The Merger Mogul Read Free

holding out a tempting
morsel on his fork.  Angela leaned forward, showing an amount of cleavage
that was even more tempting. Daniel’s eyes drifted downwards to take in the
abundant view and then moved back up to see her lips close around his fork,
holding it in her mouth for just a few seconds, closing her eyes in bliss.
    “Delicious!”
she sighed appreciatively.
    Daniel shifted
uncomfortably in his chair and for a moment contemplated being late for his
retreat. He didn’t believe in wasting time so he was ready to take things to
the next level but, unfortunately, it wouldn’t be tonight.  Besides,
Saturday wasn’t that far away.  Delayed gratification was good for the
soul or was it confession that was good for the soul? Not for the body but
probably for the soul, if he believed that sort of thing. He could delay for
two nights.  Anticipation was half the pleasure and he was pretty sure
this merger would be pure pleasure. He turned his attention back to his dinner
and his date.  Until Saturday….

Chapter 3

 
 
    “Umm, good,”
groaned Daniel in pleasure as a pair of strong feminine hands manipulated the
tense muscles in his shoulders.  They drifted down to his lower back,
kneading his muscles on the way down and continued their probing and soothing for
another fifteen minutes.  Daniel was practically asleep by this time.
    “You were
really tense,” the masseuse told him. “Spend fifteen minutes in the sauna and
then take a cold plunge in the pool – you’ll feel wonderful.”
    “I feel
wonderful already, thanks to you,’ said Daniel, reluctantly getting up from the
massage table. He wrapped the towel around his slim hips and headed to the
sauna.
    The team was
scheduled to get together, in about an hour, to start their session.  He
hoped he wouldn’t be asleep by then since his body felt like limp
spaghetti.  He definitely needed that cold plunge to wake him up.

 
 
      “Ok team, I hope you enjoyed the massage and
sauna as much as I did.” There were murmurs of appreciation all around. 
Daniel sat with his team of consultants in a conference room they’d rented for
this purpose.
    There was Bryan Hardt who had been to law school with him and was one
of his few real friends, Ian Bane who was an investment banker, Claire Morgan,
an MBA with a specialty in Finance, Benjamin Kreiger ,
who was a tax specialist and Harold Kellerman , an
accountant. All except Ben had been with him for the last four years, when he
had to expand the business to handle the work that started flooding his
office.  Ben joined the group earlier in the year, so this was his first
retreat.
    They were a
good team – young, bright, ambitious and willing to think outside the
box.  He paid them well and they were loyal to the company, at least as
loyal as most employees could be expected to be these days.  Most of them,
like him, were married to their work and that’s the way he liked it.  The
only exception was Harold who had been married for about ten years.
    “As you all
know, the M&A market has started to slow down again which tends to happen
with a recession. In addition to that the numbers show that a third of the
mergers in the past have failed outright (like Shellbury) and almost as many
haven’t lived up to their objectives.  Bottom line is we need to come up
with some new services for the business so that we won’t be so exposed. We’ve
got a lot more overheads than when I started out eight years ago so we need
some more baskets to put our eggs in, so to speak. Any suggestions?” asked
Daniel.
    “Perhaps the
best place to start is with what we already have,” suggested Claire. “We can
take an inventory of what skills we have in-house and how we can use them
differently.”
    “That’s what I
was thinking as well,” agreed Daniel. “Then we can determine if we need to
bring someone on board to make up our deficiency. That person doesn’t have to
be a permanent part of the team either; we can