CEO Dad Trashed My Proposal but Spoiled My Brother

Why did my brother say he'd "beaten me again"? Simple. Back in school, when it came to grades. Or later, when it came to results at the company. He always came out just a fraction ahead of me. Almost as if someone had arranged it that way. The next second. I turned around and looked at him, calm. "Assistant? What assistant?" "Oh, right, you don't know yet." "Dad just decided." "You're going to be my assistant." "You'll help me handle this project." "The company makes money, the shareholders are happy." "And some of the credit goes to you, too." "Well, that last part was my idea, actually." "We are brother and sister, after all." "Wouldn't look right if I took all the credit myself." Something in his words set a faint tremor moving through me before I could stop it. "Dad told me to be your assistant?" "That's right." "If you don't believe me, go in and ask him now." I stared at the door of Dad's CEO office. Every instinct in me wanted to storm in and demand the truth. But in the end, I held back. I was about to tell him I wasn't interested. Instead he tossed me his car keys. "Sis, go bring my car around from the parking lot to the front, would you." "And book Mr. Matthews for me in a bit." "I want to go over the details of this project with him." "Oh, and grab me a coffee while you're at it." "Extra sugar, thanks." It didn't take long. Every department in the company got the notice from the CEO's office. Craig Delgado had been promoted to manager of the project department. All at once. People rose from their desks to congratulate him. As for the way they looked at me. There was contempt in it. And something that said they were looking at a poor, pathetic thing. I drew a slow breath and didn't blow up. I only gave a long look at my brother, basking in everyone's praise, then turned and left the building for the parking lot. Ten minutes later. My phone rang, sharp and insistent, like it was chasing me down. I looked at my brother's name on the screen. The corner of my mouth lifted. I answered and said hello. "Sis, what's going on with you?" "Didn't I tell you to bring the car to the front and wait for me?" "I've been standing here three minutes already." "Where are you?" I kept driving, and let out a flat little "hm." "Craig, I'm not your driver." "If you need someone to drive you around." "You can go hire a driver of your own." His voice came back, refusing to believe it. "Dad made you my assistant." "Driving is part of an assistant's job!" "And Mr. Matthews is waiting for me." "If I'm late to the very first meeting about the project details." "And it upsets Mr. Matthews and the whole project falls through." "Who's going to answer for the fury of Mom and Dad and those shareholders?" "Are you willing to take that on?"

"That's your own problem." I hung up on him. Then. My brother called again, fast and frantic, like his life depended on it. I didn't pick up. Furious, he called Mom and Dad to tattle. "Jeanette won't be my assistant." "We had a meeting set with Mr. Matthews to go over the project details." "And she just took off on her own." "She even lost my car keys." When Mom and Dad heard about it. Both of them flew into a rage. "Your sister is completely out of line!" "That girl can't tell what matters and what doesn't." "Craig, you go meet Mr. Matthews first." "We'll deal with your sister." "Okay, Mom, Dad." After Craig hung up, the corner of his mouth curved up on its own. He thought for a moment. Then he opened his messages and typed one out. "Sis, Mom and Dad are angry." "You're done for!" "Just wait for your scolding." When Craig's message came through. I was already sitting across from Winston. "Miss Delgado, what would you like me to do?" "My parents are so desperate to let him prove himself to those shareholders." "So I'm going to make sure they don't get their way." Winston asked, "Then what should we do with the project?" "Scrap it. Right now!" "Understood." I got up and left the restaurant. On the way home. Mom called. "Where are you?" "On my way home." "Making you your brother's assistant was your father's and my decision, and you should honor the bet you lost." "Your project proposal wasn't as good as your brother's." "That's an undeniable fact!" I smiled faintly and asked, "Mom, is it really a fact?" "What do you mean?" "You mean this wasn't your decision?" "Do you have some kind of misunderstanding about us?" "A month ago, your father and I told the two of you, you and your brother." "That we'd be absolutely fair and impartial." "That we'd never take anyone's side..." Before Mom could finish. I cut her off. "Ask yourselves honestly." "Have you really been fair?" Mom answered without a second's hesitation. "Of course!" "There's no point in this." I hung up on her. By the time I got home. Mom was sitting on the couch, her face dark. Dad was back too. The moment I stepped through the door. Dad let out a cold snort, his face hard and cold. "Jeanette Delgado, come here and kneel down!"

I'll Give You What You Want. I'm Out. I walked over to stand in front of my parents. But I didn't kneel. I just looked at them, calm. "I said, kneel!" My father's face was hard, his voice a furious bark, heavy with all his authority and weight. But he quickly saw something. I was meeting his eyes without so much as a flinch. His brows knotted together. "Did you not hear me?" I asked him back, "Usually, when you tell me to kneel, it's because I've done something wrong." "So I'd like to know. What exactly did I do wrong?" My mother said coldly, "You refused to admit you'd lost. Out of pure jealousy, you nearly made your brother miss the meeting time he'd agreed on with Mr. Matthews." "We don't need to spell out for you how important this project is to the company, do we?" "You treated it like a joke, and you still have the nerve to ask us what you did wrong?" "Let me tell you, you were dead wrong!" I sat down across from them, my face blank. Then I let out a flat little "Oh." "So because I wouldn't be my brother's assistant." "That makes me the one in the wrong?" My father slammed his hand down hard on the coffee table. "Yes. Your brother beat you on his own merit, and you're throwing a tantrum instead of admitting it." "If word of this got out, people would say Hal Delgado can't even raise his own daughter!" At that. I laughed. And the longer I laughed, the wetter my eyes got. "What are you laughing at?" My mother snapped at me. "I find it funny. So I'm laughing." "Funny? You think we're funny?" "Yes!" I admitted it without hiding a thing. "How dare you!" My father shot to his feet, jabbing a finger at me, his face twisted with rage. "Jeanette Delgado, have we spoiled you so badly that you've grown this out of line?" "Spoiled me?" "Doesn't it embarrass you... to say that out loud?" "You—" My father was so livid he could barely get a word out. I got there first. "Every resource funneled to my brother. You stand there preaching fairness and honesty, then quietly lock him in as project manager behind everyone's back." "I broke my back on that proposal. Pulled all-nighters, one after another." "And my brother?" "He doesn't have to lift a finger. He drives his sports car to the clubs, picks up girls, plays video games when he's bored." "And that makes him a 'genius' in your eyes?" "When you were writing his proposal for him." "Did it ever cross your mind how ridiculous you looked?" The two of them exchanged a stunned glance. They'd never dreamed. That something buried so carefully. Could have reached me! "You... how did you find out?" "Who told you?" I smiled coldly. "My brother was so pleased with himself, whining up to you in the office. Too bad he got impatient. After all... I hadn't gotten far." My father's expression shifted. "Jeanette, it isn't the way you think—" My mother's anger slowly drained away, leaving a trace of awkwardness in its place. "The truth is, your brother really has been working hard. These past six months he's stayed up night after night learning how the company runs, and he cut ties completely with that old crowd of his. We did this because we didn't want all his effort to go to waste—" "Oh." "You feel for him, you don't want his effort wasted, so you decided to sacrifice me instead?" "These past two years, I landed one high-quality project after another. I made this company money hand over fist, and the shareholders couldn't stop grinning." "When I got busy, I'd go days without a proper meal." "My stomach acted up, over and over." "I was so buried in work that even my boyfriend gave up on me." "Did anyone ever feel for me?" "Since you've decided he's the one fit to inherit." "Then I'll give you what you want. I'm out!"