened and in walked Paul. He wasn't dressed as formally as when I last saw him. He was wearing khakis, a light blue button down shirt, and a black tie. Simple, a little elegant, a hint of nerdy.

"Hello! Welcome!" Paul exclaimed as he walked into the lobby.

He reached out to shake my hand. It was as if nothing had happened on Friday night. Honestly, this was kind of fun. We both were portraying ourselves as cordial and professional. No one knew that less than 72 hours ago, my hand was drenched in Paul's cum.

"Mr. Rhodes..." I said.

"Oh, please, call me Paul." he said in a playful tone.

"

Paul

," I emphasized, "This is Mack Savard, he's in charge of our applications team. If you were to sign with us, he would be managing your migration to our system."

Paul shook Mack's hand.

"Mack, thank you so much for coming today." Paul said.

"Mr. Rhodes - I mean Paul, I'm looking forward to telling you about what my team can offer." Mack said nervously.

"Great! Shall we head upstairs?" Paul asked.

We both agreed and Paul led us out of the lobby, and into an elevator that carried us up to the 15th floor. When the elevator stopped we exited and were led through a maze of cubicles and into a glass conference room.

The conference room was immaculate. The centerpiece of the room was a beautiful wooden table that was surrounded by dark brown leather chairs. They looked extremely comfy. In the back there was a variety of refreshments set out. A large screen hung at the front of the room. On one of the long sides of the room were floor to ceiling windows that looked out of the building. On the other were maps with ports, sailing routes and flight paths marked out.

I had been in a lot of different conference rooms, but this was by far the nicest I had ever been in.

"Please, take a seat. Help yourself to any of the refreshments along the back. While you get settled in, I'm going to grab some of my developers so they can join us." Paul explained and then left the room.

I plugged in my laptop and brought up a presentation we were given that provides more details on the features BizTel can offer. Mack setup his laptop so he could take notes and reference information he needed if he was called upon in the meeting.

"Jesus, that's really Paul Rhodes?" Mack asked.

I looked at Mack and smiled.

"Like holy shit... That guy basically created our industry. You didn't tell me I'd be meeting with

him

today." Mack continued.

"Well, Mack... I didn't want you to get too nervous." I joked.

Paul returned a few minutes later with a handful of others. Although he introduced them to us, their names and positions slipped my mind, as they held little significance to our conversation.

Before Paul sat down, he turned to address his developers.

"Guys, this is Christine and Mack from BizTel. I know you're probably wondering why the fuck they're here, so let me explain a few things. Christine has told me about some of the features that they already offer, the BSS keeps dragging their feet on. Now, our contract with BSS isn't up for another year or so, so I figured it was worth exploring if switching to BizTel was even an option." Paul explained.

His developers looked puzzled.

"I think one of the key things is knowing what the transition from BSS to BizTel would look like. So Christine is going to talk more in depth about the features we're interested in, and Mack is here to talk about what migration will look like and how they can possibly help us speed up that process." Paul continued.

"So, BizTel, the floor is yours..." Paul said as he took his seat.

I launched into my presentation, pausing only to answer questions from Paul and his developers. As I explained the features that Paul was most excited about I could sense a change in the developers. They were no longer skeptical, and were now hanging onto my every word.

Then came the hard conversation.

"So... Like I said, our contract expires in a year. So we would need everything ready to go in about 13 months." Paul explained, "No I have a great team of developers out there, but this is a serious undertaking. What kind of support is BizTel willing to give us to make that happen?"

I looked at Mack for a second. I thought about letting him try to answer, but I was worried he might say something dumb and ruin the momentum we already had.

"I've spoken to several of the stakeholders at BizTel and they assure me that they will provide whatever resources are needed to make sure Cornerstone is fully functional when their contract expires." I said.

"So what does that help look like?" one of the developers blurted out.

"Mack, why don't you tell them about some of the things your team can do?" I said.

"Yeah... uh... So I run the applications team and our job is to work with our customers to help them develop any custom hooks into our system that they may need. We also assist with data migration as well." Mack said nervously.

"So what does that mean?" another developer asked, "You're just going to answer some email for us?

The developer looked mildly annoyed.

Mack rolled his head from side to side. He knew how silly the support sounded, but he also knew that's what their primary job was.

"For the most part that-"

Mack was quickly interrupted by Paul.

"Excuse me, what?" Paul said in a perturb voice.

I knew this meeting was about to blow up if I didn't diffuse the situation.

"What Mack is trying to say," I interjected, "Is that that is mostly what they do. However, for some customers they will do more than that. I think it's safe to say that Cornerstone is one of those customers."

I shot a look at Mack, silently relaying to him that he needed to keep his mouth shut.

Paul gave Mack and I a skeptical nod.

"I don't think you understand the gravity of this situation. We're giving you an opportunity to get our business. To be blunt, we're happy with BSS. This would be a huge deal for your company, so I would expect BizTel to be a little more eager to support our migration efforts." Paul said.

"Well, let me ask you this, Mr. Rhodes..." I said, sitting up in my chair.

Calling him Mr. Rhodes felt a little naughty considering what we had done the other night.

"What is your vision? What is it that Cornerstone thinks they'll need?" I asked.

Paul paused for a second.

"I think... I can't tell you all the details of what we expect, but at a high level, I would expect that your applications team will basically be living here at the Cornerstone offices. We'll need instant support. I'd want to use them as boots on the ground, writing code, testing features, everything." Paul explained.

Mack opened his mouth to speak and I quickly shot him a stern look, which sent him slouching back in his seat.

"That's very helpful, Mr. Rhodes. Based on what our management has told me, I think that is a reasonable ask." I said in a polite tone.

The meeting continued on in a tenuous state. All parties were doing a careful dance, trying to maintain the balance and not cause the entire deal to blow up. After the meeting wrapped up, we exchanged pleasantries and went our separate ways.

I asked Paul if I could treat him to happy hour, but he declined saying that he had too much work he needed to finish up. I wasn't sure if that was an honest response, or if it meant something else. In a way, I was relieved. It was getting close to the time I needed to pick up my son. I hated the feeling of having to scramble to find someone else to pick up my son.

The next day I called a meeting with a bunch of stakeholders at BizTel to go over what Cornerstone needed so that we could make a formal offer. The meeting lasted all day. The applications team whined that they were going to have to do so much extra work as part of this deal. Then there was debate about pricing strategy and how the deal should be structured. By the end of the day I was mentally exhausted.

Thursday afternoon I had a preliminary offer to send to Cornerstone. As I read through the offer I could feel the gravity of it. This offer could be the thing that keeps my job, or it could be the thing that kills it.

I called Paul

"Hello?" he answered.

"Hi, Mr. Rhodes, this is Christine from BizTel. I just wanted to let you know that I have a copy of our initial offer for Cornerstone. I was wondering if you wanted me to email it to you, or if you wanted to meet in person and we could go over it."

The phone went silent.

"Uh... Sure, how about we meet for lunch tomorrow?" Paul asked.

"Wonderful! How about we meet at Johnson Street Tavern at 12:30?"

"Perfect. See you then."

I sighed and collapsed back into my seat. I could feel my nerves returning. This was going to be another one-on-one meeting with Paul and we had already established a precedent for what can happen when we're alone.

I decided to leave early and go get my nails done again. I wanted to make sure I looked attractive to Paul.

The next day I arrived early at Johnson Street Tavern. This way Paul wouldn't see the car I was driving. I got a table in a corner, which I thought would be less noisy so we could discuss the details of the contract.

Paul walked in looking pretty casual. He was wearing light blue jeans, a Hawaiian shirt, and flip flops.

"Hey!" I exclaimed as he approached the table.

I stood up and gave him a friendly hug before we both sat down at the high top table.

"How are you doing?" he asked.

"Ugh, Cornerstone is keeping me really busy." I joked.

Paul flashed a nervous smile.

"Well, glad we've kept you on your toes."

Just then the waiter came by and took our order. Paul ordered a neat scotch and I ordered a vodka soda.

"So, are you ready to see it?" I asked Paul.

"See it?" he said with a confused look.

"Our offer?"

"Oh, right. Sure. Let me have it."

I was confused by Paul's reaction.

Did he forget why we were here? What the fuck?

I reached into my bag and pulled out a copy of the offer and slid it over to Paul.

Paul took the offer and thumbed through it. He was too quick to actually read anything. Then he put it back down on the table and slid it off to the side.

What is going on?

"Looks great! I'll have to dig into it later." Paul said, patting his hand on the stack of paper.

"So, how was your weekend? Everyone go okay?" Paul asked.

We made small talk for a while. We ordered food, more drinks, then another round of drinks. We didn't talk about the deal the entire time. A couple hours had passed and I was starting to feel a buzz.

Should I drive back to the office like this?

"Hey, so... I uh..." Paul said, nervously fidgeting with his hands.

I froze and looked at Paul with a concerned face. He had been acting so weird, I was worried this was going to be bad news.

"I really enjoyed the other night." Paul said.

Oh no...

I thought to myself.

"I hope you did too by the way." Paul continued, still fidgeting with his hands.

"Yeah, that was a nice evening." I said with a smile.

"Yeah? Good." Paul said nervously.

"Yeah. I'm glad you enjoyed it too."

Paul looked around the table, checking to see if anyone could hear him. Then he leaned in close.

"I'd love to do that again sometime." Paul whispered.

I figured he was talking about another night out on the town, which could lead to something extra like the other night.

"Oh! Sure! No problem. Is there something you had in mind? Another concert? A movie?" I asked.

"No, not that. I mean, that was fun too, but I was talking about what we did at the end of the night." Paul whispered.

Shit... How oblivious am I?

I thought to myself.

The nerve on this guy. Here he asks me to go to lunch to talk about our offer, then he ignores it and then asks if I could give him a handjob again. If I didn't need this deal, I would have gone off on him. However, that wasn't the case. I really needed this deal so I could keep my job.

I bit my lower lip and flashed Paul a seductive smile, "Oh, yeah?"

"Mhmm... Like... Maybe now?"

"Right here?!" I whispered loudly.

"No-no-no... We could go to my car, or get a room, or... I don't know." Paul continued to whisper.

I thought for a moment about the options. I had a feeling that this was probably going to become a regular thing. I didn't really want to keep getting hotel rooms every time he wanted a handjob. That was going to get expensive, and while I had Kelsey's full support, I didn't want to alarm anyone as to what

might

be happening. I guess his car was the best option.

"Sure, let me pay and we can go to your car." I said quietly.

Paul smiled, relieved that I agreed. From that point on he was like a puppy dog. He would have done anything I had asked.

I got our check and paid the $136 bill.

I have to pay and give him a handjob, sheesh... what a deal this guy is getting.

I thought to myself.

The truth is, BizTel was paying for lunch, but the principle is the same.

"You lead the way?" I asked.

Paul got up out of his seat and began walking towards the door of Johnson Street Tavern. I followed behind him. I felt like everyone was looking at me as I followed Paul out of the restaurant. It was like they knew I was about to go outside and jerk this guy off. I kept my gaze towards the ground, trying hard to avoid making eye contact with anyone.