John Hutch, with his light brown hair and cold blue eyes, figured they would move ahead of the game before Ivan could solidify any future plans. Barry Mitchell, with his warm brown eyes and darker hair, only wanted to hear what Ivan had to say for himself. And by the time they had met him for dinner that evening, Ivan had already come up with plenty of ideas of his own to discuss with them.

“Let us begin by saying that you put on a fabulous event this weekend, Ivan. Fabulous!” Barry commented first.

John only nodded in silent agreement.

“Thank you,” Ivan told them. “It was a real stretch trying to pull it all together on such short notice. But everything seemed to work in our favor, so I just went with it. They call it momentum, right?”

Ivan intended to speak openly with them while remaining friendly and loose. He wanted them both to know that he still liked them. They had been very fair to him.

John said, “Ivan, Barry and I will be in some very serious talks to close deals on at least eight new major clients from your event on Saturday evening. Now, we both understand that you’ll likely be bringing in your own list of new clients from the event as well. But it gets to a certain point where we all have to ask ourselves, ‘Is Ivan more important to us at the office, or out there closing deals?’”

They were taking the conversation exactly where Ivan needed for it to go. So he became cautious. He wanted to see what John and Barry would come up with on their own.

He looked over the table at Barry Mitchell to hear what he had to add.

Barry looked at him and shrugged. In his opinion, John was being a little too anxious.

“Well, you’re gonna make a lot of money off of these deals, Ivan, that’s for sure,” he commented with a chuckle. And he was saved by the food. At least five different sushi dishes arrived at their table, including white rice.

“Perfect timing,” John stated to their server. He said, “All of this talk about money makes me hungry. What about you, Ivan?”

Ivan was still trying to configure his angle. Big business was a chess game. He wanted to make sure he made all the right moves.

So John is pushing for a new deal, and Barry is pushing the brakes, he assessed of his two bosses.

Ivan smiled and reached to gather some of the sushi for his plate. He said, “Being hungry is natural. But we always want to make sure we eat the right foods. And I hear that sushi is good for you.”

He slid a piece of raw salmon into his mouth and chewed it down.

John and Barry began to fill their plates to eat as well.