Total pages in book: 26
Estimated words: 23956 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 120(@200wpm)___ 96(@250wpm)___ 80(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 23956 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 120(@200wpm)___ 96(@250wpm)___ 80(@300wpm)
Then, a woman sashays into my office, and to my astonishment, it’s Rose. I jump up a little in my seat, remembering the things I was just thinking about her. Trying to play it cool, I smile in a professional manner, standing to shake her hand. That tiny palm is soft and feminine in my big paw, and she looks at me hesitantly with warm brown eyes.
“Hey, Mr. Pratt. I hope my dropping by unannounced like this is okay,” she murmurs.
“It’s no problem. Have a seat, Rose.” She gracefully slips into one of the armchairs on the other side of my desk.
“Did Stacey offer you a beverage? There’s coffee, water, or tea if you’d like,” I say in a professional tone. Thank god it’s only slightly hoarse. What are the odds she would drop by right when I was thinking of her? The pretty brunette smiles, and my heart races.
“Oh, thank you. I had a coffee this morning already,” she says.
“Okay, great. So how are you, Rose? This is certainly unexpected, although delightful. Is everything alright?” I ask. Hopefully, everything’s fine. Oh shit, is one of my grandchildren sick, and she’s here to deliver the bad news? Rose seems to read my mind and holds up her hands.
“No, no. Everything is wonderful!” she smiles. Then, she nervously bites her lip and scooches to the end of her seat. I notice that she has on a professional skirt suit set, although the skirt is distractingly short. In fact, I have a hard time tearing my eyes from the length of creamy thigh revealed as she shifts uncomfortably in the chair. But then, Rose takes a deep breath and looks me in the eye.
“I have a business proposition for you, Mr. Pratt,” she says in a clear, direct voice. What? I steeple my hands, intrigued.
“Really?”
She nods.
“Yes, I know … well, I have an idea and I was hoping to bounce it off you,” she says.
I smile.
“Sure honey. I’m always interested in what you have to offer. Let’s hear it.”
And with that, Rose presents a delightful deal that changes the course of my life forever.
4
Rose
I seriously cannot believe I am doing this. I’m sitting in Damon Pratt’s office about to ask him to invest in an escort agency I want to launch to go against City Girls. I’ve shown up unannounced and am feeling a bit unprepared. Okay, if we’re being honest, ‘a bit’ is a radical understatement. I didn’t prepare anything.
Instead, I woke up this morning with the intention of getting ready for this moment. In my mind, this was going to be the culmination of all my dreams and desires. But two phenomena took over: procrastination and overexcitement.
Procrastination saw me sitting at the table in front of a blank notebook, alternating between biting the tip of the pen and tapping it against the pad of paper. I sat for about forty-five minutes trying to figure out where to start. I have all of these great ideas, and I understand how they would work in real life. But how do you put them on paper? Does every detail need to be listed or just the bullet points? The more unknowns that crossed my mind, the further I got from actually writing anything down.
Next came overexcitement. Sure, a standard business plan includes tons of detailed documents. But Saucy Nights is not a standard business! I don’t need fancy paperwork, I need capital. I need to get going. And Damon of all people would understand this! He knows me and has seen how I work. I’m great on the go, just not so much when it comes to steady, methodical planning.
I slammed the notebook closed. Yes, there are plenty of things to be written down, but why does everything always have to be memorialized? I ignored the fact that I didn’t know the first thing about organizing, documenting, legalizing, and of course, implementing and executing my idea, and instead, decided to just go for it.
Then, I jumped the gun and got dressed with the intention to make my dream a reality. It didn’t take much to work up the nerve to come to Prime Architects. I convinced myself again on the walk over that I would blow Damon away with my idea, and he’d be so excited that he’d believe my excuses.
‘I haven’t written a business plan because I already have it all figured out up here, in my mind. I’ve been tweaking and correcting City Girls’ tactics for years now. All I need to do is apply what I’ve learned over the years to my new business. I know I can make it happen!’
But now that I’m actually here, in person in his office, a wave of doubt washes over me. I realize how silly it all seems, but suddenly, my mental business plan seems very small and childish in this huge executive suite with the sun beaming through large floor-to-ceiling windows.