Something about Elle Ch. 03

Elle wondered about giving herself to him on the sofa. Hannah was in deep sleep but even if she came out and saw them entwined she'd probably smile and retreat back into her bedroom.

When she calmed Donovan yawned and said he better go.

They shared a proper kiss and he left, Elle thinking he looked rather pleased with himself. That was probably because he'd learned that Elle could become flaky and when emotionally upset that even she cried.

As the heaving of her distress diminished, Elle drifted off to sleep.

Hours later she awoke, made coffee and checked her phone. Two calls from Dunlop; she deleted them without listening to them. Why listen when they would only be demands to send back everything he's given her and for her to stop acting like a drama queen.

Elle went to bed a little happier, knowing she could dream about her Donovan without guilt. She hoped he'd be true to her.

First thing next morning Elle emailed her very new ex-fiancé Dunlop:

Please send any of my gifts or my other property in your possession to the refuse dump. Don't give anything of mine to her. Elle.

It sent off the instruction severing the close link between them forever, she hoped. She felt free, wonderfully free and went on to work. Hannah and Donovan have gone north for the day to visit Hannah's ailing sister Ruby.

Elle entered her office and her phone went - the voice sounded rude as it said good morning and Elle knew who it was before Milly identified herself and asked Elle to pop up to see her on the executive floor.

"Mrs Hepburn, how lovely to meet you at last."

The thickset but nonetheless attractive looking woman raised an eyebrow and held it, ensuring it was noticed, before saying, "Call me Milly. Everyone does, right down to the janitor."

Elle smiled, wondering where on the ladder from janitor to co-owners she was placed in the business in Milly's mind. Donovan had avoided placing her name on the establishment list of personnel, saying she in limbo until her position was confirmed as being permanent. Her impression was Donovan positioned her immediately under him. That thought turned erotic and made her color.

"Ah, I can see why Donny-boy was head-over-heels in appointing you to this temporary position - how does it go?"

"Visionary."

"And that's very appropriate; beautiful in theory, transparent in substance."

Elle thought she'd better call a halt to this right now; if Milly though she could abuse Elle like this, she'd never stop.

"Have you finished with your sniping; if not I have the choice of whacking into you or returning to my office."

Milly took a step backwards, and looked horrified.

"How dare you speak to me like that!"

"Likewise."

Milly's aged-redden eyes locked into the cool clear and unwavering eyes of the much younger woman, and Elle astutely looked away first, giving Milly moral victory.

"People will be arriving soon; come into my office and close the door."

Elle followed but didn't close the door.

"Sit there," snapped Milly, pointing to a chair and going back to close the door.

She returned to the desk, raising an eyebrow when noticing Elle learning against the bookshelf. A smile lurked around Milly's lips as she said, "Damn I'm sorry; this is an impasse. Let's just get on disliking each other and tell me about yourself."

"I still haven't made up my mind about you Milly, but at least you have the guts to back down when you know it's the sensible thing to do. In my book that is to be admired."

"Flattery won't justify you being on the payroll, honey."

"I never thought it would. I have been warned you opposed my appointment and it wasn't stated but I assumed that while Roger Grossi would feel threatened and would dislike me intently that you would have an even greater reason to dislike me because I was appointed despite your objections."

"That's a very accurate assessment."

"Why don't you give me a chance Milly. Ask Roger bluntly what his impressions of me are and describe my contribution so far."

"I called him last night," Milly said.

His reservations remain but despite that Roger gave you an endorsement which I can only describe as being a couple of notches below 'raving'.

"Roger?"

"Yes I know my personnel," Milly said dryly.

Elle said, "I think I'd better sit down."

Instead of going behind her desk, Milly said beside Elle on the sofa.

"Elle woman to woman let's continue verbally scrapping but no eye scratching, right?"

"Very well."

"After Donovan screwed you in New Zealand until your eyes popped why didn't you let him go when it was time for him to come back here; my understanding is you were engaged to be married?"

"It's really quite uncomplicated, Milly. I was coming to the end of my employment and Donovan offered me a dream job in a city I've always dreamed of visiting. It may interest you to know apart from a gentle kiss goodnight after dining late, he never touched me and I had no such interest in him."

"What!"

"It's true, Milly. I saw he was interested but he backed off when I pointed out I was newly engaged."

Milly looked puzzled. "I thought this was all about sex?"

"That's news to me."

"Roger concedes you do appear to have remarkably developed analytical powers..."

Smiling at interrupting, Elle had said "Appears?"

Milly frowned and said, "Actually I don't recall him using the word. But I'm left wondering how can this be so? Roger and I and Hannah and Donovan are very experienced in entrepreneurial business and particularly in problem solving requiring knowledge and flair to force the breakthroughs. You come from a tiny country without an extensive practical business pedigree - strong academically, light in practice."

Elle stroked the back of her neck, looking at the painting of the wall of an oasis in a tropical setting, thinking how appropriate to contrast with this concrete jungle of downtown LA.

"Milly it's necessary to draw your mind around what I claim to do and not dwell on how I do it, because even I can't really explain the latter. Most people attempting problem solving tend to attack the task in mind-sized pieces - bits that either attract their focus or they prioritize for some other reason - perhaps that's where they are asked to start. That involves their mind in a comfortable, progressive basis - in other words, solve one piece of the problem, move on to the next, although not necessarily in sequential order."

"Yes I understand that; it's so logical."

"Is it?"

"Oh here we go; Roger said you would baffle me."

"Not so Milly. When you look at an orange, do you look at the whole orange?"

"Yes, of course. But if I peel it I then look at the segments. There's nothing difficult about...oh. Hold on, what you are saying is that it is necessary to take in and work at analyzing the whole problem before going any further."

"Exactly."

"That you specialize in bursting through the barriers created by comfort-seeking mind-sets to achieve an outlook according to the philosophy of holism: the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts."

"Brilliantly understood and expressed Milly."

"Well we'd better have coffee. You'll know of course I'll remain totally unconvinced that your engagement in our company's business has any merit at all. It is up to Donovan to convince me otherwise you are out of here after your trial period of six months is up."

"That's understood Milly. You appear to have a sharp mind; if Donovan is unable to convince you of my merit when the time arrives I'll know I have failed in my mission, which was to be of considerably usefulness to this company. I wouldn't require to be asked to leave - I would depart as soon as I heard that edict, ringing in my ears like the gloomy peels of funeral bells."

"Oh what a bright little speech. You are a very interesting young woman; perhaps you will grow on me."

"Milly it really doesn't matter a damn to me what you think of me personally so let your animosity toward me to continue. My task is to show that my contribution counts, I'm earning the money I'm being paid, earning the right to occupy my patch of office real estate and ultimately I hope to blow you away with a project solution which means everything to you. Did you say coffee?"

At the executive meeting on the next Monday, Elle noticed a distinct change in the style and tone of the meeting - the same people but with the addition of Milly. There was more formality and less flow, with Milly seeking clarifications that stalled the interflow of exchanges, boring those not immediately involved (which was most of the assembly) and she kept snapping "One speaker at the time", thus inhibiting spontaneity. She'll have to go, thought Elle - well, in her mind that was the solution as old dogs can't be taught new tricks; she should be retired anyway.

At the end of general business Donovan darkened the room and switched on the projector.

"Springdale Mall," said Carol, as soon as she saw the mall entrance and before the camera tilted upwards to film the name of the mall.

"Have you won this as a rejuvenation project," Randy joked.

"Depends how good a pitch you people can present to me. You have until 8:30 tomorrow morning. Duncan Barnes who, with wife Jemma and her mega-wealthy family, old 54 percent of the stock between them, was talking to Freda Klein, whose son's jewelry business has recently opened with great success in the mall. Freda and son Ruben are clients of ours."

"Duncan has concept drawings for mall rejuvenation as we call it from specialists in the field and was most unimpressed; he wants something to kick-start mall trading, which has been in decline for five years due to increased trading competition. He liked our logic in persuading the Klein's to relocate there and how we analyzed our way to solutions."

Donovan didn't mention any names but everyone except Milly glanced at Elle; Milly asked Bill something and then she, too, glanced at Elle who was calmly twirling a ringlet of her hair.

"Duncan accepts that we are not mall developers and we'd bog down over a fees formula. To break the impasse I goaded him to offer a one-off incentive payment just for an exterior theme concept, arguing that's where the attraction to shoppers starts.

He's in a hurry for renovations to progress in stages to be completed in time for the lead up to Christmas shopping, hence my acceptance of the deadline tomorrow morning.

"We've little to lose should we come up with nothing, or $50,000 if his board accepts our concept. I want you to drop all work today and divide all design-related people who are in this room into two teams led by Roger and Karl, of course excluding Milly, Hannah and Leigh who are administrators. You take first pick Roger."

Roger picked Donovan which forced Karl to take Bill Codington, director of research and analysis. Roger chose Randy, director of new business development and Karl looked at both Carol (client liaison and development) and Elle, and chose Carol.

Donovan interrupted the selection and said. We'll have one person over and can't risk having Elle being left out - you picked the team you want to help out Elle."

"I'll go with the team I perceive to be the weaker one so far selected for this particular project. I'll go with Karl."

"Thank you for that vote of confidence," sighed Karl, looking at Roger who was grinning with delight; it was his first opportunity to go up against Elle.

"By the way, I'll shout the winning team and partners, if we do win, to dinner and place $20,000 of our fee into the executive bonus fund if we collect that $50,000."

He was handclapped.

Donovan played the film clip once more. It showed the entrance and exit routes, the mall layout and features and handed slides of the layout plans to each team leader.

"Does mall management have any aerial clips?" Elle asked.

"Yes there is an aerial with those slides, Donovan said."

"Come on team," called Roger. "Let's copy these plans and get some sketches underway. Carol hurry over to the mall and get vehicle and shopper movement data."

Karl said, "Roger copies of that data for us please. Let's go to my office, team."

"We'll give you a copy of all the data Carol gathers up as we are happy to assist our rival colleagues," Roger said expansively.

While they filed off rather excited by the challenge, Elle grabbed Karl by the elbow. "Karl, I need to spend four hours over at the mall, okay?"

"Yeah that's fine. Hopefully you'll be able to make a contribution as a result of that. I'm bringing in a draftsman and a computer graphic artist from downstairs to bolster our team as Roger has those skills himself."

"Good thinking Karl."

Elle studied that slides including the aerial and then went over to the mall, returning just after 2:00.

"Anything?" asked Karl, looking worried.

Elle handed the computer graphics artist a CD and asked her to bring up the ground plan of the mall.

"Here's what we have to do..."

It was agreed next morning that the full teams should accompany Donovan to meet Mr Barnes and the chairman of the investment company to present the two proposals.

"Let us present first," Roger requested. "If we are to win approval we need to confront Mr Barnes right at the opening with a king hit."

"In that case we ought to go first because Elle has come up with a stunning concept which is already screaming for implementation," Karl yawned.

Roger looked apprehensive.

"Are you sure that fast-talking innocent hasn't seduced you blind?"

"I wish," Karl sighed. "She is utterly amazing."

Donovan said he ought to check out the proposal of Karl's team.

"No I think Milly should do that as an independent representative," Karl countered "She should quickly assess the proposals and, relying on instinct, deciding which team should present first."

"Right Milly," Donovan said looking at his watch. "You have seven minutes available to look at Roger's presentation and then seven minutes to look at Karl's. Then we head to the mall. Go!"

Roger rolled his audio-visual presentation, speeding up in slow parts to ensure he could screen the conclusion within the allotted time. He just managed to squeeze it in.

Karl presented his video with Elle giving a thirty second verbal wrap up - total time taken, three minutes and thirty-five seconds.

Roger watched Milly come out of that short presentation, face ashen, and knew he was beaten. He muttered to Donovan who looked torn between dejection and elation.

Duncan Barnes greeted the teams, introduced by Milly.

"Right everyone, grab a coffee and a sandwich and come into the small viewing theatre. Mall Developments International is more than interested in updating the mall but disappointed me by declining to engage in a design competition. They say they've never heard of you guys but say if you come up with anything feasible they'll produce the working drawings and take it from there."

Roger presented the DVD of his team's concept which ran for twenty-one minutes. It showed the total exterior of the mall replicating a Spanish Mission style concept topped by a bell tower with the name Springdale Mall in flashing color lights stretching over both sides of the roof-line and stopping just short of the bell tower.

The presentation included short interviewers of shoppers and their children commenting on the concept - all liking it. More interviews of mall traders, spokespersons for the two mall trading groups and civic authorities speaking in support of the concept.

"Excellent, excellent," Duncan said, "It's flattering that it roughly aligns with a few other malls in Southern California."

There was a silence, everyone unsure whether that was a compliment or a criticism.

Looking at his watch, he invited the second presentation.

The DVD showed all the buildings of the mall, renamed Springdale Rainbow Mall, painted charcoal with vertical protruding charcoal panels each displaying an assorted piece of a rainbow. And then a huge spot lit rainbow was shown constructed on the rooftop and stretching over the entire structure, Elle in a voice-over stated "This rainbow concept totally meets current building height, span and bulk limitations. All it requires is approval of engineering design, specifications and achieving certification of its construction when completed."

An overhead view of the mall came on screen and the voice-over stated that traffic flows were three times greater on the boulevard along the eastern perimeter of the mall. A single line of one-level residential properties separated the boulevard and the mall with no accesses to and from the mall. There was limited access at the north and south ends and excellent access at two points at the route running parallel to the western boundary. The commentary stated the board would be painfully aware it required direct access if only entry from the boulevard for traffic approaching from the east.

"The owners of that key residential property that meets full planning approval for access from the boulevard by the owner-residents have rejected generous offers several times and more recently an absurd offer. Our suggestion is that mall management probes deeply to find the real reason the occupiers don't wish to sell and then have experts try to come up with a compromise that is more than half-way acceptable to those owners. It's possibly related to their length of occupancy in that house which makes them feel in declining age that's where they belong and wish to stay. But what if their home was relocated to a site near-by and the present gardens, plantings and lawn either transferred or replicated on the new site?

Duncan clapped Elle holding his hands above his head and when the surrounding applause faded he addressed the gathering.

"This second concept excites me as it achieves what my wife and I and her family were seeking here and our chairman Mr Button said he was well pleased with the rainbow concept. I'll recommend to our board acceptance of the rainbow proposal because it really is not gimmicky. It provides a totally coordinated image for the mall but above all is a total package, possibly solving our western side access dilemma as well - something that some of the best brains in this city have wrestled with and failed to resolve.

"I congratulate you Karl and your team and especially to your delightful lady standing there in pink and white. She is worth her weight in gold, literally."

"Elle, please come forward and accept our concept award check for $250,000 and please stand for a photograph for publicity and archival purposes."

Elle shook her head.

"No thank you Mr Barnes, present the award to our team leader and please have our president and vice-president in the publicity photographs."

But Karl and Milly insisted the whole team stand with her and Donovan and Karl accepted the check.

That Friday was one of the best days in Elle's life. Her value, at least for the moment, to the company was beyond question. Although $50,000 was a windfall for Business Uplift, publicity over its conceptual design for the mall rejuvenation in the news media and news updates could enhance the company's reputation considerably.

But Friday was not finished for Elle.

More Coming