Chapter 1
Room One – Degradation
Sullivan~
While I was used to working long hours, I was also very determined not to burn out from it.
As the owner and CEO of Gray Advanced Technologies, I had no wife or children to speak of, so it was safe to say that the company was my only pride and joy, and so it had my attention like a new mother with her firstborn.
For better or for worse, God had blessed me with the mind of a computer, and so technology had always fascinated me, and with the way that it evolved so quickly, I lived in my office more than I did at home, though that wasn’t a complaint.
I’d made my choices, and I didn’t regret any of them.
Plus, I was also still young enough to still have a wife and kids if I chose, which I could admit didn’t interest me just yet, if ever.
Luckily for me, where there was money, women weren’t far behind, and so my needs got taken care of plenty when I had some down time.
It was also fortunate that most of the women that ran in my circles knew the score and took what was offered without any drama.
For a man that had complete control over every aspect of his life, I didn’t do drama.
The second that emotions were thrown my way, I shut down like prison gates at the end of the night.
Now, that wasn’t to say that there was a huge hole where my heart should be, because that wasn’t the case.
My parents, Daryll and Leana Gray, had done a great job of raising me to be a decent human being and to consider others often.
However, there was a difference between offering compassion to someone in an emotional crisis and entertaining someone’s need for attention.
So, I was all for the former, just not the latter.
I was also very aware of all my shortcomings, to which I’d say that there were quite a few.
So, the last thing that I wanted to do was get myself a wife, then neglect her because I was addicted to work, which I was.
I lived for the thrill of a deal, and I thrived on pressure and deadlines.
In fact, I was at my best when faced with unexpected hiccups, and that was the very reason why I’d been able to celebrate my first million at only twenty-four.
Ten years later, I’d made my first billion, and one year after that, I had managed to turn that one billion into ten because I ate, slept, and breathed GAT.
Honestly, at this stage in the game, I wasn’t even sure if I’d know how to navigate an actual adult relationship with a woman.
I’d probably forget anniversaries, dinner dates, her birthday.
..you name it. There was also the fact that I was borderline obsessive-compulsive, so the idea of someone coming into my home and messing with my vibe was enough to make me break out in hives.
It was the very reason why I opted for hotel rooms when it came to a romantic night out.
I didn’t need anyone invading my personal space, and I wasn’t looking to treat anyone rudely while entertaining them.
I wasn’t that big of an asshole.
At any rate, I’d been going hard for the past three months with a new project in biomechanics, and I was due for a weekend off.
Now, while I never did crazy shit like vacation out of state or anything like that, I did have a nice mountain cabin that I liked to visit whenever I had some down time.
Usually, I was only able to get up there for a weekend, but two days out of the city did the soul a lot of good.
I also needed a break before attacking our newest endeavor, which reminded me that I needed to get to the conference room for our first meeting.
Now, while GAT had hundreds of facilities worldwide, it had only two administration buildings, the one in Colorado being the one that I called home.
The other one was located in London, but that was for convenience purposes only.
Unless there was an emergency, I only visited the London location twice a year, and for only one week at a time.
So, since our Colorado office was our true home, the building boasted of twenty floors, my office being on the top, giving me access to the rooftop, which came in handy when I needed to smoke, though I was doing my best to quit.
Still, despite my best efforts, there were times when it was a choice between nicotine and murder, and so I chose nicotine as the lesser of the two evils.
Anyway, the rest of the building had been designed for convenience with the first floor being the lobby, the second floor being nothing but conference rooms, the third, fourth, and fifth floors being administrative offices, the seventh floor being the cafeteria and break area, the eighth floor being the gym, the nineth, tenth, and eleventh floors being more administrative offices, floors twelve through sixteen being our labs, then it went R&D, legal, finance, and HR, leaving the twentieth floor to me, my two secretaries, and my administrative assistant.
My floor also had a conference room of its own, but it was usually only reserved for meetings with the heads of my departments, which I had in five minutes. So, grabbing the preliminary folder off my desk, I made my way out of my office, then headed over to meet with the others.
My secretaries were also the best in the business, and they never allowed anyone without an appointment to pass them without permission.
I likened Erica, Sarah, and my administrative assistant, Elton, to Cerberus, guarding the entrance to Hades.
All three were worth the salary that they were paid, and their annual bonuses rivaled those of my department heads.
Walking into the conference room, I saw that everyone was already here, which was expected if I was being honest. GAT’s recruiting team only went after the best, and if anyone was stealing any extraordinary talent from us, it was the CIA and FBI.
“Mr. Gray,” Martin Matthews immediately greeted. He was in charge of our research and development team, and just like all of my other department heads, he was expected to be hands-on with everything that touched R&D.
“Martin,” I greeted back as I took my seat at the head of the table. “Now, what does your team have for me?”
“Mind you, we’re just at the gestational point of this advancement, but we think that we can finally restore retinal degeneration disorder.
“That’s impossible,” I remarked confidently as I leaned back in my seat. “There are too many biochemical abnormalities in that type of disorder, which is why it hasn’t been done yet.”
“It’s all about protecting the cells within the retina, Mr. Gray,” Mitzi Bardot said, piping up, and if there was one thing that I hated about my job, it was this woman.
Mitzi fucking Bardot.
She was about five-foot-three, had dark brown hair, deep-sea blue eyes, curves that were inherently feminine, and was smarter than all the people in this building combined.
At thirty-four, she’d been working for Gray Advanced Technologies for a little over five years, and she had performed several miracles in those short five years.
When you looked at her academic achievements, it was quite clear that she’d been born a genius, and as a child prodigy, she’d won more awards than any one person needed.
However, it was her two Westinghouse awards for engineering education and advancement of science that were impressive as hell.
She’d won them both when she’d been only four-fucking-teen, and along with every development company in America, she’d also been recruited by every government agency in the world.
For someone with the first name Mitzi, the woman put Einstein to shame with what she was capable of.
However, like most women’s downfall, she’d fallen in love with an idiot, then had quit her job with goddamn Nautical Engineering to follow the fool here.
Granted, we’d been lucky as fuck to capitalize on Mitzi’s love life, but still.
Her boyfriend was IT for a telecommunications company, and though not a horrible job, he could have done that anywhere.
In my opinion, he should have followed her in chasing her dreams, not the other way around.
Plus, if it wasn’t enough that she was smarter than I was and could probably run GAT with one hand tied behind her back, she also made my dick hard whenever she opened her mouth, and that wasn’t a good thing.
From the moment that I’d started this company, I hadn’t ever messed with any of my employees, and that was a line that I refused to cross, no matter how attracted to the woman I was.
Even though there wasn’t a no-fraternization clause within these walls, the last thing that I wanted was for Mitzi Bardot to quit GAT because I had no experience with having a girlfriend.
Mitzi also wasn’t the type to do friends-with-benefits, so that definitely shut the door on anything possible between us.
“And you think that you’ve found a way to do that?
” I questioned, turning my attention from Martin to her.
“I mean, not for nothing, there are medical researchers and scientists that have been working for years on trying to reverse retinitis pigmentosa, Usher syndrome, and macular degeneration just to name a few.” I eyed her, and the fire in her eyes was really doing me no favors.
“What makes your research different, Ms. Bardot?”
“Well, may I ask if you’ve even read the preliminary reports or summary?” she asked tartly, and everyone else in the room immediately shifted uncomfortably, which was warranted since no one usually dared speak to me like that. “It would help to know before I go into too much or too little detail.”
“As I’ve always done with anything that’s ever been placed on my desk, I’ve read the report from front to back, Ms. Bardot,” I replied sharply, reminding her that I also had a bite with some sharp teeth.
“But did you understand it?” she shot back, and my dick immediately stood at attention.