My Plan, Her Plan, Father’s Plan

May 13, 2020. One of the Najbreit estates in Los Angeles.

“So the two of you came together?” I say.

Mandy passes Tiffany a glass of sangria and then sips from hers.

Mandy’s wearing a dangerously low-cut dress today, the curves of her tits barely constrained by the thin black strips of fabric. Tiffany, on the other hand, is dressed more modestly, something strapless and blue and tight-fitting and designer. She fidgets with the silver bracelet on her wrist.

“Mandy came to see me at my place,” Tiffany says. She glances nervously at Mandy. “We um… we came together afterwards.”

“Where’s Claire?” Mandy asks suddenly.

She looks me over, eyes lingering on my clothes. Can she tell what’s wrong? Is there even anything to tell?

“I think she’s busy,” I say. “I haven’t seen her yet, despite wandering about the house.”

“And you left your glass here while you were wandering,” Mandy says, nodding at my sangria still on the dining table.

I let the remark pass without commenting on it. There’s nothing to win by engaging in that particular conversation.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Tiffany shooting me a pleading look. What’s wrong? Or is she just trying to apologise to me?

Claire strides into the room then, wearing a light pink button-up blouse and a short skirt, touching up the corners of her lips with a tube of lipstick that she deftly slides into her purse.

“Sorry, lost track of the time,” she says. “Make yourselves comfortable, have a seat, feel free to help yourself to the refreshments. We’ve got a lot to discuss today, unless you’ve changed your mind, Mandy.”

Mandy raises an eyebrow.

I start talking, trying to seize momentum in the moment.

“Let me start by saying that I can still get Hanna Maria. I blew my chance at the Zuboff party. I know that. But despite everything that went wrong, she was still interested by the end of the night—she bought that I’ve broke allegiance with the Najbreits. Since Simonds gave us three weeks, the deadline to close is on the thirty-first, and that’s still plenty of time to make my move. Lionsgate is short on cash. They don’t want to pay one-point-four billion dollars for STX if we pass on the two billion. They’ll want to play ball with us. We can make this joint takeover work, you just have to give me a chance to try, heck, you can start raising your two billion on the side if you don’t think I’ll succeed, but at least give me the chance…”

Mandy’s ceased listening to me some time ago.

She picks up the hooked cheese knife on the charcuterie board and tosses it in the air. It flips in the space above the table, dazzling as it catches the light, and she snatches it by the handle on its way down. She stabs the knife down into the brie and hacks off a slice. Holding the blade up to her mouth, she runs her tongue along the sharp of the edge, licking off a thin layer of the cheese. She smiles and winks at me.

“You don’t have to persuade me,” she says, taking another lick off the knife. “I think it’s a good plan.”

“What changed?” Claire asks, her eyes narrowing in suspicion.

“I had a little chat with Tiffany,” Mandy says, that cheshire cat smile prowling onto her face. “I’ve decided that we’re not even going to raise try to raise the two billion. It would be a lot of wasted effort.”

“So you’re killing the deal,” I say in a low voice. “Letting it go, just like that, unless I can somehow bring the bacon home, alone.”

“On the contrary,” Mandy laughs.

She smears her knife all over a cracker and pops it in her mouth. She crunches down on it and crumbs fall out the corner of her mouth, drizzling onto her cleavage in little specks. She tosses her red hair back and takes another leisurely bite. She’s enjoying this too much, and I have no idea why.

“Tiffany’s going to help out too. Aren’t you, honey?” Mandy says, poking Tiffany by the shoulder when she doesn’t immediately respond.

Tiffany stares straight ahead at me with that pleading expression. She looks terrified.

“What did you tell Tiffany?” I say slowly, staring down Mandy.

Something has gone wrong here.

Mandy meets my gaze and laughs some more.

“Oh, nothing much really. It’s more about what she told me.”

“What did you tell her?” Claire asks Tiffany, sounding awfully sympathetic.

“Another plan,” Tiffany mumbles softly.

Claire and I give each other a look. Tiffany opens her mouth, as if she were going to continue speaking, but not sound comes out.

“Don’t worry, it took me quite some time to wrangle the truth out of her,” Mandy laughs. “But Father’s been giving me some lessons. I’ve gotten pretty good at it.”

“Tiffany’s going to seduce Bob Simonds to sweeten the deal for us,” Mandy says, patting Tiffany on the shoulder. “I’ve heard he likes his girls young. She’s going to fuck him, he’s going to give us a discount. I think Tiffany could save us a couple hundred million. It’s a good plan, don’t you think?”

“How… Tiffany would never…” I begin saying, but I try to meet Tiffany’s eyes.

She looks down. The glass of sangria in her hand is trembling.

“Of course Tiffany could never have come up with a plan like that,” Mandy says, rolling her eyes. “But Father is a clever man. He was inspired by you, Claude, and so he gave Tiffany a back-up plan. It’s very poetic. You seduce Hanna Maria, Tiffany seduces Bob, and the Najbreits win the game, as we always do, at the end of the day.”

“You’re fine with this, Tiff?” I ask.

“Do I have a choice?” she whispers.

She sets the glass of sangria down on the table, hard.

“I’m not comfortable with it,” Claire says quietly.

“You can take it up with Father if you’re not happy,” Mandy says idly.

She’s twirling the knife in her palm now.

Claire sighs and shakes her head. She’s not going to put up a fight.

“And you, Claude?”

“You called it a back-up plan, right? Tiffany doesn’t need to do this if I succeed?”

“Sure.”

“Then no, I’m not happy with it,” I say plainly. “But what I think about it doesn’t matter. You know why? My plan is going to succeed, and Tiffany’s never going to have to ever think about this shitty one ever again.”