Cocotte Read Free Page A

experience. That will come.”
    I paused.
    “Your father will be proud of you…”
    A thin trickle of tears rolled down her che ek and she sniffled. She finally nodded. I put out my hand to her to shake hers and left my business card on the bar. I glanced at my watch and I couldn’t be bothered, waiting any longer for Marc so I got up.
    “ Emily, you start on Monday. Report at my office at nine a.m. sharp.”
     
    ***
     
    Monday morning arrived and I stared out my large office window, to revel in the rising sun. In the distance was the national office for Cerberus petroleum. It was a monster of a building, standing out amongst the rest. With the acquisition, eighty percent of our intellectual properties were to be transferred and the terrible task was to lay staff off that already had duplicate roles.
    I couldn’t help but be nostalgic , about the hard yards Marc and I put in and the staff that believed in our cause. I was adjusting my silver cufflinks when Marc burst in through the door. “What's the whore doing here?”
    I gla nced at my watch, to notice Emily was half an hour early.
    “I gave her a job.”
    Marc started laughing and rubbed his temples. Marc started to thrust his fingers into his straight black hair. “Are you serious? Doing what? Your personal blow job assistant?”
    “ Marc, you know our hands are tied up with the changeover. I have to finalise the restructure and go through the handover of all our accounts with Sherry over at Cerberus.”
    “ Sherry… mmm…” Marc said with a glint in the eye, stroking his goatee.
    “What?”
    “I’ll be happy to do a handover with her, in my bed.”
    “ Put your balls back in your pants, Marc. It’s important you do your job right, securing all the intellectual property once I announce the restructure. Millions of dollars of our company secrets can’t fall into a competitor’s hands.”
    “I know , Oliver. There’s going to be some pissed off people, some of them have been loyal from the start. I wouldn’t be surprised if they try to take all they can get.”
    “ That’s why, when we negotiated the deal with Sherry, we upped the redundancy package. The ones that will be leaving, will go with a golden handshake.”
    “You mean diamond…” Marc laughed.
    “I’m just glad Cerberus accepted, but Sherry keeps dragging this out.”
    “The sooner the document is signed the better!” I added.
    M arc’s eyebrows lifted, then he pointed to my door. “So where does the whore fit into all this? Is she going to work underneath your desk, while you make people redundant?
    I held my tongue, Ma rc had that ability to test my nerve but he was the type of guy that said what was on his mind.
    “Her name is Emily. I hired her as my executive assistant.”
    Marc scoffed at my comment and checked his phone. Oliver, you do what you think is best. I know it’s going to be a crazy couple of months, but I think it won’t bode well. Especially with the staff layoffs you’re going to do. Doesn’t help, her being a hooker either.”
    “What she did before should have no bearing.”
    I paused. “Should it Marc? You would know…”
    Marc paused and stroked his goatee again. I thought about his wife, if only she knew what he was doing…
    I think he clicked on the hypocrisy of the situation since he said nothing.”
    “Can I have your confidence then , you will keep this between us?” I said.
    “ Yeah, I will keep the whore a secret.”
    I crossed my arms and raised an eyebrow.
    “ Sorry, I mean Emily.” Marc said.
    “One more thing,”
    “What?”
    “How did you know?”
    “Know what?”
    “That she worked at Showgirls?”
    “Meh, the bitch is picky on who she chooses and what she likes to do, that’s all I can say.”
     
    Marc left and I caught a glimpse of Emily waiting outside my office as the door was closing. She had her makeup pad, using the brush to powder her nose. I paged her to come through.
    Emily had the first day of work nerves on