When she's out of tears she checks the clock on her phone: it's late but still not that late. She texts her father and Peter Rabbit not to expect her in until "a bit later" because she's got work to do.
Doesn't she just? This is an absolute disaster.
Gemma is exhausted, her chest hurts and her eyes are red and puffy so she's probably done enough crying. Until this week never had she ever done that either, but it turns out she doesn't like it and it's no use anyway.
What she's got to do now is try and get Queen Bees out of this mess. She's not entirely sure that's even possible, but there's a slim chance that the purchase order she counter signed two days ago hasn't actually been delivered to the French warehouse guys yet. If she can pull out of that contract then she can pull out of the Montage deal too, and then she'll be back at square one and it'll be humiliating, but it won't be the end of Queen Bees yet. She calls Hari, apologises for the late hour and asks her to forward the tracking link from the courier.
Hari duly sends it, Gemma opens it: the letter was delivered yesterday at 2:37pm so that's it: no luck, too late. Queen Bees are contractually committed to spending money that they can't get without selling out to Montage. They are, in corporate parlance, completely and utterly screwed.
Gemma stands up and starts pacing around her desk, Agnes-style. Then she opens the door and starts pacing the corridors too, since at this hour she's the only one in the building anyway.
If there is one person in the world whom she hates even more than herself or Frank right now, it's Rob. The self-same Rob, who all those years back interrupted her first kiss with Dylan, has been Queen Bees' corporate banker ever since they registered the company and raised debt to pay for their launch. Rob is the one who arranged the loan, and strongly advised them to save on interest charges by making that loan convertible into voting Queen Bee shares, which back then weren't worth diddly squat to anyone.
Rob then placed this convertible debt, or warrants, with various long-term investors attracted more by their yield than by the Socially Responsible Investing credentials offered by Queen Bees. As far as Gemma knows none of the warrants have ever changed hands since – or indeed been converted into shares. Because rule number one of warrants, as they teach you at corporate finance school, is that it always pays to keep the option to convert them, rather than to convert them.
All this time Montage, starting with that two-pretty-faced complete and utter tosser Frank, have been assuring her that they were not seeking to acquire a controlling stake in Queen Bees. And getting a blooming great valuation for it too. But of course, as effing Frank would say with his delicious hint of a French accent, to Montage converting a few warrants is all they need to become controlling majority shareholders after Gemma and Agnes have stupidly signed the other 49% of Queen Bees over to them.
It's no wonder, Gemma thinks as she u-turns in front of the deserted reception desk, that Montage have been pushing for a stake ever closer to 50%: minimum dollar investments had nothing to do with it. On that too, Frank has been lying through his teeth. Did Geoff even ever go on a corporate governance holiday, or was that just an excuse for them to buy time – and more of Queen Bees' warrants?
How could she not have thought about the warrants? She should have. She should have… checked. It's not like Dylan didn't… no, she won't think of Dylan. Dylan had no clue about the warrants either anyway, or he would have told her – and enjoyed it too. Dylan's problem with the deal was only ever that he didn't like or trust Frank. In hindsight, of course, he wasn't wrong. But he also wasn't terribly specific.
And anyway this isn't Dylan's fault, it's hers: she should have thought of the warrants. She should have closed that loophole, somehow. Refinanced them with non-convertible instruments before she sought new investors, that's it. Yes, that's what she should have done. Oh, but the blasted things hadn't changed hands in a decade!
So more to the point, she thinks, u-turning in front of the gender-neutral toilets: how could Rob not have thought to flag this to her? These warrants were his idea in the first place, and obviously he was involved in the Montage deal all along too. Tempting though it is to think Rob evil, it's much more likely he simply forgot, or couldn't be bothered. Plus, as well as being lazy and barely competent Rob has always been greedy, and right now he's getting a cut on both sides of every Queen Bees' warrant that changes hands, so why draw attention to it?
Well, this is what comes of picking your corporate banker with your heart instead of your head. Dylan did warn her about Rob too, said he was useless, but then Dylan's always had a thing against Rob as well. For obvious reasons. But when Rob pitched to her he actually did a decent job, even though he was going through a breakup at the time, so she took pity on him and now…
Now the irony is that she's lumped with only this stupid, lazy, ugly Rob to talk to. She tried Dylan a number of times whilst pacing the corridors, and he definitely meant it about ghosting her because she's not even getting as far as voicemail. She u-turns in front of reception again and starts another lap of the office.
His loss: Dylan will miss out on the satisfaction of being proved right on Frank. One might call it a tragedy, given how much Dylan likes being right at her expense. Gemma tries not to focus on how many things Dylan was right about, in retrospect. It makes her want to cry all over again, and she mustn't.
She also can't tell Agnes, not until she's figured out the best way out of this, she decides as she u-turns by the loos. Should Gemma break the contract with the warehouse company, leading to a lawsuit and almost certain bankruptcy? Or should they take Montage's money to pay for the warehouse, and then wait to be sacked from their own company so it can be pulled apart? The brand is probably all Montage are really after, so they can sell it to some soulless L'Oreal or Estee Lauder.
She knew she shouldn't have signed that purchase order, she thinks as she u-turns again. She knew it. That price was too good to be true. Well of course it was, the French warehouse guys are already majority owned by Montage, so they do what they're told. Gemma wonders whether they too were once a promising company, eager to grow. She wonders what else they've been made to do against their will, besides selling their services at fire-sale prices in order to entrap Montage's next preys. All those poor software engineers in Poland and India were probably French once, and working out of Bretigny sur Orges.
If Montage do take over, Gemma thinks with a shudder as she u-turns again, she and Agnes must leave first, not wait to be sacked. God knows what that will do to Agnes' mental health…
Hopefully Agnes might still go back to running hives in Africa as a charity? But what about Hari? What about Patience, in Obuasi? What about…
No no no, tears will not help. She has already established that: enough! The only thing she can do at this stage is keep quiet, and buy time, and pray for a miracle. After all, clearly Montage still haven't got enough warrants to go ahead with the deal, so until they do, this whole nightmare is not quite real yet. It's happening, but it's not happened.
She'd better call Rob. She takes a deep breath, then tries to breathe out like she's blowing out candles, the way Agnes made her do on Monday, but it doesn't work. Bah, who cares, she'll try breathing again after she's called Rob. God, she hates Rob!
x
She rings and rings again, and on the third lot of ten rings he finally picks up:
"Gemma," he pants.
"Rob, at last," she fake-laughs, "am I interrupting some quality midweek extra-marital hanky-panky?"
"Ha ha, oh, Gemma, they don't make them like you anymore!" Rob laughs back even more awkwardly.
Though Gemma was only joking, hoping to flatter him, she is now 99% sure she was right. She can literally picture him pulling his trousers back up, and it's not a pretty picture. She is also 100% certain that that picture is neither helpful nor relevant right now, though Rob does have a lovely, much wronged wife and two young children up in Harpenden.
"Well I'm sorry to call you at a bad time but I'm afraid we have a bit of a situation here, Rob. How long have you been selling our warrants?"
"I, uh, I'll have to… can we talk about this in the morning? I think I have a slot free at eleven if you want to go for a coffee? I've known you too long to offer you cake but we can…"
"Oh I'm sorry but I'm afraid not, Rob. Just a few minutes of your time now, if you don't mind? It's rather urgent or I wouldn't have called."
"But I…"
"It's OK, finish whatever you were doing, I'll wait."
There are noises in the background, some of them consistent with zipping up, some with whining about her, and some with slamming doors, and then the background noises go away and Rob says a chirpy and completely brazen:
"So, Gemma, what can I do you for?"
"It's about our warrants: how long have people been buying them?"
"Funny you should ask, we have indeed had renewed interest from several private banks…"
"How interesting. And how many did you sell?"
"Well, actually,"
Well, actually? Rob is going to well actually her? Now? This is not to be believed. If Dylan could… but no, never mind Dylan – though he literally did tell her so.
Rob goes on about how he's received applications from various buyers but unfortunately he's not been immediately able to fulfil these orders, having so successfully placed the original issue with long-term investors, mostly at family offices, all with solid SRI credentials.
So now with the rising popularity of Socially Responsible Investing Rob's sure there's going to be pent up demand for Queen Bee's debt and perhaps she should consider raising another tranche? Only once the Montage deal is through, obviously, so they keep to their leverage covenants. Anyway, in the meantime Rob has put feelers out to the current holders of the warrants and he's hoping to facilitate some sizeable transactions over the next few days, which could be very beneficial to all parties.
By which he means that he's going to take a cut from both sides and line his pockets yet again, the idiot, whilst blissfully sending Queen Bees to the slaughter.
"OK, Rob, that sounds really great, but now here's the issue."
"I don't see any issue."
"It's Montage, you see. It's Montage who are trying to buy our warrants. They're not random private banks, Rob, they're Montage's bankers. We overheard them discuss it a couple of hours ago."
Silence from the usually garrulous Rob, then:
"What?"
"I know, right. Who'd have thought?" Gemma says bitterly. Certainly not Rob, by the sound of his silence. Gemma waits for the cogs to finish turning inside his thick skull. Until he realises the full implications of what he's been doing:
"So… even if you only sign 49% of the existing equity over to Montage…"
"…then if they exercise about a quarter of our warrants in issue, they'll be majority shareholders, that's right," Gemma says, hastening him along.
"Hmm, well I don't think you can sign your deal with them then."
Funny how now that it's a dud he's calling it her deal. To hear him a week ago you'd have thought the deal was entirely his personal doing. But as Gemma's Headmistress used to say at boarding school: if you can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all. How right she was, but how difficult it is sometimes not to say anything, when there are so many completely obvious nasty things one could be saying. Gosh, what a marvellous life people like Dylan must have, speaking their minds all the time.
No no, never mind Dylan. It's Rob's ego she needs to be massaging right now. And it's not usually very difficult.
"You know, I think you're right, Rob. In hindsight and for all the due diligence work we've already done for them, I would much rather not do the deal with Montage anymore."
"Yeah that's a shame, Gemma."
"Aha, I mean first thing they'd do after sacking me is sack you, right? And we couldn't be having that," she can't help reminding him.
"Certainly couldn't! Shall i write to them that we're pulling out of the deal then? I can do that for you, Gemma, don't worry. I can handle them it's no problem, no problem at all."
How nice of him: seriously, as if she needed him for that.
"Well that's awfully kind of you, Rob, thanks. But see, the problem is we just signed a purchase order with that automated warehousing company in France. Remember those credit checks you had to rush through for us on Monday?"
"Oh yeah?"
"So… we're committed to buying a unit off them within twelve weeks."
"Aha…"
Seriously, is she going to have to spell this out?
"Which obviously we don't have the money to do, unless we sign with Montage. But we're still liable to the French… do you get me now?"
"Hmm, yes, I see. You shouldn't have done that."
Thanks for telling me at the time, Gemma doesn't say. Instead she does say:
"Quite, Rob. Quite. But you see, we're in a bit of a bind now. I'm sure it'll all resolve itself in the end, but in the meantime I don't think it would be helpful for any of the parties involved not to think everything's completely tickedy-boo. I just need to stall, Rob. Do you think you can help me stall this until we've come up with a solution? All you need to do is not sell those warrants."
"Hmm…"
He makes it sound difficult. As if he hadn't been blissfully doing just that for the last ten years: not sell her warrants.
"I realise this is a huge ask, Rob," she lies, "especially after all the legwork you've already put in. But I really think your interests and Queen Bees are aligned on this one. I don't think you guys have a relationship with Montage, do you? They already have three or four banks they work with, so if I have to sign this deal and they vote me out of my job, I think you'll lose a lot more than commission on a quarter of our warrants…"
She lets this sink in for a moment.
"I think I can probably buy you a few weeks," Rob says in the end, "Though this is really difficult for me, you know. Pulling back on some transactions I've personally facilitated, it's not going to be easy but… for you, Gemma..."
For her? Yeah right, he's saving his own skin, and asking her to be grateful. If there's one good thing about this whole nightmare, and there can't be many, it's that if Queen Bees go down they'll be taking Rob down with them.
"That's really great, Rob, I really appreciate that. Thanks for taking my call. I knew I could count on you."
"Not a problem," he lies.
"Pleasure talking to you," she lies back. She'd better get used to lying.
A Bee in her Bonnet is Copyright Mel Liffragh 2021, all rights reserved.