“Interesting,” I said. “Of course, it assumes Saito’s C-suite are coin-operated and not, say, mission-driven.”
“Everything is coin-operated,” she said, “if you use enough coins.”
The table stifled a laugh. No one wanted to be the first to side with the junior. Not in this room. Not with me in charge. Still, I let it ride. Better to let her show off now, burn off the bravado before the real games began.
I toggled to the next slide, the profit-loss model I’d slaved over until two this morning. “Let’s discuss the synergies,” I said, letting the word hang in the air just long enough to make the consultants twitch.
I waited for the old men to finish their ritual mutterings about brand alignment and workforce redundancies. Calvin Reeves, Eliza’s brother, technically my peer but functionally thefamily’s designated distraction, leaned in, his blue eyes darting from me to his sister.
“I think what Valor’s getting at,” Calvin said, “is that with the projected cost savings, we should see a six percent lift by Q3, not four. Unless I’m missing something?”
He was. But it wasn’t the numbers.
I watched Eliza. She didn’t look at her brother, just adjusted her cuff as if prepping for a blood draw.
“You’re assuming Saito’s existing contracts transfer without a loyalty tax,” she said. “They won’t. We’ll lose at least two in the first ninety days. Maybe more if they sense we’re slow-rolling the integration.”
“Not if we get in front of the narrative,” I said, raising an eyebrow. “You’ll be point on that, Ms. Reeves.”
She matched my stare and held it. “You want me to babysit the transition?”
“I want you to own it.”
She smiled and this time she didn’t even bother to hide it. “You alwaysdelegatethe fun stuff, don’t you?”
I didn’t miss her pointed call back to our conversation that morning.
A shock of laughter rippled from the cheap seats at the far end, quickly choked off. I felt the pulse of it—momentary disorder, quickly re-contained.
“I always delegate to those most likely to execute,” I said. “Unless you’d prefer someone else?”
“Not necessary,” she said. “But I’ll need unfiltered access to Full data. No PR sandbagging.” She was pushing and I liked that, even though it irritated me also.
I considered her for a moment, all sharp angles and sharper intellect, and then I just nodded. “Done. Next.”
I moved to the financial projections, expecting pushback. Instead, the room went silent as Eliza scanned the spreadsheet. Her pupils dilated; she saw something.
“You have personnel expenses trending flat after consolidation,” she said still looking at the sheets. “That’s not going to happen unless we automate the bottom quartile.” She didn’t phrase it as a question. She knew.
I waited half a beat, then said, “That’s proprietary, but yes. Model assumes phased automation.”
Finally, she set her pen down. “It’s optimistic but the implementation will get ugly.”
“Which is why I want you managing it,” I said.
She just shrugged, as if to say:of course, you do.
Across the table, one of the old guards, a gray slab of a man named Hastings, cleared his throat. “I have a question about this line item,” he said, jabbing at his printout. “The amortization rate here is… aggressive. Is that intentional, or a copy-paste error?”
Suddenly all eyes were on me. I felt the prickle of sweat at my collar but I ignored it and said, “It’s deliberate. We’re front-loading capex to maximize tax exposure this fiscal.”
He wasn’t convinced. “Still, it’s a significant deviation from last quarter’s assumptions.”
I glanced at the footnote. The spreadsheet labeled ‘Eliza Reeves, Draft 2.’ Cute. I turned towards her and asked. “Ms. Reeves, did you prep this model?”
She looked at it and shrugged. “That’s not my version.”
“But it’s got your header.” Hastings pressed.