‘Aunt Laura?’
‘Yes?’
‘I have an idea. How about I fly you home? That way you can be flexible on your return and take care of more business in the morning or delay your bad news meeting to afternoon giving us more breakfast time together in the morning.
We won’t have to rush out of bed to get you to the airport. I will explain the situation to Linda. She might want to stay later with her lover before returning. If you need a nap on the 2-hour flight, there is a bedroom in the plane. Just a crazy question – are you a member of the mile high club?’
‘OK to the flight offer and no on club membership,’ I said slowly. The thought of morning sex with Jamie flashed through my mind and joining the mile high club with him!
Linda has another lover? Maybe that is why he has been with her so long. Sheesh. I feel like I am in the middle of an erotic story. One where I am losing control.
‘Great, let’s do that. I will put my pilots on alert. See you in a bit!’
**********
‘Julie, everything is set. I will stay with Jamie tonight and he offered to fly me back on his private jet. I accepted. It is a Gulfstream G700 for god’s sake! Remember how we looked at those for fractional use during COVID? He is actually licensed to fly it, but his pilots will fly it so that we can spend more time together on the jet.’
I left the bedroom out of the discussion. I don’t know what Jamie was planning so I didn’t need Julie’s radar on it.
‘That’s good news. Do you want to move the last meeting to later in the morning or afternoon?’
‘Move it to mid-afternoon. Jamie said it is only a 2-hour flight. I think I saw somewhere that the Gulfstream flies faster and higher than a commercial jet so that helps get me back in time for dinner. I told Robert I would divorce him if he made me eat Bambi.’
‘Got it boss. Have a wonderful evening. Take pictures of the Gulfstream! I hear some are outfitted extravagantly with living areas, kitchens — I am mean galleys, bedrooms used long flights or short flights for mile high club members. Get a picture behind the controls in the cockpit and the pilots. Maybe a cute photo with you, Jamie, and Linda too. He is such great guy.’
‘Will do. This really is going to turn a blasé day of meetings into an exciting adventure all due to my nephew Jamie.’
‘Ten four boss. I would like to meet Jamie one day. Bye!’
I intentionally used the nephew to throw Julie off in case she was thinking otherwise. I didn’t touch the Linda comment. I needed for her to think Linda would be there tonight and tomorrow. Julie’s radar is too powerful, and I didn’t need any additional questions or ‘Oh’ or ‘Hmm’ or other signals that her radar was up.
Time to wrap up.
I walked into the meeting room, picked up the recording phone, walked out and listened to it. Pretended like I was getting a silent call.
Back in the meeting room I held the voice recording phone up.
‘OK if we listen to the end of the last meeting? I need to capture the action items in my notes. Please join in on anything I miss. Any objection? No? Ok great.’