Page 4 of Love ad Lib
He replaced the paperclips into their box, swapped it for a new one in the stationery cupboard, then turned on his computer. He was in the middle of brokering a huge deal on behalf of an international steel conglomeration and couldn’t afford to make any mistakes. The commission was worth tens of thousands of pounds, and he needed every penny.
‘Oi, oi, Foxy!’
Henry glanced at his watch. Seven a.m.
Essex boy Carl swaggered into the open-plan office, his hair still damp from the shower. He threw his jacket on a desk and flexed.
‘Guess who just benched more than Jamesy-boy?’ he asked with a grin.
Henry raised his eyebrows at the rhetorical question.
Carl threw his arms wide. ‘Me, baby! There’s a new king in town.’
A man sauntered in behind him. ‘Only because I’ve been up all night drilling your sisters. Tomorrow, I’ll put you back in your place.’
James Hunter-Savage had arrived.
Tall and muscled, James had his suits tailor-made, his tousled black hair trimmed weekly, and his shave executed by a Turkish barber wielding a cut-throat razor. James had over two years and two inches on Henry and seemed compelled to mention these facts at every opportunity. He was the most successful broker at Conqueror and produced enough testosterone to supply the bulls at Pamplona.
Henry hated him.
James had been three years ahead of him at Eton. He was confident and brash and excelled at sports, whereas Henry was shy and finished growing after leaving school. They both rowed, and their paths crossed again for a year at Oxford University. At only six foot two, Henry lacked the height and bulk to make the top tier. James, on the other hand, rowed Oxford to victory in the boat race.
Just the sight of his face rubbed Henry up the wrong way. And when was Carl going to shut up? He flicked his attention back to the computer screen as an automated reminder pinged in from HR.
Reminder. Mandatory attendance this morning at the experiential training session. Arrive 09.50 for a 10.00 start.
Wasn’t there an email about this a few weeks ago? He scrolled back until he found it.
From:Lorna Ferguson
To: Henry Foxbrooke
Subject: Training Workshop
Dear Henry,
At Conqueror we are keen to strengthen interpersonal connections between colleagues and foster a spirit of collaboration. The Industrial Brokerage team has been identified as a department that could benefit from additional support in building communication skills, so we are bringing in a facilitation company to run an experiential training session.
Please find all the details in the attachment.
Kind regards,
Lorna Ferguson
Henry ranhis hands over his face. More HR bollocks and a total waste of time. No matter how many PowerPoint presentations he was made to endure, no productivity graph or pie chart was going to convince him to sit down and break bread with Hunter-Savage.
Brokering deals was a relentless treadmill. Week in week out, he slapped on a confident and gregarious mask and schmoozed and charmed the owners of London’s most exclusive nightclubs to gain access for small men with big wallets. He didn’t have the energy or desire to maintain the performance with his colleagues. They weren’t his friends now and certainly wouldn’t be after this morning’s event.
At nine forty-five, Henry lined up his keyboard with the bottom edge of the desk and placed his mouse two and a half inches to the right. He pushed his chair in, leaving his jacket over the back, then took the stairs to the top floor of the Conqueror building and the biggest conference room.
The tables and chairs had been pushed to one side, leaving most of the floor space clear. He didn’t have time to clock anything else, as a young woman appeared in his face.
‘Hi! I’m Libby!’ She took his hand, squeezing tightly. ‘So fantastic to meet you! What’s your name?’
‘H-Henry,’ he stuttered, taken aback by the energy of her welcome.
‘Awesome. It’s so great to meet you, Henry. My full name is Liberty, but only my mother calls me that if I’ve done something wrong. Most of the time everyone just calls me Libby, which is cool too; I like it and it’s a bit like a version of Elizabeth, which was my grandmother’s name. What’s the story behind Henry?’
