thousand and ten thousand,” Tess said, counting out the final seconds of the position. “Okay, last chance to check out Andy’s balls. Now, lower your legs slowly, and don’t forget to breathe.”
They all copped a look, including Brad Hayes and Lee Sanchez, the other two males in the group. Brad was a thirty-year-old communications major from Harvard, and Lee was the team’s prematurely balding marketing whiz. Andy rose to a sitting position, as red as a stop sign, but seemingly pleased by all the attention to his male anatomy.
Tess had held this morning’s brainstorming session in the company gym so she and her team could take Qigong breaks. She’d expected skepticism toward the martial arts technique, especially from some of the agency veterans, but at least everyone had agreed to give it a try.
“Tell me again why we’re doing this?” Brad Hayes asked. “I tend not to do things I can’t pronounce.”
Carlotta snickered. “Do you even need to ask, Brad? Tess comes from la-la land.”
Tess took the jab in stride. In the week she’d been here, she’d picked up on some animosity from Carlotta, who’d been at Pratt-Summers longer than anyone else on the team. Tess could think of two reasons. Carlotta didn’t believe that Tess had the creative chops to handle the job, which was understandable. Tess had yet to prove herself. Or Carlotta felt the job should have been offered to her, which was a bigger problem, but Tess was optimistic that she could handle it with plenty of diplomacy, and maybe some plum assignments.
“It’s pronounced chee gung,” Tess said, answering Brad. “Qi means life force, and gong means accomplish through steady practice. It works wonders for me. Keeps the blood flowing and the ideas coming.”
Tess dragged her mat into the circle on the other side of Andy Phipps, not wanting to come between him and Jan Butler. It was time to get back to work. She’d been brought in as their boss, so it wasn’t surprising they were a little wary of her, but she hoped to quickly melt any resistance. The team was on a tight deadline with the Faustini campaign. The starting gun had gone off even before Tess arrived, but she did not intend to lose this race.
At least she’d had some experience with bonding and leading. She was more concerned about the other task Erica Summers had given her. Pratt-Summers had built a reputation for brilliant innovation. They’d won nearly every industry award for their avant-garde designs, but they were also becoming known for their arrogance and lack of communication with clients—and it was costing them business. Tess had been brought in to do what spin doctors were supposed to do—create a new image for the agency’s clients, but she’d also been tasked with creating a new image for Pratt-Summers itself.
Now, there was a challenge.
And worse, Erica had asked her to keep quiet about it. She didn’t want to ruffle feathers. Creative types were sensitive about being handled, she’d cautioned, as though Tess weren’t a creative type herself. It was Tess’s ability to successfully straddle the two disciplines—account management and creative—that made her the perfect covert agent for change within the creative division.
“Let’s talk about the Faustini account and don’t be shy.” Tess coaxed the team with her hands, like a traffic cop beckoning cars to advance. Too bad she didn’t have a whistle. “Any new ideas since our last session on Faustini? Somebody toss something out. Anybody. I don’t care how wild it is. How do we make Faustini’s new leather boots a must-have item?”
Andy had arranged himself cross-legged on his mat, continuing to tempt the ladies. “We don’t,” he said. “We start with the briefcases, their signature product. First, make the cases sexy, then introduce the boots.”
“Good luck making a briefcase sexy.” Carlotta shook back her claret-red waves and played with the zipper pull of her Lycra warm-up suit, as if to say now this is sexy.
Tess would have guessed Carlotta to be in her late thirties, but thanks to the wonders of cosmetic surgery, she was, and probably always would be, ageless. It was tempting to think she’d been hired to boost male morale, and maybe their testosterone. But, to date, Carlotta had racked up more awards for her ads than any other Pratt-Summers creative. She was kick-butt in more ways than one.
Andy sprang up and went to get a sleek black leather case he’d left under the basketball backboard. Tess recognized it as a Faustini. She watched with interest as Andy dropped to his knees on his mat, took a pair of sheer red panties from the case and glanced up, a wicked gleam in his eye.
“A man can’t spend every weekend working,” he said, letting a beat pass. “Faustini. Work hard, play hard.”
He’d given Tess an idea. She reached over and touched the lid of the case seductively, swirling her fingertips over the silky leather. “It’s so soft,” she cooed in a kittenish Marilyn Monroe voice, “and you’re so successful.”
Andy arched an eyebrow: “You’re into leather, too?”
“Not leather,” she scolded. “Faustini.”
Tess and Andy grinned, high-fiveing each other. “Not a bad thirty-second shot,” she said.
“Or!” Carlotta squealed. “Picture me as a dominatrix, a bullwhip in my hand. “You’re not carrying a Faustini?” She cracks the whip. “Take that!”
The enthusiasm was contagious. Soon, they were talking over each other, but the suggestions got more and more outrageous. Tess hated to be a killjoy, but she’d already met with Alberto Faustini, the company’s rather stodgy founder, and he didn’t want anything far-out. He’d told Tess to come up with something provocative, but nothing X-rated, and that was despite strong opposition from his new partner, his twenty-two-year-old wild-child daughter, Gina, who favored vampires, sexual bondage and other gothic images. Fortunately, Gina Faustini didn’t sign the checks.
“Guys,” Tess said, “we want to seduce customers not shock them.”
“Why not shock them? Before you can seduce them you have to get their attention.”
Tess wasn’t sure who’d spoken until she noticed her team members looking over her shoulder. She whipped around, saw the source of the disembodied voice, and was glad not to be hooked up to a lie detector. Her sweaty palms would have shorted the machine out.
How long had he been standing there?
She’d never met Danny Gabriel, but even if she hadn’t seen his likeness plastered all over the agency walls in photographs with business giants and celebrity clients, she would have recognized his personal trademarks—the bare feet, the worn blue jeans and the flowing hair he’d gathered into a loose ebony braid.
Here before her was the agency’s image problem in the flesh. Not his clothes, even Gabriel donned a suit on client days. His attitude. He was Tess’s codirector—and the infamous advertising savant she’d been brought in to teach some manners. The Faustini account had been his before it was given to Tess, and rumor had it that he’d been replaced because he sided with Faustini’s daughter.
What was he doing here now? He’d been in Tokyo all week, drumming up international business, which was his new focus, according to Erica. Tess was supposed to have been formally introduced to him tonight at a dinner with Erica and the board members. She was nervous enough about that. If Carlotta was the agency’s diva, then Danny Gabriel was its rock star.
Tess sat
