Chapter 1

"Mr. Hawkins? They're ready for you now," said a smiling, perky young secretary as she popped her head into the boardroom waiting area.

A lot of executives dreaded these annual evaluations but, ever the rising superstar, I relished them.

"Thank you," I replied coolly, as I stood up and set the copy of Forbes I was leafing through back on the coffee table. After smoothing my tie, I picked up my leather portfolio, stepped confidently past the pretty young thing holding the door for me and entered the boardroom.

Richard "Dick" Wallace, my boss and the Chairman and CEO of Megacorp, sat at the head of the conference table. "Hawkins," he said brusquely, as I approached. "Good afternoon." Wallace would be the Head Rich White Guy In Charge in just about any room - he knew it, and he wasn't afraid to show it, either.

With a perfunctory wave of his hand, he introduced his two colleagues: "You know Stan Grossman, from Sales. And Bill Diehl, my COO."

With a polite but curt smile, I nodded and replied "Sure, hello again Stan. Bill." I shook hands quickly with these "beta dog" Rich White Guys — whose ranks I was working like hell to join — before taking the last unoccupied chair.

"So, Hawkins," said Wallace tersely, leaning back in his chair. "Tell me about your year." Megacorp was one of the largest, most successful, and most secretive of the "beltway bandits" in the D.C. area, raking in several billion dollars a year in government, military, and intelligence community contracts. An annual review at Megacorp was not the place for small talk.

I got right to the point. "In short, very successful, sir. Revenues steady, and costs down, significantly. Introduced two new product lines and--"

"Terminated four others," interrupted Grossman, the fat salesman.

I paused a moment for effect and then crisply replied, "Yes, Stan, that's correct," staring daggers back at him. "As you and I have beaten to death during countless discussions in this very boardroom, I made an affirmative decision to exit some maturing markets earlier than originally planned in order to focus on newer opportunities that offer better growth potential. I believe the results speak for themselves."

"They do indeed speak for themselves, Johnnie," he said, using the diminutive for effect, since last names were customary at Megacorp. "I was doing a nice, brisk business in those markets, and now we've let our competition--"

"Start directing way too much of their time and attention towards a handful of waning, legacy market segments that provide next-to-no profit margins and extremely rigid cost structures," I said, interrupting back. Grossman and I had been going at each other hammer and tong over strategy all year, and he had grown increasingly hostile as my approach, while not yet inarguably successful, had also failed to crater the way Grossman loudly and frequently "guaranteed" it would.

"Yes, I see," continued Wallace, immediately cutting off debate before Grossman could respond. This was good. I was winning, and I knew it. Better yet, Grossman knew it, too.

Wallace's next question wasn't what I was prepared for, though. "Speaking of maturing, Hawkins ... You're what, now? Thirty nine?"

"Thirty eight," I replied out loud. And what the fuck does that have to do with anything, I thought, but didn't ask.

"Your marriage ended this year, did it not?"

I couldn't help but pause for a moment at this one — not really to register my irritation at this new line of questioning but because I really was stunned to be asked these questions. I'd been through more than a dozen of these annual reviews and had never been asked such personal questions.

"Well, yes, sir, that's correct," I said in response, pausing again afterwards to try to end the point.

When Wallace just stared back at me, I realized I needed to push back a bit. "Sir, I think it's clear that any issues in my personal life have had no impact on my performance here, and that--"

"No, Hawkins, I know — look, the point I'm making is that you're actually still quite a young man. And don't tell me you don't enjoy being single again!!" he said with a conspiratorial frat-boy laugh and a quick glance over to Grossman and Diehl, who dutifully laughed along.

And yeah, I admit I never had trouble attracting women — either before, during, or after my marriage — but the truth was I really wasn't enjoying being single. My dick had gotten me into too much trouble over the years, especially recently. Once it cost me what could and should have been a very happy marriage, I made a firm resolution to keep it in my pants for a while, and so far I was actually doing so.

"Well, I appreciate that sir," I replied, hoping this tangent into my personal life had ended, "but the real issue here is--"

"The real issue, Hawkins," said Wallace, interrupting again, "is whether you're really sure you want to be an executive here."

Still a little shocked at the direction of the discussion, I paused for a second to regain my poise enough to start punching back in earnest. "Sir, I assure you, I take a back seat to no one in my dedication to excellence and willingness to sacrifice for the team. There's not another executive here who has contributed more to the success of --"

"Yes, yes, yes, Johnnie, I know all that..." Wallace's tone was growing a little exasperated, and the way that nickname popped in there was not a good sign. "But I don't think you follow me. I didn't ask whether you're capable of being an executive here, I asked whether that's what you really want."

"And the reason I ask," he continued, pre-empting my next attempt to respond, "is that it really doesn't seem to be making you very happy."

The hard kernel of truth behind that one stopped me cold.

"You've certainly not been unsuccessful here, Hawkins, and I've never doubted that you've got potential, but here's the bottom line: You're not getting promoted to Executive Vice President this year." This time, my shock lasted only seconds before being replaced by white-hot indignation.

"Now don't misunderstand," continued Wallace, "you did have a reasonably good year, but not a great year - and as you know we set the bar for EVPs very high here at Megacorp."

"Sir," I replied, doing my damnedest not to shake with fury, "I took over the Bio-Electronics division at a literally critical juncture. On the path it was headed, its debt burden and failure to leverage its R&D could've dragged down the entire company. Barely over a year later it's poised to be the finest turnaround story in Megacorp's history. There's not another VP in the business who could have accomplished what I did with that group, and over the next five years I'm projecting revenue and market share to rise by--"

Still unimpressed, Wallace cut me off again. "Hawkins, Hawkins, please ... You keep reciting all that B-school mumbojumbo to me as if that should be the basis for my personnel decisions. Obviously I know about all the history and the figures, but it's all beside the point. Your results aren't unacceptable, but think about this: if over the next five years our Bio-E business grows by leaps and bounds while its top executive develops a substance abuse problem and clinical depression, Megacorp on the whole really isn't much better off, is it?"

Again, I just sat in silence.

"Look, Hawkins, let me make a suggestion." Ever the helpful boss, Dick Wallace liked to make these "suggestions" to his colleagues and employees. And when he did, he merely expected them to hear him out, consider his "suggestion" honestly and candidly, and then follow it in every jot and stroke as they would the word of God.

"You know Vivian de Beers, right? She's got our HR department doing some very interesting work aimed at helping people identify their core strengths and weaknesses, and helping them use that information to guide their career paths."

I just stared back for a moment, still ricocheting between shock and rage at the news that I would not be promoted. "Sir, with all due respect, if you're suggesting I'm being passed over so that I can go 'find myself' through some horseshit HR program--"

"What I'm suggesting," replied Wallace, leaning in and lowering his voice the way he did when he wanted to terrify an underling, "is that you take advantage of the means at your disposal to make sure that you're being put to your highest and best use here at Megacorp. Do I make myself clear?"

After just enough silence to go right to the edge of insolence, I replied, "Yes sir. Quite clear."

Wallace nodded and smirked just quick enough to twist the knife. "Good," he said. "There it is, I think. Stan? Bill, anything? No? Very well then, thanks, Hawkins, I think we're done."

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught the look of smug satisfaction on Grossman's fat face even as I bee-lined it from my chair to the door — I managed to avoid direct eye contact with him, but if I hadn't I very likely might have torn out his throat on the spot.

Despite the shock I'd just endured in the boardroom, I managed to smile pleasantly and avoid throwing up or punching anyone as I left the executive suite. Instead of returning straight back to my office, however, I took the internal stairs down a level to go see an old girlfriend.

Vivian De Beers was the head of Human Resources for Megacorp, and she and I had known each other for a little more than ten years. We even dated for a little more than a year or so.

Well, that's not exactly right. We probably "dated" for about a month or two, tops, then kept "seeing each other" one weekend at a time, and eventually got into a nice routine of fucking each other five or six times a month, one booty-call at a time.

Nice routine for me, at least. To be honest, I knew Viv was a little disappointed that we didn't have more of a real relationship, but I also knew that the sex was so good — for both of us — that she was happy enough to take what she could get.

Vivian was an animal in bed, and she was all woman: ripe and fleshy and curvy. She stayed in shape, to be sure, it's just that she had serious tits, and hips, and a beautiful firm, wide ass. I never really went for the over-aerobicized, ninety pound "hardbodies;" they made for nice enough nice arm candy, but women like Vivian tended to be a hell of lot more fun.

In other words, I guess I prefer Bridget Jones to Renee Zellweger, if you know what I mean - so for me, Vivian was simply a knockout. And horny. She wasn't one to quietly "make love" in the dark under the covers; Vivian loved to fuck, plain and simple.

Out of bed, Vivian had followed a fairly traditional path for businesswomen, taking over Human Resources when the matronly woman who founded the department finally retired after more than thirty years in the job. It wasn't glamorous, nor did it offer any realistic chance of further promotion up the corporate food chain, but it paid well enough and certainly seemed to suit Vivian's personality. She liked helping people find jobs they enjoyed, and she was good at it, which meant she enjoyed working in HR very much.

I, on the other hand, had set my sights on the CEO's office from day one. I was determined to run my own company one day, and although it wasn't technically the same thing, I always expected that running a division like Bio-Electronics for a cutting edge company like MegaCorp at thirty eight would feel like a resounding success.

And it did, to a point, but I soon found that this professional success came at quite a personal cost. A cost which was made particularly clear to me when I came home early from a business trip one night to find my gorgeous young wife bent over the backrest of our living room couch, getting energetically fucked from behind by a nineteen-year-old barista she had met the week before.

The days that followed were filled with lots of shouting and tears, recriminations and harsh words, but remarkably quickly I managed to face one core fact about my marriage: it had ended practically before it began. Between my regular 18 hour days and my damn-near monthly two- or three-week business trips, Lindsey and I had become more like roommates than lovers probably back when we were still planning the wedding. Once shouting stopped we were both ready to admit our marriage was a mistake, and we cooperated on what turned out to be a quick, relatively painless divorce.

Relatively painless, in large part because Viv was really great. She had insisted that I stop the booty calls when I got married, and while we still hadn't rekindled any of the old passions (in fact, the rumor was she had "changed teams" since she ended our fling) she was hugely supportive and great about letting me vent.

Which was exactly what I needed right now — even if we couldn't be fuck-buddies anymore it was great to have her as a regular buddy.

"Hey kiddo," said Vivian sympathetically when I appeared at her door.

"Those fuckers," I replied, as I entered Vivian's office and shut the door behind me. "Let me guess, you already knew?"

"Well, I am the HR director, John. If you were going to get moved up to EVP I would have known about it a week ago."

"Well, fair enough — and look, I don't mean to direct any of this at you, but it's all just such bullshit, you know? It was like Kafka or something, it just kept getting worse and worse. First he tells me I'm not getting promoted and next he tells me to come see you for a dose of some claptrap, New Age, psycho-babble snake oil you're apparently selling down here. No offense, Viv, but please, just for old times sake, cut me one lousy break today. You're not really going to make me sit through this crap, are you?"

[Three days later.]

"It's good of you to give this a chance, John. I know you're kind of ... skeptical about it. Think of it this way: even if it does nothing else for you, it should take your mind off things for a while. Many of the people in the test program find it quite relaxing, even stimulating."

"Viv, look, I admit: I certainly could use some relaxation, given how stressed out I am about that damn evaluation — but that's exactly why, quite frankly, I really don't have time for this. It's like I told you the other day, with Lindsey out of the picture I was counting on the extra money from the promotion to pay for the rest of the house."

My beautiful young trophy wife and I had been right in the middle of renovating a beautiful old Victorian row house when the breakup hit — and although I was adamant about keeping the house, I was counting on the promotion to fund the rest of the work. Without her income and without the promotion, I was fucked.

"Have you thought about getting a roommate?" suggested Vivian. "Matter of fact, there's a simply fetching young woman in our trainee program who needs to find a room to rent, and that basement would be perfect as a rental, wouldn't it? As soon as we're done, I'll email you her info — who knows, it might even be fun to make a new friend and hang around with some younger people." Her smirk left no doubt about what she meant by "hang around with."

Given our history, Vivian knew I was a slave to my dick, but I was always kind of relieved that she was willing to joke around about it. And, as always, her expert appreciation of the female form did nothing to dispel those rumors about switching teams.

"Yeah, great," I answered, "that's exactly what I need — an introduction to the next former Mrs. Hawkins ... And really, Viv, seriously: what possible good could come for me from getting a 'fetching' young, female roommate?" I knew she meant to help, but this had catastrophe written all over it.

"There's only two ways that could end, Viv: either I start fucking a subordinate which, given the way that last evaluation went, is absolutely the last goddamn thing I need for my career right now, or I start sharing my house with some random chick who'll play Justin Timberlake albums until all hours of the night and fill up my house with drunken 20-somethings every other weekend. And I wouldn't even get to fuck her!"

"OK, Johnnie? First of all, sure: points for knowing who Justin Timberlake is. But I'm afraid they're not called 'albums' anymore, OK? And second of all," Vivian said, doing her best to interrupt my stewing, "Candi is really not the blast-music-all-night and party-all-weekend kind of girl. In fact, I've never seen a harder worker in my life. She's sweet and cute and all, but as much time as she spends in my lab, you'll probably never even see her around the house. And renting that basement apartment to her could really help with those renovation bills."

No zippy comeback after that one, because in simple point of fact Viv was absolutely right.

"Anyway," she said, "since you're in such a great big rush, let's go ahead and get you hooked up." Vivian helped me sit back on the reclining couch and finished attaching a multitude of electrodes to my wrists, chest, and forehead.

Once the wires were all in place she reached up for a large, elaborately wired dome which looked like a half-assed amateur Star Trek version of an old beauty salon hair dryer. She pulled it down over my head and said, "There's a very interesting technical background to all this, but I know you're too important for all that so I'll just give you the short version. The basic idea here is a lot like a polygraph - we present you with a bunch of varying stimuli and then we record your conscious and unconscious responses."

"It's going to ask me questions?"

"Kind of, but it's not really like Q&A, it's a little more like free association. You'll get the hang of it quickly - just pay attention to the sights and sounds and you'll find that it's actually quite easy to tell when the system is looking for a response."

"And when it does, I just blurt out whatever I'm thinking?"

"Not really, it's a little more involved than that. The system doesn't just bounce you around through random thoughts, it basically takes you through a series of opportunities to make choices and distinctions, express preferences, identify similarities. The science behind it is really quite fascinat--"