Cufflink Ch. 01

This story has little sexual activity so if that's your bag, please try elsewhere.

Cufflinks

This is a very ordinary tale in many respects. Similar stories abound, but its different when the events are real and you are the husband finding out too late just what it's like to be shafted by your wife and employer. This happened to me just in the last twelve months and the fallout from her affair still rumbles on.

My name is Craig Anderson and at the time this story started I was aged thirty three. I am the team leader of a sales team comprising of myself and three others. I work for SAM Engineering and until recently I have been happy to work there. The company was founded by Samuel Peters and we have a proud reputation in the machine tool market. Our machines are used by many companies both at home and abroad. My wife, Kirsty also works for SAME, but in a more senior position than me. She was the one who first interviewed me when I applied to work there. She was in HR and during the following ten years rose to be the head of department and she now sits on the board of the company. Until the events that have led to my present situation, we both reported to Sam Peters our MD along with the Operations Manager, Colin Dawes and Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Darren Malloy. The company wasn't huge but we employed almost two hundred and fifty manufacturing staff and an office staff of forty five, covering my group, Sales and Marketing plus Procurement, HR, Accounts and Finance.

Kirsty, is a pretty, smart lady and at 36 years old is the embodiment of a successful working mother and wife. After I was offered the job with SAME, we started seeing each other regularly culminating in our marriage eight years ago. We have only one child, our son, Andrew or Andy for short who is eight years old. Yes, I can do the maths as well and Kirsty was very pregnant when we got hitched. Some months after Andrew's birth, Kirsty suffered some complications and as a result we were advised not to have any additional children. We discussed it and decided that I would have a vasectomy as this is less intrusive an operation. We were both devastated as we had originally planned on having three kids, but we had to be satisfied with just the one.

In common with most couples, our sex life in those early years was explosive! Anytime, anywhere was our mantra and that led to a few close encounters with strangers almost catching us in compromising situations. Kirsty has an exhibitionist streak and we both liked to have sex in circumstances where we may have been observed. As our responsibilities grew, that lust for new and exciting sexual encounters diminished and our sex life is now what I consider to be very tame. Kirsty and I have talked about pepping up our love life, but that's about as far as we have got. Something always seems to get in the way and if one pre-plans these things, the result is never as good as the spontaneous couplings we used to enjoy so much.

Our problem started when Kirsty warned me that Sam Peters was intending to cut back on his working hours. His wife Viv had been diagnosed with cancer and he wanted to be there for her during her chemotherapy treatments. Sam had instructed Kirsty make a job offer to Jeremy Todd. Sam was best friends with Jeremy's father and knew the family well. Jeremy started and within a few months had shaken up nearly every department. Don't get me wrong, some of the things he introduced were long overdue, new accounting practices, modernising the manufacturing tools and equipment were his early successes. Until now, he had left my Sales and Marketing to our own devices. We had our sales targets and as a team, we delivered them! I thought that we, as a company were working well as a team and maybe that led to a bit of complacency on my part. We lost one of our established customers to our main competition and Jeremy led the resulting debrief session. It turned out that we had lost out not on customer care nor on any quality or delivery problem, but on a straight forward pricing! I, as Sales leader could not complain, I had the discretion to negotiate on price as long as we made the target profit, but Gary Border, our Sales Representative responsible for this particular customer had not briefed me on any price problems. He believed that we were on course to get a renewal, but I should have personally verified the situation and I failed to do so, so the buck stops with me!

So until this business setback, things were rolling along pretty nicely as far as my career and family life was concerned. That changed when we lost that contract. It was not a major loss, the revenue from that contract only made a slight dent in our figures and we would soon more than recover the ground lost with the new business we had won, but it must have made Jeremy rethink the Sales operation. He started to take a far greater interest in my department, constantly asking questions and meddling with our internal procedures.

It was during this time that my relationship with Kirsty started to suffer. I was working damn hard to ensure that we had no more reverses on our existing customer base. This meant a lot more travel to visit our established customers and generally keep on top of their current issues. Kirsty too, was spending longer hours in the office, planning for the future was how she described it. I wasn't formally on the board on SAME, but I was normally kept appraised of what was being planned. Not anymore! I was being squeezed out of the decision making process and I resented it in some ways. In others, it was an advantage because I could use the time to develop new contacts with an eye to future sales. It didn't bother me too much as Kirsty was always there and she would tell me if anything important affecting me was planned, or so I thought!

The first sign of the troubles to come arose when I received an angry call from one of my best customers, Jack Simmonds of Simmonds Industries. He was furious about a letter he had received from SAME regarding our future terms and conditions. He emailed me a copy and I immediately saw why! I apologised and told him that it was all news to me too and that I would sort it. I asked him to give me a few hours to get back to him. He told me in no uncertain terms that he was intending to tender his business regardless. He had been intending to simply renew our contract, but was so upset about the letter that he was determined to 'test the market' as he put it.

Now, I was furious, the loss of this business would hurt us badly. Simmonds Industries represented about fifteen percent of our turnover and that was serious! The real annoyance was that I had discussed this renewal with Jack only the month before and was confident that he would renew our contract. Now we would have to prepare and submit costly a costly proposal in terms of man hours and there was little chance of us procuring the business such was Jack's anger!

Clutching the letter, I stormed into Jeremy Todd's office and was surprised to see Kirsty and him sitting with their heads close together, discussing something. They looked up with a surprised look on their faces at the intrusion. It was then I noticed another man sitting opposite them with a smug look on his face.

Jeremy said, "Ah Craig! Just the man. I was about to call you and invite you to meet your new boss, but you have saved me the bother."

That stopped me dead in my tracks! New boss! I looked at my wife with the unasked question on my lips and she had the grace to blush and just nod her head slightly in confirmation. I was to get a new boss and she must have recruited him and didn't think to tell me that it was happening! I was stunned more than angry. I felt betrayed that she had gone through what had to be a long recruitment cycle and never a word to me about it! She must have known how I would react to that and the fact that she had not even hinted that it was happening hurt me more than anything else.

Jeremy interrupted our silent communication by making the introductions. "Craig, this is Alex Young and I have recruited him to expand the Sales and Marketing side of the business. The economy is recovering and getting more buoyant. We are entering into a major expansion of the company and I think that Alex is the right man to lead this exciting development."

Alex Young stood up and offered his hand to me. More from force of habit than any desire to be friendly, I shook his hand and mumbled something about wishing him well. I then turned back to Jeremy and threw the letter down on his desk. As he picked it up and scanned it I demanded, "Did you send this out?"

He confirmed that he had and I replied, "Well Alex here has his first challenge! He will have to find some new customers to replace Simmonds Industries as a client. I have just had their MD on the phone and he is livid about the content and tone of that letter! We were going to get an automatic renewal letter this week and now, thanks to you and that letter, he is determined to go out to tender! I don't need to tell you just how much business Simmonds represents to us but if you had told me that you were about to issue major changes to our T&C's, I may have been able to sugar coat the pill a little. Have you sent it to any of our other customers?"

Without waiting for his response I ranted on, "Because if you have, I can expect a lot more calls like the one from Jack Simmonds. What were you thinking of?"

It was an angry Jeremy Todd that stood up and came around his desk to plant himself in front of me. He pointed his forefinger at me and stopped just short of stabbing it into my chest, "Don't you dare challenge my decisions! You are just a salesman and it's your job to secure our customer base and that includes any T&C's that we introduce in the best interests of the company. If it wasn't for your wife supporting you, I would have seriously considered your position. In my opinion, the Sales group have not been pulling their weight and you, as team leader must carry the can for that! Now I expect you to work with Alex here to redeem the situation with Simmonds Industries."

Well at least I now knew I had no future at SAME but I had a mortgage and family to support, so I managed to keep my temper in check with great difficulty. I backed one step away from him before I said or did something I would later regret. Instead I turned to Alex Young and said, "Best of luck with your new job. I wish you every success. With a boss like him, you're going to need it!"

Kirsty sensing what I was about to do, grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the door, "Please Craig, don't do anything rash. You are upset, that's understandable, but please wait until tonight when we can discuss the situation rationally!"

I looked at my wife and for the first time since we had met, I loathed the very sight of her. I felt betrayed and angry, so angry that I simply said, "You're wrong about that! I'm not upset at our illustrious leader, we all make mistakes of judgement, there are extenuating circumstances relating to the Sales team performance and both you and Sam Cummins knew and accepted them. But I am fucking angry that I have been blindsided by the woman who purports to love me! That's what really hurts! I don't give a shit about Alex Young's job, in light of what's happened here today, he's welcome to it. No my issue is with you and your attitude to me. Whatever made you think that I would accept someone coming in over my head, especially when my wife was responsible for recruiting him and never let on to her husband that it was even on the horizon?" I hissed at her, trying unsuccessfully to keep my voice low.

Jeremy Todd must have heard because he interjected, "Kirsty had no choice, she was sworn to secrecy. I made the decision not to tell anyone until the deal was done. If word had gotten out about Alex joining SAME, it would have placed him in an untenable position with previous employer. In hindsight, I was wrong, I should have brought you into our confidence and for that I apologise. I also apologise for issuing that letter without consulting you. It was a crass misjudgement and we need you to work with us to placate our customers."

I was somewhat placated myself by his ready admission and apology. A boss who could realise his errors and be man enough to face up to them, was a man worthy of respect. It still didn't absolve my wife who had been listening intently to our exchange and I noticed that she was looking at Jeremy Todd with a look that she had once reserved only for me! It was a look bordering on adoration and when she noticed me watching her, she quickly changed her expression to one of sympathy for me. I didn't want her sympathy, I wanted her love and trust and she had withheld her trust in me or maybe both, love and trust. I just wasn't sure anymore.

I turned and left the office without replying and with Kirsty hot on my heels. She caught up with me and pleaded with me to calm down. I told her that we would talk later at home, meantime I had some thinking to do.

We did talk at home and she eventually persuaded me that she could not and would not break her word after she had given it even if it led to problems in our marriage. One part of me could understand where she was coming from, but the other part could not accept what I felt was her betrayal. When we eventually retired for the night, the issue was still unresolved and Kirsty took it upon herself to prove that she loved me. The make up sex that night was terrific! We even had sex al fresco on the garden swing the next night when the weather was really too hot inside.

My situation at SAME was difficult to say the least. Word of my blow up at Mr Todd was common knowledge as was his assessment of the Sales team performance. I tried to look at his assessment objectively and our performance had been OK but no more than that. We met our targets, but the targets were set by Sam Cummins and were not particularly hard to achieve, so in some respects I was guilty of being lax in not driving the team for greater market share. Sam Cummins was perfectly content with his Company's size and lacked the ambition to make it grow. That's probably why he brought in Jeremy Todd I reflected. All this introspection made me realise that I was not cut out for higher management, I was a damned good salesman and decided to concentrate on that.

Alex Young was a good looking man several years younger than me. He was suave and persuasive and soon had all the females in the office hanging on his every word. His first priority was to repair the damage caused by that letter so he had me take him round all our major customers and he did a good job smoothing the ruffled feathers. The exception was with Jack Simmonds! What Alex failed to mention to me was that several years ago he had been engaged to be married to Jack's daughter, Annie and he had dumped her just a week before the wedding! I had phoned ahead and Jack on hearing that I was bringing my new boss to meet him. In the course of our conversation, he recognised Alex's name and asked me some questions to confirm his identity. He never expanded on his reasons for the questions, but I assumed that was why he had abruptly terminated our conversation. Alex and I drove down together in my car and he used the time to quiz me on my colleagues and our customers. When we arrived at Simmonds Industries Reception, Jack came to reception in person and in front of everyone in attendance, blew Alex off! There were representatives from one of our competitors there in reception and they witnessed this exchange It embarrassed me to have to stand there and listen to one of my customers and a man I regarded as a friend berate my new boss publicly! I know that if I had been one of the reps from our competitors, I would have been pleased to see the confrontation. It clearly exposed that there was a serious flaw in our previously solid relationship with Simmonds and if I had been in the same situation, I would have exploited that rift!

Alex was clearly embarrassed also, but he still tried to charm his way into Jack's good graces. Jack rounded on him and said in a loud voice to his Security Guard, "This man is not welcome on these premises! This is my Company and I want you to email every employee of mine not to communicate with or discuss anything appertaining to our business with him. You can attach a photograph to the email, so everyone will be able to recognise him. Now please escort him off the premises!"

I turned to leave with Alex when Jack then turned to me and taking my arm led me through the security door and into his office. As we exited the reception I glanced back to see the Guard escorting Alex out of the building. It was pouring down with rain and I had the car keys, so he would have to wait until our business was concluded before he could seek the shelter of my car. My phone vibrated and I sneaked a glance to see that Alex had tried to call, but I looked at Jack watching me and he smiled and asked, "Mr Young, I presume?"

I smiled back and said, "Yes. He's going to be very wet and pissed off when we conclude our business. It's an awful shame, isn't it?"

We both had a laugh at my new boss's expense and I took the opportunity to ask Jack why he had taken such a dislike to my new boss. He revealed the circumstances about his daughter's engagement. He had made it his business to discover all about Alex Young and he advised me not to trust the bastard! His words not mine, but I had to agree with him after the stories that Jack revealed about Alex being a notorious womaniser, married or single females were all fair game to him and Jack also revealed that his daughter nearly had a nervous breakdown because of Alex Young. We talked about the letter and I managed to smooth things over. The T&C's that had caused the storm was not so much what they represented but more it was the way the letter had been worded that had upset him. He subtly hinted that he would probably renew our contract without going to tender, but that he wanted to listen to what our competitors had to offer first. He did say that he would not meet with or discuss our contract with Alex Young and insisted that all communications between SAME and Simmonds would be through me. We concluded our business and before I left, he asked me some questions about Jeremy Todd. He had met him briefly at a business function some years ago and wanted to know how I felt about working for him. I tried to be as non-committal about him as I could. I told Jack that it was early days and I had yet to make up my mind, but I would let him know.

I never said a thing to a very wet Alex Young on the return journey about my meeting with Jack and he never offered any explanation to me either. He was still damp and subdued when I dropped him off at his home.

The next week Jeremy called me and informed me that Jack Simmonds had signed the new contract. He quizzed me about why Alex was persona non grata at Simmonds, but I was discreet and simply said that Jack took an instant dislike to him. Alex announced the renewal at our next staff meeting and all but claimed that it was due to his influence with Simmonds that SAME had the new contract!

Over the next few months, Alex started introducing his changes. He wanted every sales person to compile a weekly prospect sheet bearing all the data relating to our bid including our best guess on converting the lead into a contract. It was time consuming and at our monthly reviews, he would look at the actual versus predicted result. It was time consuming and led to a lot of resentment from my former staff, now my colleagues. Alex became obsessed with each sales person pipeline, what we were working on and where our next prospect was. I never worked like that and it became a bit of an issue between us. I kept my prospects close to my chest until the customer was about to issue the documentation. Many of my leads came from informal chats over a beer or round of golf and many of these hints were in confidence and only given to me because of the relationship I had developed with the customer over the years.