“Gotcha, chief,” Stephen says before winking and adding in a voice for my ears only, “Gonna miss your pretty face around the office, slugger. Don’t be a stranger, okay?” He backs away, pointing at my chest. “And send us a copy of your article, when you’re finished. My mom loves that stuff. She takes all my press mentions to church to show her friends. It’s super cute.”
“Super cute,” I echo with a queasy smile as I lunge after Ryan, shutting his office door behind me with a combination sigh-groan that makes my brother laugh.
“A week out of your writer cave that rough on you, sis?” He smiles at me from across his massive oak desk, where he’s busily tucking folders into his briefcase. “You appear to have showered recently. I’m impressed. Surprised…but impressed.”
“Very funny. Yes, I’ve been showering daily, but that’s not the problem.”
“Glad to hear it.” He taps at his cell, attention fixed on the screen. “Just in case you need to look for a job outside your lair, showering is a good life skill to keep in your arsenal.”
“Again. Hysterical. You should do stand-up in your spare time.” I keep my tone light, though the reminder of the tenuous nature of my freelance writing gig compared to Ryan’s high-salaried, big-bonus position isn’t the most welcome at the moment. Especially considering I might have to cancel the “Not Your Mother’s Wall Street” article I’ve been working on for the editor at Barrington Beat. If I do, the week I spent here investigating will have been a waste of time. “But I need the not-funny Ryan right now. Seriously. There’s a problem.”
He looks up, his smile fading. “Is Dad okay?”
“Dad’s fine,” I say, with a frustrated huff. “Which you would know if you called him every Sunday. You know he wants you to call, too. It’s family check-in, not Ellie check-in.”
“But he keeps me on the hook for hours, El, and you make sure I stay abreast of all the news that’s fit to print,” Ryan says, his golden boy grin coming out to play.
“Speaking of fit to print… I can’t write the article, Ryan. At least not the way I pitched it. It’s not going to work.”
His brow furrows. “What? Why not?”
“Because this is still our mother’s Wall Street, or more like our father’s.” I wave my hand toward the world on the other side of his door. “Different technology, different slang, but it’s still the same ol’ boys’ club underneath.”
“What?” He props his hands on his hips. “But you said it yourself—we have more women working for S and H than any other financial firm our size. We’ve stepped up our recruiting efforts for female candidates, revamped our family leave policies… We’re almost at a fifty-fifty male to female ratio for new hires, El. What other firm can say that?”
“Yes, and that’s all great. But most of the female hires are making less money for the same jobs, or they’re starting from the bottom while the men—many of them with less experience—are going straight into management positions,” I explain. I can’t believe my detail-obsessed brother has managed to overlook these facts. “And a lot of the women are only part-time. They don’t have benefits, job security, or—”
“That can’t be right,” Ryan says with a shake of his head. “Have you talked to our hiring manager? Blair’s been doing an amazing job.”
“Blair’s very busy,” I say diplomatically, not wanting to get Blair in hot water, despite that fact that she’s been an uncooperative B-word all week.
Being unable to get one of the two women in management positions at S&H to answer my questions hasn’t made my job any easier, but I don’t want to make unnecessary waves.
“You should pin Blair down before you leave.” Ryan taps two fingers on his desk. “I haven’t heard a single complaint from the new people. We’re running like a well-oiled machine.”
I sigh. “People aren’t going to risk their already uncertain positions by complaining to the boss, Ryan, but I’ve definitely heard rumblings of discontent.”
“Like what?”
“Nothing I’m ready to share,” I hedge, “but enough that I can’t in good conscience write an article about my brother’s ground-breakingly-awesome-for-ladies workplace at this juncture. I need time to dig deeper.”
“Then take it,” Ryan says. “If we have parity issues, I want to know about it. That’s not the kind of company I want to run, El. I hope you know that.”
“Of course I do.” A rush of warmth fills my chest. With his good looks, razor-sharp mind, and Chosen One energy, Ryan could have become another entitled jerk like so many of his Harvard friends.
But that isn’t my brother. He’s a good man with a great heart, which is one of the major reasons I needed to have this conversation with him before my research goes any further.
“But if I’m going to keep digging, I need to have something to show for it,” I continue. “Eventually I have to deliver a piece to Barrington, positive or negative. Are you okay with that?”
To his credit, Ryan hesitates only a second before nodding. “But I think you’ll come to see this in a different light. Jack and I are pro-diversity and pro-equality.” His glance shifts to the door behind me. “Right, Jack?”
“Indeed.” Jack’s laid-back drawl rumbles through the room like a soothing roll of distant thunder as the door snicks shut behind him.
But, as always, the presence of Ryan’s partner and best friend is anything but soothing. I don’t know what it is about the man, but Jack Edward Holt brings out my awkward, twitchy introvert like no one else.
I spin on my heel with a nervous laugh and a jerky wave. “Hey, how’s it going, Jack? Didn’t hear you come in.”
His lips curve in his signature smirk, the one that assures you he’s always in on the joke. “Going good, Ellie. Get everything you needed for your article?”
“She needs more time,” Ryan says, answering for me in a big brotherly fashion that nevertheless rubs me the wrong way after spending a week with the patronizing and/or oblivious men on his staff.
They aren’t all bad guys, for sure, but most of them could use a course in not interrupting their female colleagues while they’re speaking and keeping jokes appropriate for the workplace. There’s also the matter of the exotic odor emanating from the men’s locker room in the company gym.
But hey, one battle at a time…
“And someone at the top to make sure she gets access,” Ryan continues. “Can you handle that for me, Jack? I’m in Portland for the rest of the month.”
“I don’t know, I have a lot going on,” Jack says at the same time I blurt out, “Jesus, Ryan, I don’t need a babysitter.”
Jack and I turn, gazes bumping as I try not to let my aversion to Ryan’s proposal show. For his part, Jack looks uncharacteristically surprised.
But then, having his company rebuffed is probably a rare event for Mr. Holt. With his artistically mussed sandy-brown hair, sleepy green eyes, and long, lean, I-hit-the-gym-like-most-New-Yorkers-hit-the-coffee-shop frame, Jack is even more stupidly handsome than my brother. If Ryan is the golden boy next door, Jack is the bad boy with a voice like whiskey and a “let’s break the rules” glint in his eye.