A Business Love

chapter 30.1

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Calm had returned to the offices of the Moretti Group. It was late; everyone had already left, except Jessie.

She was supposed to be leaving with Julian and she knew he had to focus. The beginning of the year was always particularly busy for the members of the executive committee as they had to quickly analyze the previous year's results and determine the objectives for the new year in order to communicate them with the leaders.

She didn't want to disturb him, but she was dying to tell him the good news that she would agree to move in with him.

She wrote him a message on the Teams chat asking him if he wanted some Lays. 'Coming,' he soon answered.

Julian had been procrastinating on talking with her about the issue of her promotion. He knew that he needed to address it sooner than later.

When he arrived at Jessie's office, she tossed him a bag of potato chips. "Here, your lame chips," she said.

"Have some respect," he joked while sitting down on the chair in front of her. He could see the joy all over her face. "You're happy," he said referring to the financial results.

"Very happy," she said beaming.

He gave her an approving smile. "You've earned those results, baby."

Many people had told her that today and she routinely thanked them without really taking into consideration their good words. But when these exact same words came from Julian's mouth, it made all the difference. She deeply valued his opinion and her work being recognized by him meant a lot to her.

"Thanks amore," she almost whispered emotional as she looked him in the eyes.

She was about to tell him that she had good news for him, but he beat her to it.

"I have good news and bad news," he said while leaning back on the chair.

Jessie refrained from telling him about her good news and postponed it for now. She looked at him with an intrigued, but amused expression. "Ok! Good news first."

"I'm not supposed to tell you, but you're getting promoted to a manager position with a 100K salary."

Her jaw went slack. "What?" she exclaimed in disbelief. "I was supposed to be increased at 85K and still remain an advisor until the end of the year!"

"Massimo went to bat for you again. And he's right, with those results, it makes sense."

She put both hands in front of her mouth still in shock. "Ok, this day keeps getting better and better," she said with light in her eyes. "What's the bad news?"

She didn't believe that he really had bad news to tell her. She was convinced he was joking.

Julian sighed. He didn't want to burst her bubble but he had no choice. "It's a 43% salary raise. Anything above 30% needs to be approved by an executive. In your case, by me."

Jessie's heart started to race as an alarm rang in her mind. She immediately understood the issue. "Are you serious?" she asked as she completely dropped her smile.

"Yes," he answered in a serious tone while nodding.

She looked at him and remained silent as she processed the information. She felt like she was suddenly falling from cloud nine and brutally brought back to earth. Worry, anxiety and stress etched on her face, and Julian could see it.

"I know, that's unexpected. Someone else will have to approve your promotion," he said shrugging and grimacing.

"What are we gonna do? Is there any way around it?" she nervously asked.