Chapter 43

43 Sleeping My Way Up

Even if everyone else doesn’t know that I slept with Ace, the fact that I knew was bad enough for me. I knew that there were people who took these shortcuts in life to climb up the corporate ladder but ‘sleeping my way’ up wasn’t how I wanted to progress in my career. I wanted to get up there with my own merits and achievements. I threw my phone onto the bed before I sighed loudly.

The reason that I wanted to make it up there wasn’t that I could be up there, but it was because I wanted to have the skills and the opportunity to put my creative ideas out there to touch the hearts of people with my work in various forms of media. Sleeping my way up wouldn’t give me the skills required to achieve my dreams even if I ended up making it up there.

Plus, without the real skills, how long can I keep fooling geniuses like Jeremy, Richard, Julianna and the other on the team for?

I closed my eyes and turned onto my stomach before burying my face into my pillow. The answer to that was simple: I can’t fool them when I can’t even fool myself.

When tomorrow comes, I’ll find a chance to tell Ace that I’ve decided to turn down the role of his personal secretary and all that came with it. Come what may. Even if I have to lose my job, I’ll take it that I’m just paying for all the sins that I’ve accumulated for the past two years of secretly dating Kyle.

'

Kyle...that relationship was a complete and utter failure as well...

...

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get a hold of Ace before the meeting in the morning started for Project Alpha. Catching him after the meeting seemed like the only sure way for me to get to meet him so I decided to join the meeting. The meeting was held in one of the large meeting rooms on Ace’s floor on the other side of the floor, away from where his office was.

When I walked in, everyone was already seated. Although I was five minutes early, the other people were already seated at the meeting table. Ace was nowhere in sight, though. The other people had their eyes on me while no one said anything. Jeremy was the only one who nodded at me in slight acknowledgement that I was present in the room. Despite their slightly cold attitude towards me, none of them look surprised that I was joining.

.....

“Excuse me...” I whispered softly as I sat down on an empty seat.

The atmosphere was full of tension, and it felt very suffocating to me as I glanced around at all the superstars seated at the table. I felt like a fangirl stuck in the presence of her favorite celebrities. My chest felt so tight, and I didn’t know how to react at all. The other’s stared at their laptop screen, completely absorbed in their work.

The sound of the meeting room door opening broke the silence. Every got up from their seat and started greeting Ace as he strode confidently into the room.

“Morning, everyone. I apologize for the early morning meeting...” Ace said before he took his seat at the head of the table.

Ace glanced over at me, and a small smile curved his beautiful lips. He didn’t say anything to me, and the meeting started immediately.

“We’ve got a new project on our hands. Project Alpha is just a simple code name that I came up with. We’ll stick with that unless anyone has a sexier name because it doesn’t really matter. Jumping in, Julianna will take us through the requirements as this is a project that came in through our marketing team,” Ace said as he gestured with his hand for Julianna to take the center stage.

“Yes, Sir!” Julianna said enthusiastically as she stood up from her seat.

Everyone’s eyes, including mine, were on the large presentation screen as Julianna stood next to it and began walking us through the details of the project.

“Once again, this year, the Ashford Creative competition is upon us. As all of you are probably already aware, the Ashford Award is awarded to the best advertisement that will be used to support a non-profit organization of the Ashford Foundation’s choice. Although the non-profit organization that the foundation chooses to support changes every year, the theme of the competition remains the same. The Ashford Award will be rewarded to the commercial that best represents the goal of the foundation and the non-profit organization and attracts the most PR and attention from the general public to support the cause,” Julianna explained in her clear voice as she flipped through the slides of her presentation.

Everyone nodded along with her in understanding. She was right, everyone in the industry and also some out of it, knows about the Ashford Foundation and the competition that they hold every year. However, probably only those involved in the industry and its clients will know the true meaning behind the competition and what it really means in the business world.

“This competition isn’t just about supporting a good cause. For advertising and media companies like ours, it is the competition that decides who will dominate the market this year. Every year since the founding of this company, we have participated in the competition with the intent to win. It is common for the winner of this competition to be referred to as the best advertising company. Of course, that also means that clients will flock to us if we win this. After all, our clients are following very closely on the progress and result of this competition,” Julianna went on to explain the true meaning behind this competition.

I’ve heard of this competition before and the fact that Jesses & Hills participates every year. Of course, the company has managed to win the competition for most of the years since its founding and that is partly how the company has cemented its position as the best advertising company. I have never been involved in a project of this scale that has the pride of the company riding on it before. This was just huge...

–To be continued...