Chapter 10: Conner

My best friend and boss, Reed Helstrom, breezed into my office like he owned the place, which, as a senior partner at the investment banking firm of Price Bean & Whitlock, technically he did. A small piece anyway.

I was sitting behind my oversized glass desk with my shoes off and feet up on the credenza, staring out the twenty-seventh floor window at the New York skyline across the way.

There wasn’t a cloud in the bright blue sky. It was another beautiful spring day in New York City. Too bad I couldn’t get outside to enjoy it. It was only four o’clock on the east coast, and I had conference calls with investors booked until at least half past seven, then a client dinner at eight.

By the time I was set free of my obligations the daylight would be a distant memory.

That was the downside of being me: I made millions of dollars every year, but had very little time to spend them; which was probably a good thing.

I was on a conference call on speakerphone, but had lost interest in anything they had to say nearly an hour ago. It was a venture capitalist firm in Silicon Valley, trying to convince Reed and I that PB&W should soak a few hundred million bucks into their latest and greatest find, some dating app for senior citizens called Gray Date.

Reed had been on the same call from his office. Obviously, he had gotten as bored as I had and decided to come into my office to hang out for the rest of the call. Or he had run out of liquor in his office and was looking for something to drink. It turned out to be a little of both.

He went immediately to the bar in one corner of my office and poured himself a tall scotch. He held up the crystal decanter to ask if I wanted one. I gave him a nod and held up two fingers.

He poured us both two shots of scotch and came over with a glass in each hand. He set my drink on the desk in front of me, made sure the mute button was pressed on the speaker phone, and plopped in the leather wingback chair on the other side of my desk.

“Remind me again why we’re even listening to this pitch,” he said, eyes rolling, head shaking. Reed was a good-looking guy in his early fifties, with short salt and pepper hair, a Kennedy jawline, bright blue eyes, perpetual tan. The women in the office loved him and he loved a few of them right back. So far without his wife, Gloria, finding out.

He took a sip of his drink and sighed. “Gray Date? Really? Do old people date?”

“The more important question is, do old people even know what an app is?” I asked, picking up my drink to take a sip. The scotch burned going down my throat. It made me all warm and tingly inside. “I know my folks wouldn’t have a clue.”

“No, the most important question is why should we give a shit about old people fucking?” he asked seriously. “Why should we give a shit about old people at all? Most old people are fucking broke and have one foot in the grave. If anything, we should invest in nursing homes or hospice care facilities, not dating apps.”

“You’re a cold son of a bitch, Reed Helstrom” I said with a smile. “You’ll be old someday. You’ll wish you had an app to help you get laid.”

“My money is the only app I need to get pussy,” he said. “Fuck old people. And fuck these guys if they think we’re going to invest one red cent in their hair-brained idea.”

“So, why are we wasting our time listening to their pitch?” I asked, a little confused. Reed was normally not a guy to waste a second of his time, which he claimed was more precious than money because he could get more money, but only had a finite amount of time. I always called bullshit on that one. Nothing was more important to Reed than cold, hard cash.

“We are listening to this pitch because that’s the old man’s great nephew speaking,” he said. He lifted his glass to me. “Try to pay attention because there will be a test afterward.”

The old man was Henry Wilson Price, the eighty-five-year old founder and senior partner of Price Bean & Whitlock, the Wall Street investment firm that paid Reed and I tens of millions of dollars every year to find and close deals that made the senior partners hundreds of millions of dollars. Gray Date was not going to be one of those deals, but the old man told us to listen, so that’s what we were going to do.

“So, guys, what do you think?” Price’s great nephew asked. I looked at Reed and held out my hand.

“You’re the senior partner,” I said. “You jack him off.”

Reed licked the scotch from his lips and tapped the mute button. “Very interesting concept guys. Why don’t you send over your financial and market test data and we’ll get with the powers that be here to talk it over next week.”

“Uh, okay, we can do that,” the great nephew said. I could tell by the tone of his voice that he expected a warmer reception than he was getting. “I was under the impression that we were already a go and this call was just a formality.”

Reed put his fist to his mouth and worked it back and forth, mimicking a blow job. He said, “You’re a go to send the financials and market data. We’d be happy to take a look at that and get back to you in a few weeks.”

We heard muffled voices on the other end of the line, then another voice came on the line. This one older and deeper, with an air of impatient condescension. “This is Oscar Patterson. I’m the senior partner here. Who are we speaking to again?”

“Senior partner Reed Helstrom,” Reed said with a sigh that was purposefully loud enough for the others to hear. “And Senior Vice President of Acquisitions Conner McGee.”

“Well, Helstrom, I was under the impression that this was a done deal,” Patterson said. “At least that’s what I was told before sitting through this long call.”

Reed gave me an evil smile. He ate cocksuckers like this for breakfast. He leaned his elbows on the desk and pulled the speaker phone closer. “Well, Patterson, old boy, there’s no such thing as a done deal when it comes to investing a hundred million dollars in unproven technology.”

“Unproven technology?” It was the great nephew’s voice again. “Dating apps generate hundreds of millions of dollars a year.”

“And there are a hundred million dating apps,” Reed said, just being a dick because it made him happy to do so.

“Yes, but there has never been an app for seniors,” the great nephew said. “We’d be breaking new ground with Gray Date. The upside is huge. People are living longer, having sex longer. This is an idea whose time has come.”

Reed shook his head. “Did your marketing people write that speech for you?”

“What? Well… no… but…”

“Look, guys, here’s my take on the idea,” Reed said seriously. “When it comes to old people, the only ground breaking happens at the graveyard.” He shot me a grin. He really was a heartless son of a bitch. I loved it. “I mean, come on, a dating app for old people? Really? Are there any old people in the room there? Patterson, how old are you?”

“I’m fifty-seven…”

“So not that old.”

“Well, no…”

“Okay, do any of you guys know any old people other than your parents?” Reed asked. “I assume you don’t want to think about your parents getting laid, so let’s not include them.”

“Well, I’m sure Uncle Henry would use this app,” the nephew said.

“Your Uncle Henry doesn’t even own a cell phone,” Reed said. “You’re creating technology for the one demographic who hates technology.”

“Well, I’m not sure that’s exactly true…”

“Have you guys done a focus group?” I asked, getting in on the fun.

“A focus group? I’m not sure I understand what use a focus group would do in this case.”

“Because you don’t think old folks can focus?” Reed shot back. He sighed again, louder this time, and shook his head. “You guys are digging your own graves on this one.”

Patterson spoke up. “I assumed we had done focus groups.” A moment of silence. “Have we not done focus groups?”

I smiled at Reed. The silence on the other end of the line was the sound of a job opening. Old man Price’s great nephew’s butt had to be puckering. I just hoped to God this didn’t backfire and the incompetent fuck end up back in my lap for mentoring.

“Let’s just cut to the chase guys,” Reed said. “You do not have a prayer in hell of getting funded by us or anyone until you have documentation that shows you got a few dozen senior men and women into a room to see if they would even be interested in using an app. More to the point, you need to find out if they even can learn to use one.”

“I agree,” Patterson said. “Gentleman, apparently we have wasted an hour of your time.”

“Actually, an hour and twelve minutes,” Reed said. “I’ll give your best to Mr. Price. Call us back when you have data to back up your assumptions.”

He clicked the button to end the call before they could respond. He walked to the bar and came back with the decanter of scotch and refilled both our glasses.

“That went well,” I said with a grin as I lifted my glass and tapped it to his. “The old man might not be happy, but we just saved the firm a few hundred million.”

“The old man won’t be a problem,” Reed said. “He knew his nephew was full of shit from the start. He also knew you and I wouldn’t have a problem calling bullshit on these guys.”

“We should have lined up shots,” I said, remembering the game I’d played with Mollie on New Year’s Eve.”

Reed frowned at me. “What?”

“Nothing. I’m just glad the old man isn’t going to have a problem with us turning them down,” I said. I glanced at my watch. I had another conference call already waiting for me on the line.

“Speaking of problems, we have a potential shit storm on our hands,” Reed said, smacking his lips. “The Benson acquisition seems to be running off the rails.”

I gave him a frown. “Benson? I thought that was a done deal. What’s the problem?”

“The problem is Allen Benson has called in an outside law firm to review our offer,” Reed said, referring to the CEO of Benson Digital, a small manufacturer of computer parts that PB&W was looking to acquire. We had no interest in the manufacturing end of the business, just the patents the company held on a new computer chip it had developed. Benson had no idea, but the plan was to buy the company, fire everyone, shut down the manufacturing plant, and sell off the patents to the highest bidder. PB&W stood to make a hundred million dollars or more. That was if the deal could be done before Benson realized what we had in mind.

“An outside law firm? I don’t understand. Didn’t Benson’s in-house counsel approve the deal?”

Reed sipped and nodded. “He did, but apparently Benson no longer trusts his own in-house counsel. Hence, the outside firm review.”

I laced my fingers together and rested my chin on my fist. “Do you think Benson found out that his lawyer is on our payroll?”

“Maybe,” Reed said with a shrug. “Or maybe he’s gotten wind of our plans somehow.”

“How could that be?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at him. “The only people who know what we intend to do are you, me, and my team, all sworn to secrecy with signed confidentiality contracts.”

“Maybe somebody on your team has loose lips,” he said, shrugging with his eyes. “Money makes people talk.”

“Bullshit,” I said, angry that he would even made such an accusation. My team was hand-picked by me, everyone fully vetted and trustworthy. “Nobody on my team would talk. I’d crucify them on the stock exchange steps and they know it.”

“You sure about that?” Reed asked, his dark eyebrows arching over his blue eyes. “I know that you and I are solid, but these young players we have now, I’m not sure how much a nondisclosure agreement means.”

“It means that we can sue them into the fucking ground if they breathe a word,” I said angrily. I didn’t want to believe that anyone on my team would have let anything slip. Still, I made a note on my iPad to have a meeting to read the riot act to them.

“So, you and I have a meeting tonight with Benson and the lawyer he’s hired to look over the deal.”

“I already have dinner plans with a client,” I said.

“Would that client be a particular socialite with tits that rival the size of her bank account?” He gave me a smile because he knew he was right. “Let me guess, she wants your advice on which diamond nipple rings to buy?”

“Fuck you,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“Fuck me?” He grinned. “I wish she would, buddy boy. I wish she would.”

He was talking about Cassandra Leone, my on-again, off-again girlfriend for the last few years. Her father was a billionaire industrialist and she spent his money like it was going out of style.

She was blonde, beautiful, and busty, and could suck the chrome off a trailer hitch. Sex with Cass was like going three rounds with Hulk Hogan. She was the wildest fuck I’d ever had. Energetic. Passionate. Creative. Nothing held back. Not afraid to try anything.

I always came away battered and bruised, but grinning like a fool and wanting more. Years ago, I thought she was the girl I would someday marry. Now, we were more fuck buddies than a couple, mainly because Cass did not have the ability or desire to be faithful to any one man. She loved me, she said, but she loved a lot of other guys, as well.

So, now we got together every week or two and fucked each other’s brains out, no strings attached. We were going to have dinner tonight and screw like rabbits afterward. I supposed I’d just have to put her off a few hours to help Reed put out this Benson fire. Hopefully, she’d wait for me to come put out hers.

“Just tell her to keep her thong on until you get there. This is more important.” Reed finished his drink and set the glass on my desk. He glanced at his watch. “We’re meeting them at the Roxie at eight.”

“Shit,” I said, blowing out a long breath. “Any idea who this lawyer is that Benson is bringing?”

Reed got to his feet and stood adjusting his diamond cufflinks. “Supposedly some hotshot contracts guy from Yates Hamilton & Booz.”

“Fuck, I hate Yates Hamilton & Booz.”

“I do, too,” Reed said as he walked toward the door. “The bastards are too honest for their own good. See you at eight.”