Untouched love

Chapter eleven: enemies

As expected of Sylvester, somethings like this won’t just go by him. Bolaji chuckled deeply, he was going to bring that up separately after they were done talking. Seems there was no need for that.
He heard him chuckling.
‘’ Wait… I’m right, aren’t I? I knew I know her when you were describing her. ’’ His voice boomed excitedly and Bolaji could hear him snap his fingers in the air. ‘’ Wait, you said you two met up again? Did she also recognize you?’’ He hit him with multiple questions.
‘’ Yeah and I think she recognized me too.’’ Bolaji answered.
‘’ Dunno why I couldn’t remember her, though.’’ He was sounding almost downcast about not remembering. The crazy bastard, thought Bolaji shaking his head in amazement before bursting into laughter.
‘’ Sylvester, how were you supposed to know? There are literally hundreds of women who might have that description!’’ Bolaji exclaimed laughing. Even as Bolaji said, he didn’t believe a single word of it. The acting CEO is a unique woman.
‘’ I’m a ladies man, Bolaji. When things like this happen to me, it shows I’m losing my touch. If care is not taken, something might happen to me soon. And you can imagine yourself after you’ve met her, she’s not the type you forget.’’ He said in a duh kind of way. Like he should be aware of that. Lady’s man his ass, more like a playboy. He was even generous with that term, the dude was closer to a male prostitute with the way he changes partners all the time. You never see him with a female partner for long.
‘’ Besides, I heard something about her presence in the company before you mentioned her. So, I should have known.’’ Sylvester said. ‘’ So, what happened?’’
He narrated to him from the moment he called her and how surprised he was when she showed up at the meeting place. He included all the pieces he omitted when he was first discussing with him. Things like this always gets his friend excited, he could feel it as he was talking to him.
After Bolaji finished telling all that had transpired, Sylvester began to give some advice on how to go about things. While he had some good talking points, a lot of them were just plain bad advice. Bolaji was already taking a risk getting advice from someone who just can’t seem to keep a girl around. Although, the reason was just because of Sylvester’s nature itself. Bolaji actually thought if he actually put in an effort to stay committed there was a high possibility he would actually succeed.
They talked for a while longer before they bided each other goodbye. There were means he could employ to get the required information but they would all require time. He decided to ask directly from the source, he is going to see Samantha again and that was something he was anticipating.

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DAY 11

Samantha was in a meeting with the company’s executives in the conference room. They were all seated around a big circular conference table. The room was roundly shaped with big windows all surrounding it. They all had big curtains which were all drawn open to let the daylight in. Samantha was sitting with her back to the big river that the company overlooked. All the chairs in the room were white, there was also a white couch by one of the windows. Right above the large table was a suspended circular white lamp
In front of them all were the files they were going to go through in the meeting. Opposite her sat Sandy, a forty five year old middle aged woman. She’s an executive in the company, one of the ones that hated her and almost always disagree with her in any form she can. Sandy doesn’t hide the fact she dislikes Samantha, she has a lot of stake in the company which is one of the only reason some of the executives side with her. She is a double edged sword for them though because of the way she acts, her actions were ones that were detrimental to both herself and those she allies with. Samantha couldn’t count the number of times Sandy had acted without thinking which eventually bit her back in the ass. So to a certain degree, she knows how to handle her because she makes it easy. The real problem was Mr Keyamo, the man seated two people away to her left. The man shows he openly disagrees with her but she can’t do much of anything about it. He is an average heighted man with a piercing gaze and a clean shaved face with full hair on his head. He is an overbearing man who likes to intimidate people, he always tries to use it on her to no avail. But he was no doubt her greatest obstacle now.
Keyamo held too much power in the company. He had a lot of shares and stake in the company and some of company’s executive are sided with him, enough to threaten Samantha’s position. He also has influence amongst the shareholders. He would often try to make things difficult for her. If he had his way, she wouldn’t be the one heading the company.
However, Samantha also had a lot things going in her favour, aside from the fact that they had no choice but to acknowledge her ability to lead the company through her hard work, dedication and the track records she’s had working her way up in the company. She also had her father’s influence in company. For better or worse, that has indeed helped her in gaining some footings with some executives who were on her father’s side and with the shareholders. She hated that, since it gave her father another form of power over her, which is why she is working really hard to change that by securing good deals when things were threatening to fall apart. Her standing in the company would increase with the success that comes with each successful deal.
Although, most of them were falling through, she was still able to secure some really good ones. The company’s situation was a really strange and baffling one. She still doesn’t know why companies were refusing them and why the ones they already had were backing out. She is still trying to find the reasons that was happening, and she intends to find out.
Her thoughts immediately flickered to the Director of the Antares Enterprise she met with two days ago. He hasn’t called back yet, not that she wasn’t expecting anything this soon, but she was still somewhat disappointed she haven’t heard from him yet. Images of his boyish handsome face kept playing in her head, she was thinking about him so much she wasn’t able to properly concentrate.
Samantha slightly shook her head to clear her thoughts. The company’s executives were currently digging into her, making unreasonable demands and at the forefront was Mr Keyamo and Sandy. Samantha kept trying not to roll eyes at her, with the way Sandy was talking with that annoying screech in her voice.
‘’ We kept telling you not to cancel on the deals we have with those companies!!’’ Sandy screeched. She almost had her veins popping through her skin. Things were not going the way she wanted, they haven’t for a while and that was really setting her off. Samantha intends to keep it that way, things going her way basically meant disaster for the company.
Samantha, in a calm way, said. ‘’ There’s no way I’m going to let us continue with those deals that were terrible and almost seems like we are selling the company off.’’
Mr Keyamo leaned away from his chair, clasped his hands together placed them on table and placed his head on it with. ‘’ Those deals were what was keeping our company afloat, I mean look at the current state of the company now. You really shouldn’t have done that.’’ He said calmly in a deep set voice. His face was set in an almost expressionless state. She really doesn’t like especially when he knows exactly why she did what she did.
‘’ The company has been this way, way before I cancelled those deals. I’m trying to save the company.’’ Samantha also replied calmly back in a frank tone. Two can play the game, she wasn’t about give in anytime soon.
‘’And how’s that going for you?’’ Mr Keyamo asked her.
She was almost gritting her teeth, he knows damn well how it is going and she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of admitting it to him now. Besides, she is still working still on it.
‘’ There are a lot promising ones, we will soon be in business with.’’ That wasn’t really a lie, she has had some success in getting deals with the smaller companies and some were still pending, it was the larger corporations they were having troubles getting through with. And they were the ones the company really needed to get out their current predicament.
‘’ What about the larger corporations? Why haven’t we entered an agreement with them yet? I believe we already have some that are willing.’’ Sandra asked a little calmly now but was staring daggers with her disdainful eyes. She was acting all cocky now.
They were all rubbish is what, she almost went off on some their representatives that came to the company. There was no way she was about to accept those one sided deals they were offering, the deals were no different from the ones she cancelled, they were all really looking down on them. Samantha blamed the so called heads of the company whose incompetence led them to their current predicament, and here they all were, trying to tell her how to do things. They were sadly mistaken if they thought she was just going to roll over. Let them bring it on, if it is a fight they want, then it is a fight they will get.
‘’ We are still on them, as you know, they are not giving us favourable deals as you know. I’m not about to return us to the situation we left.’’ Samantha replied with an edge to her voice. She saw Sandra’s face tilt up in a slight grin in victory to getting a reaction from her. Tsk Samantha said internally. She was annoyed at herself for falling for that.
Mr Keyamo leaned in back into his chair, his hands were still clasped. ‘’ I have personally contacted some companies and request we look into them because we will be getting responses soon.’’ His tone was a condescending one but he still kept a straight face. She really disliked the man, if only he was a little like Sandra, Samantha’s life would be a lot easier. Samantha found it hard to get a read on him, she had only seen him get visibly angry and upset once and that was when she was appointed the Acting CEO.
Samantha didn’t care, she was still going to have the last laugh here. ‘’ Sure, if we can come to terms we can all agree on. There’s no reason not to… thank you for the help.’’ She said giving a quick smile.
‘’ This is all for our company, I’m just doing what I should.’’ He said also returning a quick smile that had to be the fakest smile she had ever seen, not that hers was all too sincere.  
They had short discussions about other company matters and the meeting was dismissed. She headed straight to her office.