and expressed a sensitivity and simple sincerity that couldn’t be replicated by the harried staff at the orphanage. Her soft, full lips came together in a sweet smile, and her flawless bronze skin radiated warmth. Her beauty wasn’t lost on the younger children, who naturally gravitated to her, even if they weren’t sure why.
But another quake was about to rock her world. Her appearance – and two recent policy changes at a stock exchange a world away – would soon set her life on a drastically different course.
~~~
After three years of mostly rousing successes, Avillage was slogging through a third consecutive quarter of flat growth when James Prescott, without notice, eliminated the position of vice president of operations in the Orphan Identification Division, and ordered its employees to report directly to his Senior Executive Vice President/Henchman Aaron Bradford. While the move had dealt a serious blow to the section’s morale, its productivity did increase. Temporarily.
As it turned out, the problem really wasn’t internal; it truly seemed to be a lack of qualified orphans.
In response, Bradford had pushed through two controversial changes in the Avillage recruitment plan. The first was to offer orphan-referral incentives, by way of a 1.5% ownership incentive for each orphan adopted by Avillage, to be split 70/30 between the referring orphanage and the individual making the referral. The second was to pursue international adoptions, thereby increasing the pool of potential orphans a thousand-fold, effective immediately.
Explicit restrictions on foreign adoption, covering criteria from the marital status of the parents to the number of children already in the adoptive family to the ability of the parents to care for a new dependent financially already existed in most countries, so corporate adoptions never got off the ground in most of the developed world. But other countries, mostly underdeveloped and/or those recently devastated by war or natural disaster, were laden with so many orphans they didn’t have the systems in place to take care of them all. A post-earthquake Panama not only permitted corporate adoptions, they rolled out the red carpet for Avillage.
Two weeks after an official memo detailing Avillage’s mission (and its incentive program) had been sent out to all Panamanian orphanages, Carlos Villanueva, a conflicted Rainbow City headmaster, not expecting or even entirely hoping for a reply, had sent a series of digital photos of Annamaria to Avillage, which eventually found their way to the desk of Aaron Bradford. He was instantly mesmerized.
Avillage had had a modicum of success with models in their brief history, but Annamaria was on another plane.
Bradford had forwarded the photos to a talent scout at a major modeling agency, who confirmed Bradford’s suspicion, while dissecting her look more scientifically. Her face was perfectly symmetrical with high cheekbones and large dark eyes accentuated by similarly-toned hair, and her full lips and bronze skin gave her a somewhat nebulous ethnic profile – a major plus in the industry. While the full body shots were more difficult to analyze because of the baggy T-shirts she wore, she was clearly tall and thin with a long feminine neck, broad but delicate shoulders, svelte arms and long, runway-ready legs.
Already the chairman of Annamaria’s board in his mind, Bradford only had one thing left to do; he needed to see her in person. A couple of other longshot inquiries from Panama would justify the trip, including a thirteen-year-old pitcher with a supposed 85 mile-an-hour fastball. But that was probably a fairy tale. Annamaria was the sole reason he opted to make the trip personally.
~~~
The city of Colón’s Enrique A. Jimenez Airport was still closed due to runway damage, so after the five-hour flight from New York to Panama City, Bradford and his assistant were forced to endure
But another quake was about to rock her world. Her appearance – and two recent policy changes at a stock exchange a world away – would soon set her life on a drastically different course.
~~~
After three years of mostly rousing successes, Avillage was slogging through a third consecutive quarter of flat growth when James Prescott, without notice, eliminated the position of vice president of operations in the Orphan Identification Division, and ordered its employees to report directly to his Senior Executive Vice President/Henchman Aaron Bradford. While the move had dealt a serious blow to the section’s morale, its productivity did increase. Temporarily.
As it turned out, the problem really wasn’t internal; it truly seemed to be a lack of qualified orphans.
In response, Bradford had pushed through two controversial changes in the Avillage recruitment plan. The first was to offer orphan-referral incentives, by way of a 1.5% ownership incentive for each orphan adopted by Avillage, to be split 70/30 between the referring orphanage and the individual making the referral. The second was to pursue international adoptions, thereby increasing the pool of potential orphans a thousand-fold, effective immediately.
Explicit restrictions on foreign adoption, covering criteria from the marital status of the parents to the number of children already in the adoptive family to the ability of the parents to care for a new dependent financially already existed in most countries, so corporate adoptions never got off the ground in most of the developed world. But other countries, mostly underdeveloped and/or those recently devastated by war or natural disaster, were laden with so many orphans they didn’t have the systems in place to take care of them all. A post-earthquake Panama not only permitted corporate adoptions, they rolled out the red carpet for Avillage.
Two weeks after an official memo detailing Avillage’s mission (and its incentive program) had been sent out to all Panamanian orphanages, Carlos Villanueva, a conflicted Rainbow City headmaster, not expecting or even entirely hoping for a reply, had sent a series of digital photos of Annamaria to Avillage, which eventually found their way to the desk of Aaron Bradford. He was instantly mesmerized.
Avillage had had a modicum of success with models in their brief history, but Annamaria was on another plane.
Bradford had forwarded the photos to a talent scout at a major modeling agency, who confirmed Bradford’s suspicion, while dissecting her look more scientifically. Her face was perfectly symmetrical with high cheekbones and large dark eyes accentuated by similarly-toned hair, and her full lips and bronze skin gave her a somewhat nebulous ethnic profile – a major plus in the industry. While the full body shots were more difficult to analyze because of the baggy T-shirts she wore, she was clearly tall and thin with a long feminine neck, broad but delicate shoulders, svelte arms and long, runway-ready legs.
Already the chairman of Annamaria’s board in his mind, Bradford only had one thing left to do; he needed to see her in person. A couple of other longshot inquiries from Panama would justify the trip, including a thirteen-year-old pitcher with a supposed 85 mile-an-hour fastball. But that was probably a fairy tale. Annamaria was the sole reason he opted to make the trip personally.
~~~
The city of Colón’s Enrique A. Jimenez Airport was still closed due to runway damage, so after the five-hour flight from New York to Panama City, Bradford and his assistant were forced to endure
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