Unwound (Mastered 2)

“He’s less patient in the dojo. He’s filling his time practicing katas.”

Amery frowned. “What’s a kata?”

“A series of flowing defensive movements that puts the art in martial arts. Since traditional jujitsu doesn’t have specific kata forms, Ronin memorized forms from judo, karate, and aikido. Crazy man. Who does stuff like that?”

A master. A man who wouldn’t ever be satisfied with mediocrity. A man who needed art and beauty in his life.

Gigi dropped off a plate of golden fried Rocky Mountain oysters.

Shiori said, “Please. Help yourself.”

“I’ll pass. You do know what those are, don’t you?”

“Yep.” She popped one in her mouth and chewed. “Calf nuts. Now I can truly scare my associates in Japan with the statement that I eat balls for lunch.”

Amery laughed.

She polished off the appetizer in no time and shoved the plate aside. “Now that we’ve cleared the air, let’s get down to business.”

“Business?”

“Yes. I tend to be brutally honest, so bear with me. I’ll get to the point, after I’ve made a few pre-points.”

Sounded like Amery might need another drink. “Okay.”

“Your company working on the packaging for the new line of Okada frozen foods wasn’t just a toss off to give you busywork at Ronin’s request. Maggie Arnold hadn’t been happy with our usual graphics team, and she needed an excuse to cut professional ties with them before they got wind of this new product line.”

“So I became the scapegoat?”

“To some extent. So in addition to sending you all the information, she chose five other companies she’d heard positive feedback on and sent them the specs too.”

“Where are these companies located?”

“Los Angeles. Chicago. Houston. San Francisco. Minneapolis.”

All major players with unlimited resources. How much would it suck if their proposals made her mock-ups look like grade school art projects. “And?”

Shiori stirred her drink. “And when I became aware of the situation and Ronin’s request of your company to submit ideas, I felt a little smug. Surely your state school college education and small company in a smaller ad and PR market would produce inferior results.”

Amery waited, expecting the most insulting portion of this conversation was yet to come.

“I expected to show my brother proof of your inability to design products for major international markets by having a comparison to the other companies’ samples. But the strangest thing has happened in the past few weeks after you left your designs with me.”

“What? You spilled tea on them and improved them or something?”

She smiled. “So defensive and paranoid. Not that I blame you. I forwarded your designs to Maggie. Once we had all of them, I flew to Seattle. Maggie and I pored over every single concept. And every single one was unoriginal, boring, or just plain lazy. None of the companies had followed the parameters; they’d given us what they envisioned instead of working with our vision.” Shiori locked her gaze to Amery’s. “The graphic artists with MFAs and MBAs and art school degrees can’t compete with a company that doesn’t have anything to lose and puts everything on the line. Your designs did that. They were far, far superior to anything we’d seen and surpassed our expectations.”

When Amery drained her drink, Shiori laughed.

“I’m not dragging this out to make you uneasy, but you deserve to know what you were up against and how the selection process works for a global conglomerate. We showed all six designs to Maggie’s team without any indication of what company had done which product. They unanimously chose your vision. We then forwarded the proposals to the team in charge of branding, concepts, and marketing, and once again, your designs were picked. So then we put it to the ultimate test.”

“Your grandfather.”

“Yes, the big, bad CEO, the man who hasn’t met an idea he can’t crush.”

Amery found herself holding her breath.

“He approved the proposal.”

“Omigod.” She swallowed hard. “Does Ronin know?”

Shiori leaned forward. “No. I wanted to make it very clear to you that this is all you. Your concept, your designs. Ronin put you on our radar, but that’s it. I don’t want you to believe that Ronin has any part in Okada offering you a contract.”

“A contract?” Before she could ask specifics, the food arrived.

Shiori immediately dug in and left the conversation hanging.

Amery was too keyed up to politely nibble on a sandwich and a plate of fruit. Ideas spun around in her head. So did fear.

“Amery,” Shiori said sharply. “I can hear your stomach growling. Eat.”

“You sound like your brother.” But she ate all of it. She even asked Gigi to bring her a slice of chocolate-chip cheesecake.

When she couldn’t stand it any longer, she blurted, “So you mentioned a contract?”

“We’ve come up with a couple of contract options because Okada definitely wants your designs. We pay very well. Yet, if you feel you’ve been overpaid because of your relationship with an Okada heir, I can let you see other, similar contracts.”

“I’d appreciate that. And forgive me if I’m acting spacey, but this is a huge shock. After everything that happened, I literally put the work I’d done on the project out of my mind and focused on my existing clients. I never imagined that you’d do anything with my proposal besides toss it in the trash. Not that I didn’t think it was good. I just believed the whole thing had been a setup from the start and I’d never really had a chance.”