#3
I jotted on the legal pad in front of me: $990MM. Cash/stock.
Justin looked over my shoulder as I did this. I resisted the urge to shield the notepad with my arm.
“Now, I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that the purchase price has to be kept under wraps til we can get this binding term sheet signed,” Lassiter continued, talking only to Adler.
“Of course.” Adler nodded and turned quickly to me. “Make a note to send Ted a quick-and-dirty NDA to look at. Let’s get that signed up before we even get to a draft of the term sheet.”
I scribbled rapidly on my notepad.
“What’s happening to the top executives over there?” Adler asked. “Anyone staying on, or are they all parachuting out?”
“A bunch of top guys are going out on parachutes,” Lassiter replied, “but we’re mainly interested in keeping Jack Barstow on.” He leaned toward Adler conspiratorially. “That’s Fred Binney’s right-hand man. Youngest COO in the history of the company.”
The name rang a bell. “Barstow,” I repeated. “That’s the guy who gets credit for bringing Binney’s revenues up forty percent over the last four years, isn’t he?”
You could practically hear every head in the room swiveling in my direction. From the corner of my eye I was aware of Marty Adler blinking furiously at me.
“That’s right,” Lassiter said slowly. He was looking straight at me now, as if seeing me for the first time.
I pressed on. “Word on the street is he’s pissed that he spent four years slaving away to get their offshore drilling operations up and running, only to learn old man Binney’s looking to sell.
He’s probably talking to a bunch of headhunters already.
We’ll definitely want a key-man provision in the term sheet. ”
No one spoke for a few seconds. Then Lassiter cleared his throat. “That’s very impressive,” he said, grinning. “Now how’d you know that about Barstow?”
“Oil and Gas Investor,” I shot back, with my first real smile since this meeting had started.
“You read Oil and Gas Investor?” He sat back in his chair, folding his hands across the formidable expanse of his belly.
“I read a lot of things,” I said sweetly. My chin was up. I met Lassiter’s gaze directly and held it. I’m glad we finally understand each other.
Lassiter turned toward Adler. “Very impressive, Marty. I gotta hand it to you.”
Adler’s expression changed back from alarm to casual confidence. “What did I tell you?” Then, clearing his throat, “Now, getting back to the term sheet—”
“That’s terrific,” Lassiter continued. He laughed and cocked his head back toward Adler.
“Beautiful, with brains, too. Now, Marty, when you told me on the phone that Ingrid Yung would be handling our deal, I expected some sour-faced old fr?ulein. Believe me, I’d rather work with a pretty little Asian gal any day. ”
“He said what?”
Murph sat crossways in one of the armchairs opposite my desk, his long legs dangling over the side. We’d just gone to Starbucks for our morning coffee run. I was spreading cream cheese onto my whole-wheat everything bagel, and Murph was balancing a tiny paper football on his knee, aiming it at me.
“I swear, that’s a direct quote,” I said. “You should have seen Adler’s face.”
Murph burst out laughing.
Jeff Murphy had a distinctive laugh. It was sort of halfway between a hyena and a rooster. On anyone else, it would be obnoxious. On Murph, it was endearing.
“And then,” I continued, “as Lassiter’s leaving, he turns to me and says, ‘I’m glad my wife won’t be meeting you. She’d never believe you were our lawyer!’ ”
Murph hooted. We were both laughing now. I somehow felt reassured by his reaction.
“Actually, though, he kind of has a point,” said Murph. “How did two Chinese immigrants decide to name their kid Ingrid?”
I got this question a lot.
Asian parents often name their American kids in a complete cultural vacuum.
That’s why you see so many hapless Normans and Eugenes, why there’d been a Eunice Kim, a Florence Liu, and an Elvis Chang in my graduating class at Yale.
As a kid, I’d longed to be a Jennifer. I’d gotten off lucky, though. It could have been worse. Much worse.
“My parents went to see Casablanca when they were dating back in Taipei,” I explained. “I was named after Ingrid Bergman.”
“Nice.” Murph nodded. “Well, think of it this way, Yung. The CEO of a Fortune 500 company thinks you’re hot. You are hot. What’s so bad about that?”
I rolled my eyes. But a tiny, agreeable thrill went through me.
“Anyway, did Adler have anything to say about it?”
“He came into my office after the meeting to go over some points for the term sheet. On his way out, he apologized for Lassiter’s ‘politically incorrect’ remarks.”
Murph turned up his palms. “See that? Even Adler recognizes the guy’s an asshole.”
“Yeah, but he’s a paying asshole,” I shot back. “What if Lassiter does something even worse, and I end up having to beg off the deal? What’s that going to look like at my partnership review?”
Murph shook his head. “You’re being dramatic. Trust me, you’re going to do just fine at your partnership review. For fuck’s sake, Marty Adler just handpicked you to run the biggest deal in the office! I’d quit worrying if I were you.”
He had a point.
For a moment neither of us spoke. Murph drained the last of his Frappuccino.
“So, anyway, what’s going on with you?” I said quickly, dabbing at a dollop of cream cheese at the corner of my mouth. “What are you up to this week?”
He looked at me and grinned. “Anna Jergensen.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Who’s Anna Jergensen?”
“Paralegal at Debevoise.”
I shook my head.
I had a theory about why every reasonably well-groomed thirty-something male in New York with an apartment and a college degree appeared to have his pick of women, while so many successful, intelligent single women couldn’t find a date to save our lives.
It was this: For better or worse, women in this town only wanted to date up, or at least laterally.
Men, however, were free to date up and down and over and under the age, education, and career gradients with reckless abandon and no one ever batted an eye.
This was why twenty-four-year-old Debevoise paralegals, forty-eight-year-old MILFs, cute belly-pierced bartenders, Croatian au pairs, Hooters waitresses, and NYU undergrads were all fair game for guys like Murph.
Yet my single women friends—doctors, lawyers, professors, consultants—always seemed to limit themselves to men who matched or exceeded their own age, education, and income level.
It was a completely self-defeating strategy.
“And? What’s she like?” I asked.
He shrugged. “We’ll see. I think she was a gorgeous girl, but there was something that kept her from being a complete ten. You know, like when a pretty girl can’t walk in heels or something.”
“What a shame.” I shook my head mournfully.
“Plus,” Murph continued, “it was pretty dark in the bar where I met her. She may be kind of a bakkushan.”
A moment passed as I chewed my bagel. “Okay,” I said. “I give up. What’s a bakkushan?”
Murph grinned. “It’s the Japanese word for a chick who looks hot from behind, but from the front, not so much.”
I shook my head. Poor Anna Jergensen, whoever she was.
As the only senior female M&A associate left at the firm, I was used to this.
While Murph could come to work and recount all the gory details of his dating exploits—and did, ad nauseam, to the great amusement of Hunter, me, and all of our colleagues—I never talked to any of the guys in the office about my romantic life.
Granted, there’d been nothing to tell for the last two and a half years, but that was beside the point.
Gloria Steinem notwithstanding, there was still a clear double standard for men and women when it came to talking about our sex lives in the office.
In Murph’s case, it was almost expected, the bawdier, the better. In my case, it would seem unprofessional at best—and at worst, slutty.
“You gonna make it to the outing this year?” asked Murph.
Parsons Valentine was about to hold its annual firm outing at a Westchester country club.
It always took place on a Friday, and the firm gave secretaries and paralegals the day off—which sounds like a magnanimous gesture until you stop to consider that they were not invited to the outing itself.
It was strictly for the lawyers and summer associates.
As with all firm events, attendance was surreptitiously taken.
“Do I have a choice?” I said.
Murph shrugged. “Not really.”
“Then I guess I’ll be at the outing, won’t I?”
He waggled his eyebrows at me. “Bringing your bikini this year, Yung?”
“Keep dreaming, Murph.”
He laughed. “Oh, I will, Yung. I will.”
My phone rang, and we both glanced at the display:
MARTIN J. ADLER x3736
Murph gave me a crisp military salute. “Guess you need to get that,” he said, unfolding his limbs from my chair and rising.
At the door he turned back around. “Not to say I told you so, but I knew you should have looked busy that day Adler came calling. Now you’ve ruined your whole summer! ” He shook his head in mock pity.
“Bite me, Murph,” I called after him. But I was smiling.
Murph was jealous, and we both knew it.