Page 34 of The Grumpy Billionaire
“Thank you,” Reid said in a low voice.
I did venture a glance at his face then, only to find his eyes were focused on my chest, so generously displayed for him at this angle. He brought his gaze back up to mine.
His eyes, that mesmerizing shade of blue-green, held a naughty gleam. Then I looked down at myself. Great day to have worn a wrap-dress.
I straightened and took my seat, drawing the neckline together belatedly. “You’re welcome, Mr. Mancini.”
Actually, I’d worn this dress for a reason. Figure-flattering and coral red, Kenley used to refer to it as my you-want-it-but-you-ain’t-gettin-it dress. Delivered in her chewy Southern drawl, the phrase had always made me laugh.
Whether because of the strong color or the male attention it usually drew, I’d always felt powerful in this dress. Paired with high nude pumps, it seemed like the perfect outfit to get me through today.
Of course, I hadn’t anticipated spending the first five minutes of our meeting with my chest in Reid’s face.
I cleared my throat. “Are you ready?” I forced myself to meet his eyes again.
They were narrowed in amusement. His tone matched.
“Oh, I’mready.”
Would it be unprofessional to start the interview with a hard kick to the shins? What would a network pro do? I took a cleansing breath, let it out, and started to ask the first question.
Reid lifted a hand to stop me. “Before we begin, I should tell you there are a few subjects that are off-limits. First, I won’t discuss—”
“No. No way. That’s not how it works. You said you wanted to do an interview. That means I choose the questions, and you answer them.”
He cracked a smile. “I see your fiery little temper hasn’t changed over the years.”
“Do you want to do this or not?”
Reid held my challenging gaze for long moments. Then he laughed, his voice dipping low, giving me goose bumps.
“Let’s do it.”
I shook off the disconcerting chill and disciplined my voice into its professional on-air demeanor.
“I’m sure our viewers would like to know, Mr. Mancini, why you’ve decided to do a televised interview now, after refusing them repeatedly since your social network launched.”
Reid looked off to the side then smirked in a way that told me I’d just asked the first question on his no-no list.
“I guess the answer to that is I hate talking about myself. I’m a private person. And… I’m not sure why my life would really interest anyone.”
I looked down at the notes I’d written based on my pre-interview research on his life the past few years. “You don’t think people would be interested in your yacht, your mansion on Oceanview Avenue in Eastport Bay, your vintage Porsche collection?”
His dark eyebrows dropped, and the corners of his mouth turned down. “I’ve always thought it was rather rude to discuss how much you have. There’s always someone with less, there’s always someone with more.”
“True. But not too many have more than you,” I countered. “Of course, you’d have even more wealth if you didn’t give so much away. According to my research, you donated more to charity last year than both Warren Buffet and Michael Bloomberg.”
Reid shifted in his chair, his pointer finger tapping the glass top of the conference table. “I don’t really want to talk about that.”
His eyes flicked up to me and back down to his hand.
“Okay…” I dove for my notes.
Usually I was a perfectly adequate interviewer, but the awkward in the room was thick enough to slice and dip in olive oil. I had to put our personal history and that little mic-cord-intoxicating-cologne-fiasco aside and do this thing.
“Let’s talk about StillYours-dot-com,” I pivoted. “You started working on it your freshman year of college, launched it as a sophomore, then dropped out of U-R-I to run the company when its popularity exploded. You’ve created several other successful tech-related businesses since then. But StillYours.com is the largest. It’s now replaced Facebook as the world’s most-used social media site. What was the inspiration behind it?”
The Million Dollar Question. The answer the viewers would most want to know, the one I most wanted to know.
