The shrill ringing of her phone is what jolts Fallon awake way too early on Tuesday morning. She groans into her pillow, her hand fumbling on the nightstand for the offensive object before eventually retrieving it, glancing at the caller ID and answering the call.
“What now, Allison?” She mumbles down the phone, a snappiness evident in her voice from the displeasure of being woken at five AM.
“I’m so sorry to call you this early, but you would also kill me if I didn’t tell you right away, so I thought it would be best to call, I mean I guess I could have sent an email, but it’s pretty urgent-”
“Just spit it out."
“Okay, sorry.” Fallon hears her assistant take in a deep breath, almost like she is gearing herself up for what she is about to say before speaking with haste, “Trident Corp have put in an offer for the contract from Red Marks Studios and it looks like they’re going to accept it.”
Fallon bolts upright, suddenly completely awake, her eyes wide open, “What? No! How? That deal was watertight yesterday, how did Trident even find out about the contract?”
“Well, someone must have leaked it, including how much we are offering because they’re promising to double it. Apparently, a representative from Trident accosted David Fisher from Red Marks at dinner last night and convinced him to take their deal instead.”
Fallon practically growls, anger bubbling in her veins instantly. Having a rat somewhere in her company isthe last thing she wanted to have to deal with right now, especially one that is sabotaging deals that her company required to secure her planned expansion, “Alright, contact David Fisher’s people, get him to meet me for breakfast, somewhere fancy, tell him that we’re interested in offering more as a thank you for agreeing to the deal yesterday. See what strings we can pull, more money is fine but we need something better, something that Trident can’t offer. Then, make sure the lawyers get that contract written up, stat. Got that?”
“Yes, Miss Carrington, I’ll get right on that.”
“Oh, and then I want you to find out everything you can about who leaked this so that I can come down on them as hard as possible.”
She doesn’t even wait for Allison to respond before ripping the phone from her ear, ending the call and carelessly depositing it on the white bedsheets, proceeding to place her head in her hands, letting out a long sigh. And yet, there isn’t any time to dwell, she has to think. She wills her mind to begin the necessary action planning, considering all the ways she could out-manoeuvre her competition, knowing she’ll have to be exceptionally shrewd to win this one.
“Can you do that to me afterwards, please?” A low, raspy voice speaks to her from underneath the bedsheets.
“Hm?” She asks, hardly paying attention, already lost in her quickly calculating head, “Do what?”
“Come down on me as hard as possible,” The disembodied voice speaks back.
Despite her work-related stress, she still huffs out a laugh, rolling her eyes and playfully hits the man-sized lump to her left with the back of her hand.
“Ow! That’s not quite what I had in mind.”
“Oh, sorry, next time you’ll have to specify,” She grabs at the bed sheets and pulls them down to reveal the face of her fiancé, his dirty blonde hair all adorably fluffed.
“You know what I meant,” He’s clearly still incredibly sleepy, blinking rapidly to adjust his eyes to the light, yawning slightly, and the sight of him gives Fallon a fleeting pang of guilt.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” She mutters as she affectionately runs a hand through his hair, attempting to tame it.
Liam shrugs, stifling another yawn, “It’s fine, what’s going on? It sounds pretty serious.”
YOU ARE READING
"I Surrender"
RomanceA little friendly competition never hurt anyone, but it sure as hell can be torture, as Fallon and Liam are about to discover.
