The Light of Hidden Flowers Read Online Free Page B

I headed out into the blinding spring sun, and down the brick-lined street to Ellie’s. I reserved my eating pleasure for no one. I loved food, from a perfectly toasted English muffin with melted butter oozing from its golden nooks, to Ellie’s homemade soup, to the fanciest five-star restaurant. In Ellie’s little lunch shop, she made three soups daily. Today I was compelled to choose between (1) portabella mushroom, sausage, and kale; (2) broccoli cheddar; or (3) tomato-basil with pesto drizzle. I selected the tomato, and licked my lips as Ellie tore a nice hunk of bread from the crusty loaf. “A pecan bar, too,” I said, pointing to her dessert case. It was my birthday, after all.
    Back at my desk, I ate my tomato-basil while I charted beta. Today I was researching a stock I’d been following for a few months, ZelInc, a data storage company. I went through my twelve-step process. Though I had run these numbers countless times before, I now ran them again. I looked at revenue, because the health of a stock started with its ability to make money. Next I analyzed the earnings per share. If revenue was the measure of how much money a company was taking in, earnings per share was the gauge of how much was flowing down to the shareholders. Then I divided the average shareholder equity during the past twelve months by the net profit the company had made during that time. This gave me my return on equity and showed me how efficiently the company was producing a return for the owners. I went on to calculate the PEG ratio, the weighted alpha. I read up on what other analysts were saying about this stock, what the insiders were buying, as well as a handful of other metrics to help my decision-making process.
    Before I knew it, hours had passed and it was already three o’clock. Jenny knocked on my door. “Guess who is on the phone?”
    I shrugged.
    “Mr. Fancy-Pants from this morning.” She gave a smug smile.
    “Mr. Longworth?”
    “You got it.”
    “And?”
    “He wants to talk to your father.”
    “Should I take it?” Dad had already been on the golf course for a couple of hours.
    Jenny nodded and then left my office. I considered calling after her, asking her to take a message, but I had been a big enough coward today. The least I could do was take this call.
    I inhaled a gallon of air, blew it out slowly. I smiled before answering, a trick Dad had taught me, a trick Dale Carnegie books and tapes had taught him years ago. “Mr. Longworth, hello, this is Melissa Fletcher. My father isn’t here right now.”
    “We’ve decided to go with your firm.” His tone was adamant. “We don’t want to interview the others. We want your father. Your firm.” Now his tone was pleading, almost frantic, like he was begging the store clerk at American Girl on Christmas Eve for the last Girl of the Year doll for his daughter.
    “I’ll talk to him,” I said.
    “Put in a good word for us, will you?”
    “I will.”
    “And happy birthday,” he added.
    I called Dad on his cell phone, the flip-top variety that did nothing other than take and make calls. I told him about Longworth. “Missy, tell him I’ll think about it. Tell him I’m not sure if it’s a good fit. Tell him I’ll consider it, and will get back to him by Monday.”
    “It’s only Thursday, Dad. This guy sounds like he’s going to blow a gasket.”
    “By Monday, Missy. Let me think about it.”
    I returned Mr. Longworth’s call. “So now he’s interviewing me ?” he scoffed. “I’m now begging this guy to take my ten million dollars?”
    “If he says yes,” I said, “you won’t be sorry.”

    Before I shut down my computer, I typed Mr. Longworth’s name into the search engine: three pages of entries, all related to his business in wires. Then I typed in “Elizabeth Longworth,” and I was surprised to see a fair amount of entries registered for her, too. Only hers were related to the work she did as a board member for the One by One Foundation,