Chapter 1: Susan New Job and New Boss
"It is nice to finally meet Mark's wife," exaggerated George Bluburn, the president of one of my husband's small accounts. We were at a mixer my husband's company was holding for their clients. Mark, my husband, is an average IT sales guy. Don't let him know I said that but he is. He works hard but never quite lands the big accounts. George's company was big and not doing a lot of business with Mark.
I was 28 at the time and hadn't really found a job that paid much. I helped get Mark through school and just worked hard.
George and I hit it off at the party. Not a sexual thing. The guy is over 60. But I think I reminded him of his daughter or maybe even granddaughter. Anyway, after talking George found out I wanted a decent job and he said one of his managers needed an administrative assistant. Within two weeks I was working at Mobile Information Marketing.
My life changed after working there for seven months. I was never great at computers, even though Mark works for an IT firm. Our IT director, Franklin, at first complained about sending some of his employees to me more than others for support. But after I worked there a month, Franklin, was personally helping me. He was definitely flirty. Half the time, when I sat at my desk and had him walk me through our database system, or marketing software, I felt him looking down my shirt. At first, I was kind of bothered by it. But he was so nice that I realized it was really a compliment.
After working there for seven months, we had the company yearend party for employees only. It was at a downtown hotel. Franklin spent most of his time with me drinking, buying me drinks, looking down my shirt, and dancing. We hit it off and flirted like we were back in high school. It was really flattering that a guy 10 years older would want to flirt with me rather than someone his age. And I had never really hit it off with a black guy before. It was all innocent.
The next week, Franklin called my boss and me into his office. He wanted me to transfer to his department and become his administrative assistant and was willing to give me a good raise. My boss was disappointed but Franklin had worked out all the HR issues.
I got settled in with a lot of subtle flirting going back and forth between us.
What I failed to tell you, is Franklin is the contact for Mark at Mobile Information Marketing. So once a month, Mark made a sales call and I got to see him. Everything was great until Mark tried to sell Franklin on a major upgrade of their systems and additional database work.
Franklin didn't like the price or the terms but liked the enhancements. This was going to cost the company over $225,000.
I could tell Franklin was probably not going to buy it. Mark asked me for the inside scoop and I told him not to plan on the sale. The sale alone would be over $40,000 in commissions to us. Considering last year he only made $60,000 this was a huge order.
Over dinner Mark started, "Honey, we could really use the commission. I need you to help me on the account."
"What the hell can I do? I'm just Franklin's secretary. I'm not a sales person and I can't make the decision."
"I need you to get all in inside intelligence you can. You know who the competitors are."
"Yeah but I told you who they are. You already know a lot about them. Besides, it would be a conflict of interest to tell you more than that."
"Well can you soften Franklin up to me or something? Can you help me make sure he likes our company and our recommendation?"
"I guess I can try," was all I could say. I thought and thought about how to help.
Since Franklin obviously liked me and liked flirting with me, I decided to go to lunch with him and find out what he thought of Mark's proposal.
I dressed up a little racier than normal. Shorter skirt. Same top but just let one more button unbuttoned. I also decided to wear 3 ½" heels verses my normal short pumps and sandals.
To say Franklin liked the outfit would be an understatement. He was all eyes and even had some accidental bumps and brushes. He asked if we could have lunch, which is what I was planning.
We went to a sports bar and ate food and did our normal flirting. My downhill slide came at the end of that lunch. I really didn't know what I was doing or what I should do to help Mark.
Franklin said, "Well, my little hottie. Is there any reason you have dressed up extra fine for me today?"
"Who said it was for you?"
"Are you saying it was for someone else? Is there someone else I'm competing with, honey?"
"No. I was hoping we could grab a bit to eat."
"Well we ate. We should go back to work. Unless you want something."
"Franklin, it is just Mark's proposal."
