by Mia Ford
“Why don’t you just show up outside her apartment or her work if you’re that hell bent on seeing her?”
“I’ve tried that,” I said, head shaking. “She refuses to come out when I’m there. She has the doorman threaten to call the cops. And then there’s this fucking injunction that Ed Ridgely filed. That’s just fuel to the fire.”
“We’ll beat that,” Reed said confidently. “I’ve talked to Ed. He knows it’s a losing battle. He’s just buying time to give Allen Benson a chance to cool down.”
“Yeah, I know. But that is the nail in the coffin as far as Katie is concerned.” I leaned back and blew out a long breath. “Goddammit, why did things have to end up this way?”
“Because that’s how business works, my boy,” Reed said, hands spread over his empty plate. “Somebody wins, somebody loses. That’s the way it works.”
I began to nod slowly as a small light flickered inside my brain. “What if it doesn’t have to work that way?” I asked. “What if we actually did a deal that was win/win for everyone involved?”
“That would be a first,” he said. “What do you have in mind?”
Chapter 29: Conner
I called my old college pal, Andy Whitlock, to ask him the name of the beautiful black girl he had been with on New Year’s Eve. She was Mollie the paralegal’s —Katie’s— best friend. Katie had mentioned her name a time or two, but I was not the best at paying attention to small talk. I found it hard to focus when Katie was in the room. I would watch her lips move, then my brain would just shut down as the blood drained to more pertinent parts of my body.
Monica, was her name, I thought.
Or Monique or…
Anyway, Andy would know her name. She was an old flame, or so he said, and probably the most beautiful girl he had ever been with. Maybe she could help me get a message to Katie. If my plan worked, Katie would be thrilled to hear from me and give me the chance to make things right. At least that’s what I kept telling myself.
“Her name is Monique Griggs,” Andy said with a hint of irritation in his voice. I had caught him leaving his office and he was talking to me while trying to find his car in the parking garage. “Why do you want to know? You run out of other girls to charm, old pal? Now you’re trying to horn in on my ladies?”
“Nothing like that,” I said. “I’m actually trying to get in touch with the girl I went home with that night. She said her name was Mollie. Anyway, it’s a long story, but I need Monique to help me track her down.”
“Why do I get the feeling that you’re not telling me everything?” Andy asked. “Come on, old buddy, give it up. What’s going on? Did she leave you with a raging case of crabs?”
I had forgotten what a dick Andy could be.
I said, “Nothing like the case of crabs your sister gave me, thank God.”
He chuckled. I heard a car door slam. The car dinged as he stuck in the key to start it up. “Then why do you need Monique to help you track her down?”
“Look, Andy, I don’t want to waste your time with boring details,” I said. “Do you know where Monique works or not?”
“Sure, she’s an associate at Yates Hamilton & Booz right there in the Big Apple, probably a few blocks down from your office.”
I rolled my eyes at my own stupidity. She was Katie’s best friend. Where else would she work?
I said, “She’s an associate at Yates Hamilton & Booz? I’ll be damned.”
“Yeah, so why do you need to talk to her?”
“I can’t talk right now, Andy,” I said. “Text me the next time you’re in New York City and I’ll buy you a beer.”
“Okay, pal, take care.”
I hung up the phone and leaned forward to tell my driver where to go.
Fifteen minutes later I was standing on the sidewalk outside of Yates Hamilton & Booz waiting for Monique Griggs to emerge.
* * *
I didn’t have to wait long. I had called Yates Hamilton & Booz on the way over, and asked to speak to Monique Griggs. I told her who I was, and she told me to fuck off and die. Monique had quite a colorful vocabulary for a young attorney.
“Look, Monique, if you care about Katie’s happiness, you need to come outside and talk to me. Please. Just give me two minutes of your time. Please.”
She was silent for a moment, then sighed and said, “Fine. I’ll be down in ten minutes.”
Though New Year’s Eve was now just a blurry memory, I recognized her immediately when she came out the front door and headed across the sidewalk toward my car.
Monique Griggs was a beautiful black girl, statuesque, with long legs and a voluptuous body, and eyes that shot darts into my face as she approached. I opened the car door and stepped aside to let her slide into the back seat.
“You have two minutes, asshole,” she said after I slid in after her and closed the door. She held up her left wrist and tapped the crystal of her watch with a long fingernail. “Starting now.”
“That’s more than enough,” I said, sitting in the seat sideways to face her. “I need to talk to Katie. I need to explain.”
“So, talk to Katie. Why are you bothering me?”
“Because she won’t talk to me,” I said.
“Can you blame her?” She cut her eyes at me and wrinkled her nose like I was a bad smell. “You’re a backstabbing asshole. You stole her uncle’s company and used her to do it. She doesn’t want anything to do with you.”
“I did not steal her uncle’s company,” I shot back. I took a deep breath and forced the anger back down. “Look, that’s now what happened. But regardless, I can make things right if Katie will give me the chance.”
She scoffed and rolled her eyes. “How are you gonna make things right? You fucked her, and you fucked her uncle. You used her to get what you wanted and once you got it, you just expected her to go on like nothing happened.”
“That’s not entirely true,” I said. “I knew she would be mad, but I thought—"
“Of course, she would be mad, you idiot,” she said, frowning, shaking her head. “Look, you got what you wanted. Why don’t you just leave her alone?”
“Because I didn’t get what I wanted,” I said desperately. “I didn’t get what I wanted.”
She blinked at me for a moment. “What does that mean?”
I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “Look, Monique…”
“Don’t bullshit me now,” she said. “Shoot me straight or open that fucking door.”
I held up my hands in defeat. “It means that what I really want is Katie. I don’t care about anything else. Just her. And I need you to help me win her back. I can make things right if she’ll just give me the chance.”
“Don’t expect me to play on your team,” she said warily. She folded her arms across her large breasts and wrinkled her nose at me again. “I doubt there’s anything you can say or do to win her back at this point.”
I said, “I think you’re wrong. I have a plan that will make everyone happy. Katie. Allen Benson. You. Me. I just need your help to make it all work.”
She narrowed her dark eyes and bit at the inside of her lip.
“You really like her, don’t you?”
“I do.”
“Well, I’ll be damned.”
“Will you help me?”
“That depends” she said, turning in the seat to face me. She tapped a long fingernail playfully to her chin and narrowed her eyes at me. “Tell me your plan, then I’ll tell you if I can help.”
Chapter 30: Katie
Saturday, March 17th, St. Patrick’s Day
Boston, Massachusetts
I had to get out of New York City before Conner McGee drove me completely bonkers. It wasn’t bad enough that he had screwed over my Uncle Allen and broken my heart. Now he wouldn’t leave me alone.
He kept calling and texting.
I ignored them all, finally blocking his number from my phone.
He showed up at my apartment two or three times.
I refused to open the door.
When he wouldn’t go away, I had to get the door man to throw him out and threaten to call the cops if he returned.
Then he showed up at my office, but since Yates Hamilton & Booz had filed an injunction against Price Bean & Whitlock to block the sale of Benson Digital’s manufacturing arm, he was politely told he shouldn’t be there and escorted out of the building.
I had to give it to him.
He was a persistent son of a bitch, but that wasn’t going to get him back into my good graces. I didn’t care how good looking he was, or how good he was in bed, or how amazing he made me feel, I had no use for Conner McGee.
I would go out of my way to never see or speak to him again. And deep inside, that killed me. My heart was broken into a million pieces, but my Irish pride would never let me show it. Or let Conner back into my life.
Thank God for St. Patrick’s Day.
When my dad called to make sure that I was coming home for what was considered my family’s biggest annual celebration, I didn’t have to think twice. I was on the next plane to Boston, and back behind the bar where I belonged.
I put on an apron and a silly green party hat, and worked behind the bar with my dad most of the night. O’Hara’s Pub was packed to the gills with Irish revelers and others who were Irish for one night a year.
The Irish music was provided by a four-piece band led by my oldest brother on banjo, all dressed in green suits and hats. Even their hair and beards were dyed green. By midnight, they were almost as drunk as the crowd. Even though their musical skills got worse with every green beer they drank, they played as loudly as they could, and everyone sang along as the green beer flowed like the water into Boston Harbor and the shots kept lining the bar.
I kept myself busy all night, pulling drafts and pouring shots, delivering baskets of wings and burgers from the kitchen, but Conner McGee remained at the back of my brain, buzzing like a pesky gnat that refused to go away.
“You okay, Katie girl?” my dad asked each time we crossed paths behind the bar.
“I’m fine, Mr. O’Hara,” I said with a smile. He had no idea my heart was broken, both for Conner and my Uncle Allen, who was oddly absent from the party. My dad told me that Allen had called earlier in the day and said he was coming to the party, but so far, he was a no-show. I just assumed he’d reconnected with one of his old Boston flames. You could imagine my surprise when I saw him walking into the bar with Conner McGee at his side.
My hand froze on the tap and I overflowed the beer mug I’d been filling. I watched Uncle Allen and Conner work their way down the bar as I wiped off the mug and set it in front of a patron.
“Katie girl, we need to talk,” Uncle Allen said, leaning across the bar to yell in my ear. He was smiling with Conner at his side. What the hell was going on? Had I fallen asleep behind the bar and ended up in a strange dream? Had I fallen down the rabbit hole where everyone was insane? As Monique would say, “What the freaky fuck is going on here?”
“What’s going on?” I asked, yelling back over the music. I gave Conner a hard look. “And what’s he doing here? Why aren’t you pounding him into the floor?”
“Can we go someplace quiet and talk?” Conner asked.
“Fuck off, asshole,” I growled. I focused my eyes on Allen. “Uncle Allen, what’s going on?”
“Come with us for two minutes,” Allen said, holding up two fingers. “Meet us out back in the alley, please. You need to hear this from me.”
I blinked at him for a moment, then muttered, “Okay…”
“Who is that with your Uncle Allen?” my dad asked, sliding up next to me with a rack of clean beer mugs between his meaty hands. I watched Allen and Conner disappear in the crowd. I turned to my dad and tried to put on a happy face.
“It’s… a friend of his from work,” I said. I picked a rag and dried my hand with it. “I need a break, Dad. Do you mind taking over for a bit?”
“Course not, dear, take a break. Your brothers and I can handle this crowd.”
I gave him a peck on the cheek, then came from behind the bar and worked my way through the crowd toward the back door that led out into the alley.
My mind was going ninety to nothing, trying to figure out what the heck was going on. I almost expected Allen and Conner to be duking it out in the alley when I came through the door. If that was the case, I hoped Uncle Allen wiped up the concrete with Conner and dropped his carcass in the dumpster.
When I pushed through the door I could not believe my eyes.
Uncle Allen and Conner McGee were laughing and talking like old friends.
The words came out of my mouth without my brain having to send them.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“I have my company back,” Uncle Allen said with a broad smile. At first, I thought he was snockered. But his eyes were clear, and his speech wasn’t slurred. He put his hands on my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. “Did you hear me, Katie girl? I have my company back!”
“I don’t… I mean… I don’t understand.” I glanced at Conner, who was standing behind Allen with a satisfied grin on his face and his hands tucked behind his back. “Conner, what’s going on?”
“We worked out a compromise,” Conner said, nodding at Allen. “We redid the deal.”
“Redid the deal?” I shook my head to make sure I wasn’t imagining things. “What does that mean?”
“Tell her, Conner,” Allen said, punching him in the arm like they were old pals. “This was all your doing, so you tell her.”
“We re-signed the acquisition of Benson Digital’s manufacturing arm to Amalgamated so the ownership goes back to your uncle and the original shareholders,” Conner said. “Since all we were really interested in was licensing the patents, we decided to work a deal that gave us the rights to license the patents, but let Allen retain ownership of the company and the manufacturing arm.”
“And Reed went along with that?” I asked, not believing his words. I thought they were putting me on. “And the partners at Price?”
Conner smiled and gave me a nod. “Reed and the other partners were only interested in the long-term gain from the patent licenses. Since we were going to resell the manufacturing operation anyway, this is win/win for everyone involved.”
“Win/win?” I said. I had to smile. “Wow, have you ever worked a deal that you didn’t come out on top? I thought the Conner McGee mantra was ‘win and fuck the other guy’.”
Conner shrugged and shoved his hands into his pockets. He said, “That did not have to be the case here. And the result is the same. Allen retains his company and gets a huge payout for the licensing. And Price profits from brokering the licensing deals.”
I stared at Uncle Allen for a moment. He seemed truly pleased.
“You’re okay with licensing the patents?” I asked.
“I am,” he said, nodding. “I was hesitant at first. Then Conner showed me the math. It was a no brainer.”
I put a hand on Allen’s arm. “And the cancer? I thought you wanted to take a break.”
“I can still step away from the company to get treatment,” he said. “I have a great team in place that’ll keep things going while I’m away.” He looked at Conner and smiled, something I never thought I would see. “It truly is a win/win deal.”
“Win/win,” Conner said.
“Wow.” It was the only thing I could think of to say. So, I said it again. “Wow.”
“And now, you two need to talk,” Allen said, putting his hands on my shoulders and leaning down to look me in the eye. “I’m very happy with the way things have turned out. I want you to be happy, too.”
“I’m happy,” I said, lying badly.
“You’re not as happy as you could be,” Allen said. He glanced at Conner, then back at me. “I’m gonna go help your old man behind the bar. You kids talk. Work things out.” He turned to Conner. “And remember, son, she has six, very large brothers inside that bar. And I’m
betting they’re all drunk and looking for a fight about now. Don’t give them one.”
“Don’t worry,” Conner said with a smile. “I’m a lover, not a fighter.”
“Remember that,” Allen said to me as he headed for the door, I felt Conner’s hand on my back. A wave of passion swept through me that I hadn’t felt since the last time we touched. I turned to look at him with tears in my eyes.
“You did this?” I asked. “You made this happen.”
“I played a part,” he said.
“But why? I don’t understand. You had everything you wanted. You had won.”
“I decided to do the right thing,” he said. “I felt terrible about the way things turned out. That’s not what was supposed to happen. You must know that I never meant to use you in any way. The fact that you were Allen Benson’s niece, it was just a strange coincidence.”
“It was?”
“I had thought about you ever since New Year’s Eve. When I saw you in that conference room sitting next to Allen I knew it was fate. Or the luck of the Irish. Whatever you want to call it. You make me feel things that I’ve never felt before. And after the deal was done, and you wouldn’t talk to me, wouldn’t give me a chance to explain… well, I knew I had to do something to prove myself to you. You make me want to be a better man, Katie O’Hara. I…”