The Girl With a Broken Heart💔

The Indifference

Richmond Headquarters
Emma's POV

I kept looking at Jake, my eyes drew to his face after every passing minute, but his never left the projector screen. He did not look in my direction again.

I gathered myself and focused hard to follow the screen, trying to make sense of the quotations projected by BLK. Everyone took notes and kept up with the pace of the meeting.
Next up the projector was the proposal prepared by me. The Legal team from BLK took serious interest and were discussing something internally as the proposal slides advanced.

The proposal was interjected by one of the spokespersons from BLK.

"Mr. Jacob, your team's risk assessment numbers are way higher than what we projected in our calculation" A man in his mid-forties said while looking at his laptop screen.

"We really could use some explanation to verify the authenticity of your projected numbers". He finished in a serious tone. I felt a knot in the pit of my stomach. This was my work, and my credibility was at stake.

He was now slowly talking to his other colleagues, not very audible to the larger group. After few minutes, Mr. Ben Muriel, CEO of BLK, the company acquired by Jake, continued, "I think we will have to regroup on the risk assessment Mr. Richmond, as clearly we do not have consensus on the projections here. These revisions might even take a couple of week's time."

Jake did not look pleased by their request at all, he replied sternly, "Let's circle back for a minute Mr. Muriel, I am sure my legal department has valid explanations for your questions."

Jake gave a go-ahead nod to Mark, and he inmediately stood up to handle the questions. He headed to the white board, and gave quite convincing explanations for a brief one-hour walkthrough that I provided him this morning. This only showed how good he was at his work.

However, he got cross-questioned again on one of the parameters that he didn't cover.

There was pin drop silence in the room, piercing gazes stuck on Mark, who was looking into the proposal file figuring the best explanation. Soft whispers filled the room and it appeared as if Richmond Corp was losing face.

Jake was giving deadly stares to Mark, and I am not sure if it was the adrenaline rush or the bout of nervousness that abruptly transformed into boldness, I stood up from my seat, and offered Mark to take it forward from where he left.

I confidently walked towards Mark, and took the marker from his hand. I turned around and introduced myself.

"I am Emma Carter from S&M, we are Richmond Corp's legal partners and I would be the right person to provide you the basis of our projected numbers here." I started in a stern loud voice, these calculations were on the back of my hand as I prepared them less than eight hours ago.

My eyes did not leave the white board for a second, however, I could feel my back pierced by Jake's serious stares. I dare not look back at him even once during my presentation, as I was sure the strength I had unexpectedly summoned would fall in splits the moment my eyes would meet his.

I forced myself to  maintain calm and continued writing down the numbers for everyone's benefit. Once I was done, I felt satisfied by my explanation. I did a thorough research and was positive that this could not go wrong.

The BLK Spokesperson looked a little agitated yet still nodded in agreement.

"Alright Ms. Carter, we agree with your calculations here, however, for our record keeping, we will need  the explanation sent as a separate attachment?" Mr. Muriel said in a bossily tone.

"You will have them faxed to you by nine am tomorrow Mr. Muriel". Before I could reply, Jake cut me out and responded in a firm tone.

"Good, we will look forward to receive it then."
Mr. Muriel said while getting up from his chair and shaking Jake's hand. I stood there, silently observing each one of the members from BLK leave the room.