To Vegas with love

by J. A. Cipriano

  She was about my age with short auburn curls that framed a pixie face and was wearing a business suit similar to Shelley’s only it probably cost a twentieth as much. She was clutching her clipboard to her chest, eyes mixed with a combination of horror and relief as they flicked between me and the downed Ducks fan.

  “Hello,” I said, making a show of tipping my non-existent hat to her. “I heard him threatening you from outside.”

  “Thanks,” she whispered, voice a barely audible squeak as she stared at the man who still wasn’t moving save for his belly jiggling as he breathed. “But I think you’ve just made things worse.” She bit her lip. “He always comes on to me, but …” She swallowed. “I’m worried he might fire me.”

  “I just don’t think that’s going to happen,” I said, and before I could continue, Maggie stepped up beside me and frowned. Then she reached out and took the girl’s hand.

  “I don’t know you,” Maggie started before giving me a let me handle this look. “But I know how this ends.” She waved a hand at the prick on the ground. “You start compromising your morals one by one, and the next thing you know your pussy is on the menu.” She looked the woman up and down. “Trust me, you don’t want to go that route.”

  “I wouldn’t …” Her cheeks flushed. “I just, well, maybe he’d leave me alone, and he’s been promising me a promotion.”

  “A promotion to what?” I practically cried, gesturing at the office. While it was ‘nicer’ than the others, it was still a fucking hovel. Like the rest of the place, it was in need of a good scrubbing and was only nicer in that the goddamned lights worked. “Have you not seen this place?”

  “I admit,” she said, not meeting my eyes, “this particular site may not have been optimal, but there was going to be a new plant, and I was sort of hoping that maybe I’d get a higher-level position at one of them.”

  I could already see the mental math going on in her eyes, the justifications for everything, the potential of a promotion handcuffs that kept her locked in. Hell, I could see the resignation in them, the knowledge that she knew what that creep wanted, and that, she had considered it.

  Fuck that.

  She shouldn’t need to fuck her way to the top.

  Not for this, and not for anywhere.

  “Well, are you qualified to run this place,” - I met her eyes - “Ms. …?”

  “Moore.” She swallowed again. “McKenzie Moore.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Ms. Moore.” I held my hand out to her. “I’m Roger Stevens, and this is my associate, Maggie Cromwell.” She took my hand, eyes still full of confusion. “I now own this plant.”

  “You’re the new owner?” Yes, her voice went up a few octaves.

  “Yes, he is.” Maggie had moved to where the fat ass was laid out and had checked his pulse and whatnot. “You got him good, but he’ll live. Probably.”

  “Great, I guess.” I turned my attention back to McKenzie. “So, are you qualified to actually do the job you wanted?”

  “Of course.” McKenzie took on a professional air, which was great because there was an unconscious, albeit now fired, guy on the floor behind us. “I’ve been his assistant for the last three years.” She bit her lip. “I know that doesn’t sound like it matters, but—”

  I waved off her comment. “Actually, the last assistant I hired to run a place has proved to be pretty great.” I smiled at her. “Have you heard of Shelley Vayne?”

  “Who hasn’t?” McKenzie practically swooned. “She’s like a hero among, well, girls like me. Climbed to the top without spreading her legs,” she flushed. “And got the top job. Now she’s fucking killing it.” She touched her lips with her well-manicured fingers. “Pardon my language.”

  “Don’t worry about the cussing.” I smirked at Maggie. “She cusses like a sailor.”

  “You’re goddamned right I do,” Maggie said, standing and coming toward us. “What do you want me to do with the fat fuck, Roger?”

  “I don’t care really?” I shrugged. “Throw his ass outside? Then have Skye remove him from the database. Also, take his keys.”

  “On it,” Maggie said, then she hoisted the asshole over her shoulder like he didn’t weigh over three-hundred pounds. Ah, gotta love technology. Those nano-suits Cami had designed were truly revolutionary.

  “How did she …?” McKenzie watched in amazement as Maggie, who was barely five feet tall, carried the huge man out.

  “She works out.” I shrugged. “And is also a doctor, so I’m sure everything will work itself out.”

  “Right …” McKenzie turned to me, and I saw the indecision in her eyes before it solidified into resolve. “If you want someone to run this place, I’m your girl.” She swept a hand out at the office. “I know what needs to be done.”

  “I believe you.” I stared at her for a moment. “But prove it to me, would you?”

  “Um …” She looked uncertain. “How do you want me to prove it to you?”

  “Oh, easily enough.” I smiled at her. “Take me on a tour of the place and tell me what’s wrong with it.” I paused. “My other associate is currently with Earl. So, if your story matches with his, well, I’ll know you aren’t just another pretty face.”

  “Well, Earl is quite knowledgeable.” She frowned. “But he doesn’t understand the business side. Sure, he can tell which motors have bearings going out just by walking through the pump room, but he doesn’t know the first thing about proper processes.” She must have read the confusion on my face because she paused for a moment and then moved across the room to a whiteboard that looked to have been recently used. “Look, see, currently, the system is set up like this.” She pointed to a diagram that seemed fairly fresh. “This is what I’d just proposed to, um, the old boss.” She pointed to a new diagram. “Basically, this would reduce our costs by upwards of thirty percent and decrease maintenance.” She paused, and as she did, I jumped in.

  “So, why weren’t you already doing it?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at her. “It seems obvious.”

  “Two reasons.” She sighed. “One, to do it requires a pump that wasn’t designed when dinosaurs roamed the earth. Earl doesn’t know how to work on them. He could learn easily enough since he’s sharp as a tack, but since he doesn’t know now, well …” She shrugged.

  “And reason two?”

  “It’s expensive. We’d have to put together a capital project and get funding from Modi.” She sighed. “And since that would include training for our techs …”

  “Have you seen this place?” I asked, waving a hand toward the hallway. “It’s a dump. Why would you propose that?”

  “Well, I didn’t actually expect it to get done here, but I thought maybe it might get implemented in the new plant, and if they found out it was my idea …” She looked at the floor.

  “Then maybe they’d consider you.” I sighed and ran a hand through my hair. “Well, how about we do our tour?” I smiled at her. “I want to hear all your ideas.”

  18

  Forty-five minutes later, I found myself back in the conference room with McKenzie. Maggie had long since taken Senior Douchebag away but then had gotten a call from Gwen to come help with another pop-up hospital at the VA.

  To be honest, she may have been the luckier of us because up until ten minutes ago, I’d been on a thorough to the point of ridiculous tour of the plant that had let me know two things. One, the plant was fucked up beyond almost all repair, and even with the quick fixes Cami had me do before we’d arrived, which mostly involved fixing bad piping sections in the city, this place needed a lot of TLC.

  And two? Well …

  “Let me stop you right there, McKenzie,” I said, waving my hands frantically as she proceeded to explain why we needed to upgrade some part in section C of treatment feature B-minor or something.

  “Is there something wrong?” She asked, clasping her laser pointer to her chest like it could defend her from a dragon as she stood in front of the whiteboard in the conference room.
She’d long since filled it up and had moved on to using those giant post-it notes, but even now those were full of drawings and whatnot.

  “Yes.” I gestured at the room. “It’s all wrong. That’s what I’ve been hearing.” I sighed and rubbed my face.

  “Well … I don’t want to blow smoke up your ass.” She tried to smile and failed which was sort of cute in a way. “But yeah, this place has been neglected for so long that a lot of things are better off being scrapped and replaced.” She blew her bangs out of her face. “And, honestly, even if they’d been well-maintained, there is newer technology we should upgrade to anyway …”

  “Yeah, I pretty much got that.” I leaned back in the threadbare conference room chair and looked at the ceiling. “That’s the nuts and bolts of it, huh?” I spread my arms wide. “What we have needs to be fixed or replaced.” I turned my gaze toward her. “That’s one of the reasons they were building the new plant, huh?”

  “Well, one of them.” She frowned, looking at the giant papers scattered across the walls. She must have found what she was after because her laser pointer sprang to live, pinpointing a page across the room. “But as I showed here, the layout and location of this plant are actually seventy-six percent better than the proposed new one.” She nodded once, confidence returning as she continued, “Basically, if both plants had the same equipment, this one would be much more profitable because of location and energy costs.”

  “And they can’t demo this one until the new one is built.” I rubbed my chin. “Give me a second.”

  “Um, sure,” she said, looking flummoxed as I pulled out my cell and dialed Cami.

  “This is Cami,” the mad scientist said after she answered on the sixth ring. In the background, I could hear the whir of heavy machinery.

  “Cami, can you come to the conference room, please?” I said, speaking a bit louder than normal so she could hear me. “Bring Earl with you.”

  “Oh … I’m in the middle of something, actually. Is it important?” she replied right before I heard Earl curse beside her.

  “Um, what’s going on?”

  “Well, Earl showed me a faulty pumping unit, and I got this idea to fix it by … fuck, now you got me covered in oil. Again.”

  “You think I want to spill oil?” Earl hollered back. “I told you we should have emptied it before, but you said this would be faster than a drain and refill.”

  “It is faster, just stop being a putz and spilling it down my shirt.” Cami’s attention turned back to me. “Anyway, I need at least three more hours here.”

  “That’s fine, but how long until you can break away? I only need a few minutes.” I glanced at McKenzie who had settled into her chair, and that’s when I realized she hadn’t met Cami, nor could she hear Earl. For all she knew, I was calling in her replacement.

  “Yeah, okay. Give me ten. Okay?”

  “Sure.” I clicked off the phone after we said our goodbyes and turned to McKenzie. “That was my mechanic. Apparently, she and Earl are rebuilding a pumping unit.” I shrugged. “I dunno.”

  “I’m not sure what to say to that,” McKenzie replied, staring intently at me. “That you brought your own mechanic or that she’s good enough Earl is actually listening to her.”

  “Cami is pretty good with machines,” I said with a laugh. “You’d be surprised what she can whip together when she puts her mind to it.”

  “I suppose I should be surprised.” McKenzie tapped her fingers on the scarred table. “But Shelley Vayne works for you, and she’s amazing.” She stared right at me then. “Tell me, Mr. Stevens. Do you only acquire highly skilled women or something?”

  “Something.” I shrugged. “Hey, I’ve been wondering something else.”

  “Oh?” She flushed nearly scarlet. “What is it?” she practically squeaked.

  “Yeah.” I gestured at the room. “You really want the job of running this place?”

  “I do,” she said carefully. “Why else would I have walked you through it?”

  “Then it’s yours.” I smiled at her. “The rest is just details.” I made a gesture with my hand. “I’ll have you, Amy, and Shelley figure it all out.” I tapped my chin. “I guess we’ll need more of a corporate structure, but then again, Amy runs Modi …”

  “I’m not quite sure what you’re talking about,” McKenzie hedged. “But I definitely want to run this place. As I’ve told you before, I have a Master’s in Chemical Engineering and have passed the PE exam.”

  “I remember.” I smirked and shot a glance at her resume, which had been casually slipped to me when we’d entered the room. “And before coming here, you interned for three major chemical companies.” I tapped the resume with one finger. “That’s why I’m hiring you.”

  “I’m sensing a but …” McKenzie said, looking forlorn. “I promise you won’t be disappointed.”

  “We’ll need to wait for Cami for the but.” I smiled at her. “It isn’t a bad thing though. Probably the best thing ever, actually.”

  “I’m not going to have sex with you.” She wasn’t looking at me now. “Even for this job.” She met my eyes. “I deserve this job without that.”

  “Look,” I said, getting serious. “I don’t give a flying fuck if you have sex with me or not. I’m hiring you because you seem capable, and honestly, all I want is to take down Chet McMahon. If we can make this plant better so that he gets fucked on his deal for that new one, well, I win.” I reached my hand across the table. “I don’t care what it costs or what it takes. I just want to put that bastard in the ground. Can you help me do that?”

  She stared at my outstretched hand for a long time. “I can help you do that, Roger.” She took my hand and shook it. “I can definitely do that.”

  “Good.”

  19

  “Well, looks like you two had a good time,” I said as Cami and Earl marched into the conference room covered in oil, grime, and who knew what else. Though, for the most part, both seemed pretty happy about their situation. Then again, Cami was always happy when she was dirty, so …

  “It’d be better if we had the right parts,” Earl grumbled before giving Cami an appreciative look. “Though your girl is a whiz at making things work.” He slapped a grimy hand on her shoulder. “She may make it as a mechanic, yet.”

  “That’s some high praise from you, Earl,” McKenzie said after she picked her jaw up off the floor. “You hate everyone.”

  “Nah, darlin,’ I just hate idjits.” He glowered around the room. “Where’s the boss man?”

  “You’re looking at him,” I said, waving for them to sit. Part of me was worried about having them stain the chairs, but honestly, they needed to be replaced too.

  “Oh?” Earl raised a bushy eyebrow as he plopped into a chair.

  “Roger fired Mr. James.” McKenzie looked at me appreciatively. “He says he wants to promote me to take his place.”

  “It’s about time for you to run this dump.” Earl smacked his hand on the table. “I mean this as a compliment when I say that even a day-old dog turd could run this place better than James, but you? You’re somethin’ special.” He glanced at me. “You’re impressing me more by the day, son.”

  “Um … thanks,” I said as I caught Cami’s attention. She gave me a small nod, and I smiled. Good. We were in agreement.

  “You’re welcome.” Earl crossed his arms over his burly chest. “Now what’s this about because one of the pumping units is in pieces on the floor?”

  “So … here’s the thing.” I took a deep breath as I stood and moved over to Cami. “I want to rebuild this place to be state of the art. Sky’s the limit. All that jazz.”

  “Good.” Cami frowned as she looked back through the doorway. “Because I’ve got a list longer than your, well,” she flushed slightly, “of upgrades we need to do here. Hell, I have some ideas for designs based on what Earl told me.” She got a wistful look in her eye. “It sounds like it’s time for research.” She rubbed her hands together.

&n
bsp; “Right …” I rolled my eyes at her.

  “Where’s all the money going to come from?” McKenzie asked, glancing between Cami and me. “And there’s no way we can get permits and whatnot approved in time to get the stuff done anytime soon.”

  “That’s why I called you both here.” I nodded to her and Earl in turn. “Because I know magic.”

  “So, the new boss is insane. Good to know.” Earl started to get up. “If you don’t mind me, I’ve got a pump to rebuild.”

  McKenzie didn’t voice it, but she obviously felt similarly to my statement. “Okay …” she said, drawing out the word. “What do you mean by that?”

  “Roger means that anything he wants, more or less, happens.” Cami smacked her hands on the table. “See how this table is all fucked up?”

  “Uh, so?” McKenzie said, eyebrows furrowed.

  “The table is as good as new,” I said. There was a ping in my ears as the command took hold. The change happened so suddenly, even I didn’t catch it. More, it was just like the table had always been pristine.

  “You’ve got to be fuckin’ kidding me.” Earl stared at the table, mouth open. “Is that some sort of trick?”

  “Sort of,” I admitted with a shrug. “I can make most things real that could actually be real.”

  “That’s crazy,” McKenzie said, looking right at me. “But I think I understand …”

  “Great.” I smiled at Cami before nodding at Earl and McKenzie. “So, instead of getting your hands dirty, I want the three of you to give me a list of all the fixes we need. I’d prefer to alter existing stuff. I don’t want to make stuff out of thin air, so if there’s new stuff, we can just order it.” I glanced at Cami. “You’re authorized for one hundred million. Buy whatever you need, just get bills.”

  “Right.” Cami nodded.

  “McKenzie, please hire people to get this place running. I don’t know what optimal staffing requirements look like, but let’s get there.” I smacked my hands together. “Sound good?”

  “It sure does, though I think I might be out of a job,” Earl said, dismally. “If you can just fix everything, why do you need me?”