Tongue Tied

Chapter 20

I spent only another minute or two on the boards and then moved on to showing him the slideshows. I'd spent so many hours trying to perfect these stupid commercials I cared nothing about. I only hoped he lifted a fucking eyebrow.

"This is not what I saw last time." Sean took his feet off the table and leaned forward to get a closer look. "Why didn't you stick with your original idea and work on it? It wasn't a bad idea."

Oh, now he decides to compliment the commercial he told me to trash.

"I thought I'd take a chance on both ideas," I said in reference to the positive and negative commercials he was watching slideshows for. I wasn't about to tell him I'd decided to do the negative ad too because I'd found out why he went with Harper Media. "I figured, if you didn't like one, you might like the other. Then we could expand on the idea you like."

Sean's brows raised slightly as he replayed the slideshow for the positive ad. "I do like versatility." What a revelation.

Michelle awkwardly cleared her throat, excusing herself from the room. She was obviously feeling like a third wheel or something to that effect. I couldn't blame her for leaving. I wanted to myself. Sean didn't even acknowledge her departure.

"These are good." He looked to me with a little less of a bored expression. I could tell by his eyes he was exhausted. Maybe that's why he was so rude all the time. Maybe he didn't get enough sleep and woke up on the wrong side of the bed every morning.

"You told me what you wanted and-"

"And you over delivered," Sean cut me off.

My immediate reaction was to frown in confusion. I had been expecting a less positive assessment of my presentation. "Pardon?"

He sat up straight as a board, folding his hands on the table. "Miss Laughlin, I've already seen the previous drafts of this, minus the negative ad," he said.

Previous drafts? Unless he was talking about my last pitch, I wasn't sure what he meant. I hadn't sent Rutherford Laurence any previews of my revised material. I started to inquire as to what he was referring to but he started speaking again.

"In my decade in this business, I have never seen presentations put together the way you do them," Sean told me. "I'm impressed. I really am. I knew you had to have heard the news that Harper Media would be handling the advertising for the Healthier Is Happier campaign. I had expected you to not pursue business with us once you'd discovered that fact. No one else would have. We'd already made our decision."

I wasn't totally following. It almost sounded like Sean was about to say something along the lines of you did a good job and I'm impressed, but it's still a no.

I finally sat down. My heels were beginning to make my feet ache again. "I'm not sure I understand where this is going," I admitted, squinting as if that would help me pay attention to his words better.

"I was very intrigued by your previous drafts of these. That's why I wanted to come here and see this presentation in person. I wanted to make sure I was making the right decision," he said. I was becoming less understanding of the situation by the second. "Now that I've seen this second commercial pitch, I know I am."

I was frowning so hard that my forehead was hurting more from that than from the headache. "Mr. Ashworth, I don't und-"

"Your persistence to acquire my business is admirable. Your ability to over deliver on material that was not even requested is the kind of impressive work ethic, determination and quality that I look for in advertising agents," Sean explained. "And that is why I would like Corbin and Hilliard, lead by you, Miss Laughlin, to be in charge of the advertisements and marketing for Healthier Is Happier."

I didn't know how to reply. I hadn't been expecting that. I was so sure Sean was leading up to the decision that would end my employment. Instead, he did the complete opposite.

"I'm sorry?" My eyebrows shot up in surprise. "You want... I... what?"

For the first time, I actually witnessed Sean Ashworth laugh. "I've already told Troy Devereaux I'm taking my business elsewhere. Now I'll let you be the one to tell him who I took my business to."

I was beyond thrilled. I couldn't believe something I'd expected to go so wrong had done a total one-eighty.

Sean and I discussed a few details of the campaign before he had to get going. We'd already gone over the short window of time he'd originally given me to work with. I didn't want to be the reason he was late to the airport.

"I look forward to working with you, Miss Laughlin," he said, shaking my hand firmly.

I nodded, about to head to Renee's office to break the great news and then face Mr. Corbin and Mr. Hilliard. Before Sean could reach the elevator, it occurred to me that I still had no idea what he had meant when talking about my previous draft.

"Mr. Ashworth!" I called after him, awkwardly jogging down the carpeted hallway in my heels. He turned around to face me, pressing the button for the elevator. "What previous draft were you referring to earlier?"

A ding sounded and the elevator doors opened. Sean stepped inside, holding the doors open long enough to answer my question. "You know, the one you sent the night of the fundraiser in Raleigh," he said. "The disc with the pitch on it."

He didn't stick around any longer to talk. The elevator doors closed and Sean disappeared from view, heading down to his big white limousine.

I trekked back to my office, trying to remember that night. That was the night I found out about Harper Media handling the Healthier Is Happier campaign. That was the night I'd been arguing with Alec in the hotel laundry room. The same night Mr. Hilliard wanted me to give Sean the disc with my pitch on it. The pitch he hadn't attended our video chat meeting for. The pitch I thought was worthless, though I still built most of today's presentation off of it.

But I hadn't been able to give Sean that disc. I clearly remembered throwing it in the trashcan in the laundry room during a fit of rage at Alec. How had Sean still received it?

I marched into my office, slamming the door behind me and immediately dialing Alec's number. I was still livid over the fact that he thought it was okay to have sex with me one day and go out with some fake blonde the next without so much as an ounce of consideration for my feelings, but that would have to be put to the back of my mind for the time being. I needed to figure out what the hell had happened.

"Hey, Bree," he answered on the third ring.

"You took my pitch, didn't you?" I accused, sitting on the edge of my desk. I was watching the downtown traffic move by in a sea of cars around the city loop.

There was a long pause. "What?" The honking of car horns in the background signaled he was outside somewhere.

I crossed my arms, holding my phone between my cheek and shoulder. "The disc from the fundraiser. I threw it in the trash at the hotel right in front of you. You took it out of the trash, didn't you, Alec?"

Another long pause. "I... well..."

"You took it out of the trash and you gave it to Sean Ashworth."

Alec cleared his throat loudly. "Alright. I'm guilty."