One Bossy Offer (9)

Now I know why I picked that shade of blue. I also know what’s wrong with the painting.

Moving back to my easel, I mix black and white on the palate until the color turns into the kind of moody grey you’d expect to find belching from a chimney. I layer smoke over cobalt blue until the background is no longer blue, but not completely grey either.

It’s dark, but a certain brightness peeks through.

When Louise calls back roughly an hour later, I’m putting the finishing touches on a faded Gothic castle perched over a cliff with thorny vines clawing up the sides.

“Louise. Didn’t we say bi-weekly?”

“I’ve got the info you asked for. I thought you’d want to know.”

“Right.” She could’ve just emailed it, but that’s Louise. Whenever she hears tension in my voice, she prefers the phone.

Damn. Am I letting that insufferable woman get to me? All over this unbelievable rejection?

I need to knock that shit off right now.

“Give me details,” I say.

“It’s a pretty new company. There’s a list of services offered and a few testimonials on their site. She also has a Facebook group with less than a hundred people in it. It seems like a barely open kind of startup thing. I did some poking around on LinkedIn and see she’s gone full-time with the business just recently, but she used to have a senior marketing position for Winthrope International.”

“Winthrope? Send me all the links you can find for her.” Clearly, my initial scan wasn’t enough.

I’d like to know just how senior that position was. It could mean she’s sitting on more money than I thought, and that might explain her laughing off my offer.

“Will do, bossman. Anything else?” Louise asks cheerfully.

“No. Just send what you have on this marketing startup, and I’ll figure out the rest.”

The email comes through shortly after I end the call. I find the attachments with all of Miss Landers’ social media profiles along with the startup’s website.

A quick glance at her Instagram shows it’s filled with pink quotes about the joys of marketing and bringing dreams to life.

Spare me the fluff.

I rake a hand through my hair, wondering why every person and their dog is a freelance marketer now. The biggest joy of marketing seems like making money without doing any real work.

After scrolling through a few short videos with mundane 'inspirational' quotes, another video pops up. She’s standing on the beach in a bikini.

Holy fuck.

I’m instantly ripped back to a giant Doberman pulling her robe open, revealing a sight I couldn’t tear myself away from.

I didn’t mean to stare.

Hell, eyeballing a woman in an accidental state of sudden undress isn’t me at all.

But when she rocked curves that called my hands and mouth to roam, well, I’m not fucking dead.

I still have a pulse—and that pulse bangs like a war drum as I stare at a half-naked Jennifer Landers.

Even the way she sweeps her hand through wet cinnamon-red hair while she giggles makes my cock jolt.

The video begins to auto-play with her talking.

“This is the best part of my workday. Yes, work day! I get so many ideas from being out and enjoying the fresh air. If your clients are raving about you but you’re stuck in a feast or famine cycle, it’s not because you need another certification. You need marketing. You need to be getting your fine work out there for the world to see. If you don’t know how, I can help. And if you think you can’t afford marketing, you can’t afford not to.”

A water droplet slides down the curve of her breast, accenting everything.

Goddamn.

There should be a law of reality against a demoness being stunning enough to strike me down.

I check out her website next. The left side is an image of a devil who looks like an angel wearing a turquoise dress and those matching glasses I suspect she only wears in front of a camera.

They bring out the natural green of her eyes too well.

Here, she looks professional and proper, but innocent. If you didn’t know her, you’d expect a total sweetheart.

And aside from spitting fire over unexpected land offers, maybe she is.

There’s another video on her sales page, too.

She’s wearing the same turquoise dress and sitting at a desk.

“I know. I know you’ve tried everything. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Reddit. Endless hours pumping out videos. And for what? If you’re like a lot of my clients when they come to me, it’s not getting you results. What if I told you the problem isn’t that you need to work harder? What if you’re working too hard?”

“What if you make fucking a cactus look delightful?” I mutter to her smiling face on the screen.

“I have a three-step process for finding you an easy flow of new leads.” She holds up three fingers. “First, simplify. You don’t need to be on nine different platforms. Pick one to master, and preferably one you don’t hate. I’ll help with the SEO. If you want to find new clients, you have to be easy to find. And you don’t have time to learn a whole new skill. I’ll do it, so you can just keep being awesome at what you do best. Finally, make connections. Engage with the content you like. Take the time to respond to DMs. A conversation keeps you first in a customer’s mind, and more importantly, builds a referral system. I know, it’s a lot to take in. That’s why I’m willing to take the time to walk you through it. Just call Odd Little Bee and ask for Landers!”