I want You Deeper

“This is your office building?” Heath turned to look at Vanessa as they walked toward the

front door. She immediately realized her error. It wasn’t his building. He was Mac Sutterfield-a name the producers of the show had come up with.

Speaking of producers, Heath and Vanessa were currently being followed by the same two camera people and the boom mic holder who had been at Heath’s house when she’d arrived for her audition. It was a bit absurd, pretending he was an average working-class guy when a production crew was trailing after him.

“This is Hardcastle Enterprises.” Heath reached for the door and opened it for her. “Home of Hardcastle Exhibitions, Hardcastle Software, and Hardcastle Technologies.”This content belongs to Nô/velDra/ma.Org .

“This Hardcastle person is pretty full of himself,” Vanessa commented as she led the way to the elevator.

Somehow, Camera Guy Number Two managed to rush past Vanessa, flip around, and get a front shot of the two of them as they walked to the elevator. Vanessa did her best to act natural with a camera pointed at her face. She figured that part would get easier over time.

Heath stepped up to press the up arrow to call the elevator. “What do you mean?”

Vanessa tried to remember what they’d been discussing before she’d been distracted by the camera. Oh, the building, which had “Hardcastle Enterprises” plastered in large letters at the top, as well as on a sign at the entrance.

“Just that everything’s named after this guy.” Vanessa shrugged. “Seems a bit…narcissistic to me.”

Yeah, it was pretty daring of her. Call her a rebel. But the guy had a lazy river around his house. He had a building with his name plastered on it. He drove an Aston Martin. It was just all so… Flashy.

“It’s customary for founders to name their companies after themselves.

Ever heard of TravTech? That’s short for Justin Travers. Ferrari, Procter and

Gamble, Wal-Mart…”

“Nike, Facebook, Google… None of those are named after their founders, are they?”

Boom. Got him. She figured he’d have a long list of buddies who named their businesses after themselves, so she headed him off at the pass.

“My roommate’s dating the guy who founded Data Industries,” she said.

“His name isn’t Data.”

“Jeremy Owens. Know him.”

Vanessa cleared her throat and deliberately looked behind him, where a small group of people was starting to gather. Heath obviously hadn’t noticed they had company.

“Anyway…” Vanessa began.

He didn’t seem to have anything to say after that. In fact, he seemed a little flustered. Vanessa smiled to herself as she stared at the indicator above the elevator doors. The one on the right would arrive any second now- Ding.

She already knew to let one of the camera guys hop in first. They loved to capture front shots of the two of them, she was noticing. The good news was, the elevator could only hold a couple more people, thanks to the crew and equipment, so their ride to the fifth floor was mostly stranger-free.

Nobody talked. Vanessa searched her mind for some sort of chitchat that would fit what two people about to go to a meeting about an upcoming trade show they’d be working would say. Nothing came to mind. So, instead, she thought about the fact that she liked Mac much, much, much more than she liked Heath.

On the third floor, both strangers stepped out, leaving Heath and

Vanessa alone with their crew. It took her a second to realize she could speak freely now. This was going to be confusing.

“Let me do most of the talking,” he said, beating her to the punch.

What? He couldn’t be serious. He surely didn’t want her to just sit there during a meeting and say nothing. If so, he didn’t know her very well.

She opened her mouth to respond, with no idea what she was about to say. Fortunately, she didn’t have to worry about it. The doors opened, and everyone around her kicked into high gear, speeding off the elevator and toward the reception desk as if they were racing.

The cameras, oddly, didn’t wait for her this time. They were both specifically trained on Heath.

So that was how it was going to be. She was only part of the narrative when it told Heath’s story. She should have known as much. The show was focusing on his journey, and she’d been hired to help out. Still, if she wanted to use this gig to get more onscreen work, she knew she had to find a way to steal the show.

Mission: on.

The man at the reception desk looked bored when Heath introduced himself as Mac Sutterfield. The name meant nothing to him, obviously. But he picked up the phone, spoke to someone for about two seconds, then pointed toward a hallway behind them. It was one of two hallways on either side of the elevator they’d just exited.

Heath didn’t even issue a command. He just turned and started walking, and the crew followed like they were attached to him by some sort of magnetic field. Vanessa flashed the guy a grateful look since nobody had bothered to thank him, but he just rolled his eyes and went back to work.

Nice job, dude. Your founder literally just saw how you treat people who arrive.

Vanessa smiled to herself as she rushed to catch up with her group. That was the first of many ways this would be interesting. The question was, would he be recognized by anyone?

For the first time since getting out of the car, Vanessa remembered how she looked. It wasn’t like she wasn’t accustomed to wearing dresses and skirts. She preferred jeans and a T-shirt, but dressing up sometimes fit the role she wanted. So, this was yet another role, only it involved wearing a dress that made her feel a bit like a mummy, bandaged from neck to knee in solid white. Only her arms were fully revealed and there was a cutout in the back that showed a small section of skin. It was cute and not too revealing, but it wasn’t something she would normally wear to a business meeting.

But as Vanessa Gilbert, promotional model, it totally fit.

Vanessa paused for a second before following the crew into the room at the end of the hallway marked “Authorized Personnel Only.” Promotional models in Silicon Valley were expected to bring their A-Game when they worked trade shows. She’d already known that much, but she was even surer of it due to her research over the past few days. Her looks would draw people over to a booth to learn more. Then she’d wow them with her presentation skills.

It was a tall order, but she was up to it. And when she was finished, anyone watching the TV show would see her as more than capable of tackling any task. She’d then have clips for her demo reel that would help her get bigger and bigger roles until she finally achieved her dream of being seen.

Yes, it had nothing to do with money or even fame. What mattered to her-what had always mattered to her-was being seen. She’d spent her entire childhood being invisible…and dreaming of the day everyone would know her name. Then her parents wouldn’t be able to ignore her.

Putting on her best “I know what I’m doing” face, Vanessa stepped into the office and immediately came to a full stop.

There was no place for her around the table. Literally. Somehow, in the few extra seconds it had taken her to step through that door, Heath had settled in at a small table in the corner, which also included five other dudes. Six chairs, six dudes, and no room left for her.

And nobody seemed to even realize she was there.

Yes, it was annoying. But it wasn’t surprising. Not in Silicon Valley, where women were invited to the table merely to keep that table from looking like it did right now. Vanessa thought about the women she’d seen in TV shows and movies about the tech industry and realized she hadn’t really watched all that many. Most of the women in tech were either ignored, as she was right now, or they were at the head of the table.

This was a defining moment.

She knew it as sure as she knew that nobody in this room even remembered she was there. Vanessa took a deep breath, reminded herself of all the young women who would watch this and know how to handle this situation moving forward, and left the room.

“I need a chair,” she told the guy at the front desk.

Suddenly, he looked alert. “I’m sorry?”

“A chair. I need one. They’ve left me without anywhere to sit in there, and I need a chair. Where do I get a chair?”

She said all this in a calm, measured tone, but if it took escalating her voice, she’d do it. Luckily, she didn’t have to. The guy nodded, picked up the phone, spoke so quietly into it that she couldn’t hear, and set it back down again. Then he returned his attention to his computer, pretending she wasn’t standing a few feet away. Ignoring her, just as the other men had.

Just seconds later, a door opened behind him and out walked a woman, carrying a chair. Vanessa wanted to ask that woman what her role was here and if she felt just as left out as Vanessa did. But there were no cameras here. The cameras were in the room with the meeting that could end if she stood out here too long.

“Thank you,” Vanessa told the woman, giving her a big smile before turning and retracing her steps from before.

The long walk down the hall gave Vanessa extra time to determine whether she could gracefully carry this chair into the room. It wouldn’t be quite the same if she was struggling the entire way. She stopped to rest when she arrived in front of the door. That gave her the burst of energy she needed to confidently stride across the room, stand next to Heath until he moved over, then set her chair down and confidently plop down on it.

Both cameras shifted until they were pointed at her. Vanessa made eye contact with each of the five people now staring at her and nodded.

“I’m Vanessa Gilbert,” she announced. “I’m here to learn more about your company.”

Heath shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “I was just telling them about you. Where did you go?”

Seriously? Where did she go? He was seriously asking that?

“I left to retrieve a chair.” She sat up straighter, looking around again. “Gentlemen, it’s my goal to absorb as much information as I can to be able to appropriately sell your products for you. Let’s make this the best quarter ever.”

Oh. Oops. She remembered too late that Heath had asked her to let him do all the talking. Oh, well.

“Ms. Gilbert, is it?” one of the guys asked.

“Yes.”

“We’re excited to have you on board. We were just telling Mac here that we’re sending both of you to Las Vegas for a couple of days, starting tomorrow. I know he has this camera crew following him for a documentary on tech companies, and Mr. Hardcastle hired you to help out with our trade shows-”

“You aren’t supposed to mention the cameras,” Vanessa said.

Heath looked over at her. There was some sort of warning in that look, but she ignored it. The goal was to make this as realistic as possible, right?

Vanessa continued as if the look hadn’t even happened. “It’s a production thing. No big deal. They edit it out if you slip up, but we were told not to acknowledge the cameras or the fact that we’re on a TV show.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of the camera guys lean to the right. He was looking at her.

They hadn’t discussed this. Any of this. It was all stuff she’d learned while working her butt off in Hollywood, trying to get just one role on a reality show. Rule Number One of reality show production: Pretend the cameras weren’t even there.

The man cleared his throat and continued. “No problem. You’ll both be going to Vegas. Leaving this afternoon. We couldn’t get you on a plane on this short notice, so Mac will be driving both of you. On the way, he can fill you in on what he knows about our company. Questions?”

Vanessa realized she was staring and quickly pulled her thoughts together. “I have a lot to learn. I was hoping to maybe sit down with one of your top employees and go through some things.”

“No time for that,” the man said. “Mac seems pretty knowledgeable. I think he can fill you in.”

“I can.”

That came from Mac-er, Heath-who was exuding some weird sort of alpha-male energy. It was as if, just by mentioning she needed to sit down with someone, she was saying he couldn’t tell her about his own company.

Ridiculous. Had the guy forgotten why they were here in the first place? The whole point was to figure out what was going on behind the scenes. He was supposed to be going undercover in his own business. Sitting in a car for eight hours, making small talk with cameras pointed at them, wouldn’t make for good footage of his company.

Oh, well. They’d just have to figure out a way to get that footage when they returned.