CEO Humiliated the Single Dad at Christmas — Then Her Father Called Him “Boss”
Chapter 12
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"Celeste." Sterling turned toward her for the first time since entering the room, and his voice did not rise either; in that moment, the family resemblance was unbearable. "This is Luke Carver. He's the founder and controlling chief executive of Carver Industrial Recovery. I am his senior executive partner. I have reported to him for three years. I told you that when I took the position, and you told me it was a consulting arrangement because you preferred that version, and I let you have it. That was my mistake, and I'm correcting it tonight."She got her footing back faster than anyone expected: that was the thing about Celeste Sinclair, and it was genuinely impressive, and it was also precisely the trait that had brought the company to 11 weeks from a wall. She set down her glass, smiled warmly, extended her hand, and said that in that case she owed him an apology for a mortifying evening, that the placement confusion had cascaded badly, and that she would very much like to start over.Luke shook her hand. He had shaken hands with men who had just tried to sue him, and his grip was unremarkable."Celeste," Sterling said. "Carver Industrial is the buyer your board has been negotiating with for six weeks."The second silence was different from the first: the first had been shock; the second was arithmetic—300 people running the same sequence backward at the same speed: the man at the kitchen table, the torn place card, the broken glass, the sentence about childcare, the 200 gift boxes, the pickup in the drive.Near the bar, a woman said, "Oh my God," quietly and with feeling. The chairman of Hollerin Steel set down his drink and turned fully around.And Celeste Sinclair understood that every single thing she had done that night had been done in front of the man who would decide in January whether her company existed in March.She did what capable people do under those conditions, which is that she went straight at it: she said she would not insult anyone by pretending the evening hadn't happened, that she had made an assumption based on presentation, and the assumption was indefensible, and that she would like 15 minutes in a private room.And Luke Carver, who had not raised his voice once in three and a half hours, said they could have the conversation right there—because everything he had to say was already known to everyone in the building except her."I'd like to ask you one thing," he said. "If you'd known when I walked in that I'd be the person signing the check on the 4th of January, would you have treated me the way you treated me tonight?""No." She did not hesitate, and she said it clearly, and to her credit, it was the truth. "Obviously not."