3

"Welcome aboard, Mr. Garin," the woman said with a smile and she gave the CEO a questioning glance. Villamor shook her head almost imperceptibly but Stanley caught it and Gunderan's raised eyebrow response. He wasn't sure what that was about but he was in a bit of a daze. The woman's voice was surprisingly feminine. He had been expecting a much deeper octave that comes from body building and possibly taking enhancers. On closer examination though there was nothing masculine about Gunderan. She was lovely, just big!

"Th-thank you," he stumbled and she grinned at him.

"I'm not scaring you, am I?" she asked sweetly, ignoring the scowl from her boss.

"N-no, I get like this around puh-pretty women," he forced out then froze, wide eyed at what he'd just said. To the head of HR none-the-less. AND the CEO! He closed his eyes and put his face in his hands.

"Oh, I like this one!" Gunderan chuckled happily.

"Sigrid!" her boss snapped.

"Fine but I can't help it if he's so cute," she chuckled at Villamor's growl. She turned to Stanley who was looking at her once more. "This is a standard executive contract for our firm. Please read it before signing it. I can answer any questions you have as you go through it."

A group of men showed up in the doorway. Stanley looked over at them and immediately felt a little uneasy as they were all so strikingly similar. They all were roughly the same height, had the same hair color, and generally the same facial features. They could be twins, if that happened in groups of... eight?

"Ah, we're in the way, aren't we? Let's move to my office," the CEO said.

"Is this furniture going to storage?" Sigrid asked.

"Do you want it?" Villamor asked.

The tall blond moved to sit behind the desk and ran her hands over the surface. Then she gave it a heavy thump with her fist. The heavy desk took it in stride. She grinned. "Yes please!" She looked over to the men in the doorway. "Please strip it back to the natural wood then give it a light oiling and a sealant before delivering it to my office."

The closest man in the doorway nodded then the rest picked up the nod. Again, the hairs on the back of Stanley's neck stood up.

Ms. Villamor stood up and gestured for Stanley to follow her. Gunderan followed him. They made their way down the hall into another waiting room. Sitting at a desk to the right of the inner door was a beautiful, dark haired man who must have been the CEO's executive assistant. Beyond the inner door was a corner office. He sighed when he saw the view from the expansive windows. Her desk, situated in the apex of the two bands of windows was exactly the kind of furniture he liked. A wide glass surface on a steel tubing frame. On closer examination though the glass surface was a blending of different kinds and colors of glass. It looked something like a Kaleidoscope. Very pretty.

The CEO gestured for them to sit on the couch to read through the contract while she returned to her desk to get some work done.

It took Stanley some time to get through the document as he'd never read one before. There were a lot of clauses regarding confidentiality and some rather strict and ominous sounding penalties for breaching them. Sigrid was very helpful in clarifying some of the legalese and by the end he felt comfortable about signing the document. There was still the matter of filling out the fields for his compensation.

Ms. Villamor gestured for them to join her so they stood and sat in the chairs before her desk. She leaned back in her chair as she held Stanley's eyes with hers. "I'm going to start you off with an annual salary of $320,000 with profit sharing, and full benefits. We will review your performance after six months and make an assessment at that time if additional compensation is warranted. Is this acceptable?"

Stanley rarely laughed but he couldn't stop himself from bursting into laughter now, thinking the woman was kidding. He looked around for the hidden cameras and saw only the two women watching him with puzzled expressions. When they didn't join in his laughter quickly choked off. "I- I thought you were juh-joking and this was all an elaborate puh-prank."

Ms. Villamor just held his eyes with hers.

"It- it is highly acceptable," he squeaked. Ms. Gunderan nodded and wrote in the figures. She slid the document over to him on the desk to sign. He took the pen and added his signature to the document.

"As a final authorization, we do require a tiny drop of blood in this box at the bottom of the form," the head of HR said and he stared at her in surprise. She reached over and gently took his hand. She pricked his finger with a pin she suddenly had in her hand and gently squeezed the finger until a single droplet of blood fell to the paper.

Before it touched the paper the droplet vaporized with a tiny puff.

The women went absolutely still and looked at Stanley closely. The young man in question was looking closely at the paper in puzzlement. He leaned forward to look closer as a second drop fell to the paper. It too disappeared with a slight hiss and pop.

"How is that happening?" he said slowly with wide eyes.

He missed the exchange between the executives. The head of HR was staring at the CEO with an intense expression and the brunette just gave her head one brief, sharp shake to shut down the unspoken question.

"We can dispense with that formality for now Sigrid. Thank you. That will be all."

The tall blond gathered up the contract and with a final glance at her boss left the office. Stanley put his finger in his mouth but it had already stopped bleeding.

"Your predecessor, Mr. Hokensev, may have kept notes on the existing equipment. You should work with Paloma to review all of his documentation. I believe you will find her to be highly motivated and she will prove to be indispensable."

He nodded to her.

"You can find your way back to your office, yes?" He nodded. She held out her hand which he shook. "Welcome to VRL Investments," she said with a smile. "Now, go save us from disaster!"

Seeing he was being dismissed he stood up. "Th-thank you for this op-op- chance!"

She smiled and made a shooing motion with her hand as she turned back to her work.

He made his way to the door and as his hand touched the handle she called to him once more.

"I've received reports that our Internet connection is remaining stable. That's an excellent start! Keep it up!"

He smiled back at her and nodded.

He walked back to his office and stopped in surprise when he saw there was already a silver plaque with his name printed on it on the wall next to the door. It also said 'CIO'. He had to take a moment to absorb that.

When he stepped inside he saw Ms. Gunderan speaking in hushed tones with Paloma who burst into a smile when she saw him.

"Welcome to VRL, Mr. Garin!" she said cheerfully. The way she said the company name made it sound like she was saying 'virile'.

He smiled at her and nodded to the head of HR who returned the nod as she headed out.

Then Stanley was alone with the beautiful young woman with the bright smile.

"P-please call me Stanley."

"Oh! I couldn't do that Mr. Garin! It's disrespectful," she exclaimed with wide eyes.

"Wuh-we're the same age!" he blurted, starting to feel a little dizzy in her presence.

"Please, I'm an Executive Assistant. You, you're a Chief Information Officer!" she gushed and leaned forward over her desk towards him.

Suddenly Stanley's eyes were trapped in her deep... deep cleavage. He pulled his eyes away and saw she was looking at him expectantly. "Uh, what was I doing?"

"What would you like to do first?" she asked.

"Oh! Right, Ms. Villamor said you c-c-could get me all of Muh-Mr. Hokensev's documentation on the existing n-n-network inventory," he said. He gritted his teeth as he was becoming frustrated with his stuttering.

She nodded and walked out from behind her desk to enter his office. He followed and was stunned to see the blackout curtains were already gone, he had a pretty nice view, and the desk had been replaced with a modern glass and steel model. He noticed the lack of a computer on the desk but assumed they would let him pick his own. After all, he was in charge of that now.

He saw Paloma lean over one of the black filing cabinets against the wall and open a drawer. Was she intentionally wiggling her ass at him? No, it couldn't be. He pulled his mind back from where it was trying to go.

"Oh NO!" Paloma gasped.

"What is it?"

"His files! They've been destroyed!" she exclaimed.

He walked over to stand beside her and saw the drawer was full of ashes. "Someone burned them?"

Paloma had a stern look on her face. "It was probably Mr. Hokensev himself. He became rather... hostile in his last week with us."