What Women Want by Fanny Blake Page B

of the wide plate-glass window across London. Then he turned to her. ‘We’ve got to do some drastic housekeeping. I’ve been going through the figures and, of course, talking everything through with Piers. He agrees with me that we have to reduce our overheads if we’re going forward. There’s no alternative but to lose the slack from every department.’
    Bea’s stomach plummeted but she kept looking straight in his eye. This was what she’d been dreading. ‘What are you suggesting?’
    ‘Redundancies.’
    ‘But we need everyone we’ve got in Editorial,’ she protested. ‘There are only six of us. There really isn’t any slack. Everyone’s working to their full capacity.’
    ‘I know that. So I’m also proposing that we cut down the number of titles we publish per year. I want you to do fewer better. You won’t need as many staff.’ He tapped his chin with a manicured finger.
    Already Bea was running through the people in the department. Stuart and Jade were indispensable. As for Alice, the managing editor who commissioned a few of her own non-fiction titles, and the two assistants, Becky and Warren, Bea couldn’t reward their loyalty and enthusiasm by putting them out of work.
    ‘I really don’t think we can do without any of them. Stuart and Jade—’
    She was about to start justifying everyone’s employment when he cut her short. ‘The decision’s been taken, I’m afraid. I want you to lose two members of your department.’
    ‘Two!’ Bea’s breath was taken away. ‘I can’t do that.’
    ‘It’s the only way I can make the numbers work. If you’re unable to help, then perhaps you should think about your own position. I’m only interested in keeping people who’ll work with me, not against me. Think about it. We’ll talk again in a couple of days or so.’ He looked at his watch, then returned to his seat behind his desk and his papers, indicating that the meeting was over.
    Bea was reeling from the brutal no-nonsense approach that she’d just encountered. Gone was Stephen’s gentle old-fashioned all-around-the-houses method of broaching something unpleasant. He’d hated upsetting his staff – but (Bea failed to dismiss the disloyal thought) the company might not have been in such a mess if he’d adopted a more leader-like approach.
    As soon as she was back in her office, Stuart and Jade made a beeline for her.
    ‘What’s he like? Is he as tough as they say?’
    ‘Well, let’s just say he apparently learned his management style at the knee of Genghis Khan.’
    ‘What’s he going to do to the editorial department? He’s bound to want some changes, isn’t he?’ Jade’s anxiety betrayed itself in her quieter-than-normal voice.
    ‘Bea, you have to tell us what’s going on.’ Even Stuart, normally bothered by nothing, had dropped his customary laid-back manner.
    ‘Nothing’s going on.’ Even to hint at what had been said at this stage wouldn’t be in anyone’s interests. ‘All he wanted was a rundown on the staff and to go through the upcoming programme. That’s it. As soon as there’s something to tell, you two will be the first to know. Promise.’ She was surprised to discover that she hadn’t dropped the childhood habit of crossing her fingers to excuse herself when telling a lie. Just as long as they hadn’t noticed.
    The rest of the day disappeared as she caught up with correspondence, put together editorial notes on a manuscript whose author was coming in the following day, talked to the publicity and art departments about the approaches they were taking to a couple of her books, and dealt with all the day-to-day business of an editorial department. Whenever possible, she avoided speculative conversations with anyone about the future of the company.
    Only when she had closed her front door, thrown off her shoes, poured herself a glass of red plonk and sunk into her deep red sofa, eyes shut, did she take time to concentrate on her first conversation with