The man sitting in front of me, the man about to be introduced to me as the boss of the firm to which I was about to give my presentation in the hope of securing a very lucrative contract with them, was the man I had let fuck me last night for five hundred dollars. NO! This can't be happening! But it was. Oh God, it was. I just stood there, numb, as Bill rose to his feet. I felt my world, my entire life, crashing around me. This was the end of my career.
"Hi, William Jones," he said calmly, politely, a smug smile on his face as he looked me in the eye. "Call me Bill." I heard him speaking, but it was as though I was somewhere else, not actually present in the room. My heart was pounding in my chest. I felt gripped by extreme panic, locked to the spot in the floor. I thought for a moment I would faint.
"Anne, are you OK?" I heard someone say. I think it was Pete. His words jolted me back into reality -- but a reality I could hardly bear! I steeled myself as best I could.
"Yes, I'm OK. Bill," I said, extending my hand to complete the formalities, though desperately trying to avoid his gaze, "pleased to meet you."
"Likewise," he smiled. He was as cool as ice, acting as if nothing had happened the night before, as if indeed he had in fact just met me for the first time -- as everyone else in the room naturally assumed was the case.
"Anne, you look a little pale," he said. "Would you like a glass of water before we continue?"
All I could manage was a feeble 'yes' as I sat down.
Oh my God. It wasn't just the embarrassment. That would have been bad enough, bad beyond belief - and it surely was. I could hardly bring myself to look him in the eye. But what about when all this got back to Mr Sheldon? For it surely would. Bill would tell him, I was certain, tell him how his marketing executive had fucked him the night before their meeting like a common whore. I felt like turning and walking out of there, right there and then. But something, maybe my sense of professionalism, made me stay. Made me resolve to at least get through the presentation. Go through the motions, get it over with, in the best way I could, and not give Bill the satisfaction of seeing me crumble. And then just get my sorry ass out of there.
It was the most excruciating and longest day of my life. The only respite was, oddly enough, when I was actually giving the presentation for which I had been so well prepared. For despite the internal trauma, the fact that I was virtually shaking the whole time I spoke, and that I could hardly look Bill in the eye even for a moment, I actually didn't do a bad job of it. But oh, then came the extended business lunch, which normally occurs at these sorts of affairs, and for two hours I had to engage in light conversation with the three men, with Bill throwing in the odd line about my private life, such as how could it be that such an attractive, intelligent girl as myself wasn't already hitched? Damn him, he was enjoying himself over this, at my expense.
We had a wrap up in the afternoon, and by five mercifully it was over. I said my goodbyes to Pete and Jeff as they prepared to leave, but then just as I was about to go Bill came over to me.
"Oh Anne, would you mind sticking around just a minute? There are a couple of points I'd like to go over."
"Yes, sure," I replied. What else could I say? And I knew pretty much what those 'points' were going to be. Pete and Jeff had gone. Now it was just Bill and myself alone in the conference room.
"Take a seat," he said firmly. The tone of his voice had changed. He remained standing, and idly strolled to the opposite end of the conference table. I watched him, his back towards me, his fingers straying across the top of the chair, lightly tapping the chair. Then he turned to look at me.
"Well, well," he said, placing one hand in front his mouth, resting his thumbs under his chin, as if in some kind of contemplation. Here it comes, I thought, bracing myself, here it comes. "That was an interesting day, Anne, I must say. Not as interesting as the night before, though -- not by a long shot. And on that topic, may I ask, what was last night about? What the hell was going on there? Doesn't Sheldon pay you enough, Anne? Or Angie, is it? Hmm?"
I started to cry. All the emotion pent up all day, I just lost it.
"I'm sorry, Bill, so sorry," I sobbed, feeling even more dejected, even more pathetic -- cracking up like this in front of him was exactly what I didn't want to happen! "I don't know what I was doing! That was, that's never happened before, I've never done that before!"
"Hey," he said, "hey!" raising his voice. "Stop crying. Get it together. I'm just asking: last night, what was that about?"
He gave me a tissue and I dried my eyes.
"I don't know. I just don't know. Maybe just a fantasy, one I never meant to be real, and it just sort of got out of hand. I'm really sorry, Bill, I... I just don't know what to say!"
"Hmm, but this is certainly an interesting situation we've got ourselves into here," he said, chuckling. God, he was laughing! "Tell you what: if you're thinking I'm not going to do a deal with you because of last night, the answer is you're mistaken. The fact is that your proposal is pretty good. It's got merit. It's not perfect, and there are some fundamental points on which I would like to negotiate different terms but, on the whole, it's well in the ballpark...
"Now, listen carefully to what I've got to say. I run this firm. Tomorrow Pete and Jeff will be making their own recommendations to me as to whether or not we do a deal, but I've got final veto. I'm the boss, I can overrule them if I so chose.
"Now, as I said, your proposal is good, not perfect, but good. Maybe good enough. Maybe not. Now, listen carefully: I've got a proposition for you.
"Since I'm the boss, and I make the decisions, I could make a decision right here and now, yes or no. As I said, I can sign up with you right now, or I can walk away right now. It's all up to me. Your pitch was good. With a few minor amendments, I think it could be something that can work for my company.
"Now, I fly back home in the morning, which means I'm here for another night. So, here's the deal: you will agree to be my personal whore for the evening, and that means you do whatever I say, when I say it. You agree to that, deal's on. How does that sound?"
No. No way. I couldn't do it. The shame I felt right now was almost unbearable, let alone be his God damned slut for the night! I almost didn't care any more. Fuck it all, my career will be over with this anyway! Just get me out of here! I've had enough, more than enough, and now he's trying to humiliate me even further, if that were possible! I was about to get up and leave as it suddenly occurred to me: why am I still sitting here even now? Isn't this excruciating enough? If my career is all over now, why not just walk out and spare myself any more humiliation and embarrassment? Why didn't I do that earlier? I'm still hanging on to some hope, I must be, otherwise I would have already walked out. Otherwise I would have walked out this morning. To walk out now is almost illogical -- why go through all the shit and humiliation I had today for nothing? There's got to still be a way out of this, got to be a solution. There's always a solution to be found for any dilemma, even one as sordid and pathetic and as unspeakable as this. But could I really do what he's asking? No. When I still hadn't given him an answer, he said:
"Oh come on. You seemed to enjoy playing the slut last night, at least from what I can remember. You seemed to really enjoy it, Anne. You just admitted it was some kind of fantasy, didn't you? Why don't you just face the fact -- you wanted it, and you loved it, you loved it my sweet little thing. Didn't you? Hmm? One more night of playing the whore and then you go home with a deal signed and sealed. It's that easy, it's that simple. What's your problem?"
I just sat there in silence, looking at the floor. I felt like something like a naughty schoolgirl sent to the headmaster and waiting to see if she was going to be kicked out of the school.
"You know," he continued, "I could also decide to let Sheldon know what his marketing executive gets up to when she's away on business at his expense. I don't know Sheldon all that well, but I'm pretty sure he'd be fairly pissed at that news. Don't you?"
"You're blackmailing me!" I said, trying to rally myself into some kind of action, even though I felt utterly cornered, completely powerless. Damn it, I knew it: I should have just walked out!
"You may call it blackmail," he said. "I would call it taking full advantage of my position of strength in this particular situation, as any good businessman would. Business isn't always fair, Anne, you should know that by now. Anne, think about it. Don't get hysterical, just think about it. I have no reason or motive to tell Sheldon what happened, nothing to profit from it. I mean, of course I could ask him for my five hundred back!"
God, now he was laughing at his little joke. This was just getting worse and worse...
"But seriously, Anne, we both know what would happen to your career if I did tell Sheldon. You'd be finished. What happened with us last night, from your perspective, was a very unfortunate and unlucky coincidence. But that's the situation you -- not me - seem to have engineered for yourself. Remember, you brought this on yourself.
"I'm saying to you that if you walk out the door right now, not only is the deal off, but I will be left to consider what course of action I might take with regards to what I tell Sheldon of our meeting. But if you do what I say, the deal's on, I give you my word on that, and I give you my word that Sheldon won't ever -- EVER -- find out about last night's little adventure. So, what do you say?"
What could I say? It was like being thrown a life raft in the middle of the ocean by the man who had just deliberately sunk the boat. But a lifeline it was. Because, if he was as good as his word, I had a deal, and I still had my career. As unpalatable as it all sounded, I didn't feel that I had much choice in the matter.
"What do you mean by anything?" I said through gritted teeth.
"Anything means exactly that -- anything. Probably the same sorts of things that happened to you last night -- and I don't remember you feeling any discomfort or displeasure then. 'Anything' means whatever I say it means. You will not be physically harmed in any way, if that's what you're getting at."
