by Hamel, B. B.
“We’re trying to get your uncle to help us out,” I say. “It’s this whole thing.”
“Tell me about it,” he says, watching me.
So I do. I give him the quick rundown, starting from the beginning. I leave out the whole marriage thing though. I figure he doesn’t need to know about that part.
“Interesting,” he says. “So you’re bribing him. I didn’t think Uncle Duncan had it in him.”
“Now you know how much you matter to him,” I say.
He laughs. “Guess so.” He frowns a little. “So you really think you can survive if you merge your companies, huh?”
“That’s the plan.” Josh finishes his beer. “Mind if I have another?”
“Go for it.” Tyler leans back on the couch. Josh gets up and walks into the kitchen. “All right. Listen to this.”
“Yeah?”
“How about I work for you part-time? I’m not super picky or whatever. I have a degree in marketing, so I could do that, or whatever position you need filled.”
I blink at him, shocked. “Wait, really?”
“Fuck it. I mean, Uncle Duncan’s right that this poker and streaming gig won’t last forever, so having your shit on my resume might be good. And who knows, maybe I’ll like it, and I can be on the ground floor during that big merger.”
“Okay, that’s smart,” I say. “But, uh, how are you going to keep streaming and playing poker?”
“Oh, I do that shit for like a few hours at night,” he says, waving me off. “I can easily work part-time on top of my usual stuff.”
I stare at him. “You work a few hours a night… and make three hundred grand a year?”
“Yeah, I know. Insane, right?” He grins. “Now I bet you get why I don’t want a real job.”
“What’s this?” Josh asks, coming back into the room.
“He says he’ll work for us part-time.”
Josh stops mid-stride and stares. Tyler just shrugs at him. “Yeah, man. That’s the deal.”
“You’re serious?” Josh slowly sits down and puts the beer aside. I grin at him and he stares warily at Tyler.
“Part-time. Whatever you need. She can fill you in.” He stands, finishes his beer, drops it on the floor, and crushes it. “That cool?”
“Uh, yeah,” Josh says, blinking rapidly.
“Cool. So I got this blunt I feel like smoking, you guys down?”
“No, uh, no thanks,” Josh says, standing. “We can’t right now. Got to do some… business stuff.”
“Cool, cool. I know all about business stuff.” He grins. “You can show yourselves out. I’m sparking up. Gotta work tonight, you know?”
“Sure. Can’t go to work sober,” I say.
“Except for my company,” Josh adds. “Then you’d better be sober.”
“No problem, boss,” Tyler says, waving as he walks away and heads back into another room.
I take Josh’s hand and we get the hell out of there before Tyler changes his mind. We hurry down the stairs and out in the city again before I burst out laughing.
He laughs with me and we lean against the building, just standing there and cracking up. He reaches out and takes my hand, and we linger in the shade, both of us feeling giddy.
“Can you seriously believe that guy?” I ask. “I mean, what a life.”
“Explains a lot. Lucked into a really good gig and he just can’t settle into adulthood.”
“Almost feel bad for him. Except then I don’t, because he makes so much money.”
Josh laughs. “So do you think part-time will be good enough?”
“I hope so. I can’t imagine Duncan actually thought we’d get that done. I mean, now that I’ve met him, I’m positive he sent us on a wild goose chase.”
“I think you’re right.” Josh frowns and cocks his head. “But Duncan will abide by the terms of the deal, I know that much about him.”
“This is crazy,” I say with a sigh. “How can we convince more board members?”
“I don’t know,” he admits. “But we have two so far. And Elizabeth isn’t actively against us, so we can leave her out of our math. It’s a twelve-member board, eleven without Elizabeth, and we have two. We just need four more.”
I take a deep breath and slowly let it out. “Think any of them will agree to it without getting some favor from you?”
“Nope, not even a little bit.”
“So we’re in for a crazy couple of weeks then.”
“Exactly. Assuming Seb doesn’t wreck us completely. But I have a feeling the board actually dislikes him as much as we do.”
“I hope so.” I stand on my toes and kiss his cheek. “You’re doing great so far.”
“Yeah?” He smiles at me, head tilted. “I don’t think I could’ve done this without you.”
“You’re right about that.”
He laughs and his head comes up into my hair. He pulls me against him and kisses me, nice and slow. I don’t know how we’re doing this, how we’re just kissing like it’s no big deal. I know we’re fake married, but somehow that’s infected our relationship and now I can’t stop it.
Not that I want to, because it feels good, so good. I love his lips against mine, his body against mine. He’s determined and smart and gorgeous, and the more I get to know him, the more I want to learn.
“Come on,” he says, taking my hand. “Let’s get to work. We have a bunch of old rich people to convince.”
I follow him, and I realize that I believe in him more than I ever have in this moment.
14
Josh
“Okay, now I’m starting to question your sanity.” Maggie frowns at me as I pull my car into a gravel parking lot. “What are we doing out here?”
“We’re working,” I say, killing the engine.
“Josh.”
I laugh and gesture around us. A long grassy field flows away from the gravel parking lot and ends at a large, man-made lake. Low trees and scrubby bushes line the lake, and a pier extends across its surface on the other side. There are a few other cars around, and an old man walks a small white dog along the paved path that surrounds the lake.
“Larry Sloan comes here,” I tell her. “It’s sort of an open secret. Every day during lunch, he comes out here and fishes for a few hours. So his lunch is more like a siesta.”
“And he’s on the board?”
“I hope so. Otherwise, we’re about to annoy some old guy during his prized fishing time.”
She sighs and opens the door. “This is hard enough without the sarcasm, you know.”
I laugh and follow her out. I linger on the grass for a second, shading my eyes as I scan the lake. There’s not much action going on, but over on the pier I notice a lone figure with a fishing rod.
“Come on,” I say, and head down to the paved path. We walk side by side, passing the old man and his yappy white dog. It tries to lunge at my ankle as the old guy grunts a hello.
“Nice day,” she comments. “Good day for fishing.”
“Hopefully he’s in a good mood.”
“Think he’s going to help?”
I hesitate. “I don’t know,” I admit. “Larry’s something of an unknown to me. He’s new to the board so it’s totally possible that he doesn’t have any preconceived ideas about what we should do. But then again, Seb might’ve gotten his hooks into him already.”
“Great.” She sighs and looks out over the water. “You ever go kayaking?”
The question surprises me. “No,” I say. “Never my thing.”
“What do you do?” she asks. “Anything… outdoorsy?”
“I run,” I say. “I lift. I surf sometimes, but mostly I sit in the sand and read. That’s outdoors, right?”
She grins. “That’s outdoors. My dad used to take me camping when I was younger, out to a place a lot like this.”
“Yeah?”
“We’d rent a cabin then go fishing during the day. He’d take a little rented boat out, and sometimes we’d go kayak
ing around the lake. It was really fun. I hated it at first, but then I sort of just… gave in.”
“Your dad sounds like he was good to you.”
“He really was.” She reaches out and grabs a honeysuckle from a bush. She holds it on her fingers then flicks it onto the ground. “I think he was trying to compensate for my mother’s death. I mean, I know he was. But it was nice, you know?”
“I haven’t really talked to my mother about my father yet.”
She looks at me, surprise in her eyes. “Really?”
“I know, that’s awful, right?” I shake my head, staring at the path in front of us. “I tried to once, when he first passed. She wasn’t ready, and I just…” I trail off.
“It’s never too late, you know.”
“Yeah. I know. I’m going to. I call her every day just to check in.”
She laughs. “I know, I hear. She’s always asking you about me.”
“She can’t help herself. She thinks this whole thing is insane, and she doesn’t even know that it’s fake.”
“Can you blame her? We did rush into a marriage.”
“True. I just…” I trail off. “I wish I could tell her how much of an asshole Dad used to be. And how much happier she seems without him.”
I expect her to give me a disgusted, horrified look. Instead, she seems thoughtful. “From what I can tell, your father wasn’t a kind man,” she says. “I doubt your mother needs to be told that.”
“True.” I shake my head. “It’s just not simple.”
“It never is.”
“Even though he was a tough person to be around sometimes, he was still her partner for forty years. Can you imagine that? Being with someone that long?”
“I know.” She laughs. “God, we’ll never make it.”
“Not with that attitude.”
“Would you even want to be with someone that long?” she asks.
I shrug and look up at the sky. The sun’s bright and the clouds drift lazily across the blue. “When I get married, it’s going to be for real,” I say, my voice low, before I grin at her. “And I’m aware of how that sounds.”
She laughs. “You really mean that though, don’t you?”
“I want a partner. I want a wife. Don’t you?”
“I don’t want a wife, but I do want a partner.”
“I love the idea of being with someone for the rest of my life. I just… I have to find the right person. I don’t want to make the same mistake my mother made.”
Maggie goes quiet for a few minutes. We get closer to the pier and I put my arm around her without thinking. She reaches up and takes my hand as it drapes off her shoulder, her fingers intertwining with mine.
“I want that too,” she says, her voice soft.
I smile and we walk down the pier together.
Larry Sloan stands at the end, wearing khaki trousers, dress shoes, and a dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He has a tackle box next to him, and his line bobs in the water.
“Mr. Sloan,” I call out from a respectable distance away.
He turns and frowns then shades his eyes. “Josh Cork?”
I nod and wave, moving closer. “Hello, Larry. How’s the fishing today?” Maggie hangs back a bit, her arms crossed over her chest as the wind picks up, blowing across the water.
Larry laughs. “Terrible,” he says. “But it’s always terrible.” He starts to reel his line in. When he finishes, he puts the rod down, leaning it up against a pillar. “What are you doing out here?”
“Came to talk.”
He wipes his hands on a towel and frowns at me. “I figured you would sooner or later. But I also figured you’d go through my office.”
“What can I say, I love the great outdoors.” I grin at him. “Did you meet my wife, Maggie, yet?”
“Nice to meet you, Maggie,” he says.
“Same to you. Do you know if this lake is good for kayaking?”
He frowns. “I’ve seen a few people out.”
“I’d love to go out sometime. But Josh here is too afraid to go with me.”
I laugh and shake my head. “Not exactly true, but okay.”
“You like to spend time outdoors, huh?” Larry frowns at her. “That’s a good thing, in my opinion.”
“I agree.” She beams. “But sorry, I didn’t mean to derail this business meeting.”
“Not a business meeting,” Larry says and looks at me. “Unless I’m missing something here.”
“Thing is, Larry, she’s right,” I say. “I’m here for business.”
He sighs and glances down at his rod. I can tell the last thing he wants to do right now during his sacred time is discuss anything related to work. But he turns to me and forces a smile on his face. “What can I do for the CEO?” he asks.
“Funny you should put it that way.” I walk closer and lean up against a pillar. “You’ve heard what’s happening, right?”
He shrugs. “Something about it. Just whispers.”
“Whispers?” I laugh. “Come on, Larry. You’re new, not stupid.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “All right, you want to be that way?”
I nod. “I do.”
“Fine. I hear you’re starting a civil war in this company. I hear you’re trying to betray everything we stand for.”
I sigh and glance over at Maggie. She’s frowning, her head cocked. “So I guess Seb got to you first.”
“Seb called me last night,” he says. “Truthfully, I think that man’s a liar and loathsome. But I’m not sure you’re much better.”
I laugh, genuinely happy to hear some straight-out honesty for once in this whole fiasco. “I’ll be straight with you then, Larry. Cork is going under and Seb wants to make sure it happens. He wants to sell his shares as soon as possible and get out before things get worse, but he needs to make sure the rest of the board sticks around until his shares all get sold off.”
Larry snorts. “I doubt that.”
“Why?” I ask. “I’m trying to merge our company with our closest competitor, which is the only way to make both our companies viable in the long run. Otherwise, we won’t be able to fight back against the big guys.”
“Even merged, it’ll be hard,” he says.
“True, but merge and we have a chance. Seb wants us just to do… what? I mean really, you’ve seen the numbers. What was Seb’s big idea?”
Larry frowns. “He wants to do nothing.”
“Exactly. Do nothing and we’re toast in a few years at best. Come on, let’s not bullshit. This isn’t a civil war. This is one man trying to scuttle a deal that could save thousands of jobs.”
Larry watches me carefully for a long moment. His deep blue eyes are sharp and his gray hair blows in the wind. He seems entirely unpretentious, his hair unruly and a little curly, nothing about him manicured or clean. But he’s clearly a smart man with a sharp eye and a lot of patience.
“Tell you what,” he says. “You carry my gear back to my car and then we’ll talk.”
I perk up. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. Carry it all.” Larry walks past me. “And don’t make her carry anything.” He waves and heads off onto the path.
I stand there and watch him go as Maggie joins me toward the end of the pier. “What do you think?” she asks.
“I’m not sure,” I say.
“I think he’s an asshole.” She shakes her head. “Just as bad as Seb. Leave his shit here.”
I laugh and turn away. “If there’s a chance he’ll go for it, I gotta try.”
“Doesn’t matter to me either way. I’m not the one carrying all that stuff.”
I sigh as I bundle it all into my arms. It’s heavy and awkward, but I manage to trudge back to the paved path. Maggie walks next to me the whole time, swinging her arms wide, grinning at me like a moron.
I glare right back. “You’re having too much fun.”
“I think I’m having a very appropriate amount of fun, thanks.”
I laugh despite myse
lf. She looks gorgeous in the afternoon sun and I’m tempted to drop all this shit and kiss her. Hell, being with her might be better than this whole company.
“Let’s run away,” I say.
“Yeah? Where to?”
“I don’t know. Paris. Barbados. Anywhere.”
“How about Australia?”
I give her a look. “Really? It’s so far. And there are so many killer bugs.”
“I know. But I like the idea of riding around on kangaroos.”
“You can’t ride a kangaroo. They’re not that big.”
“We’ll figure out a way. We’re Americans, right? We can ride anything.”
I laugh and shake my head. “I don’t think that’s how it works.” I heft up the fishing rod before I drop it by accident. “Come on, what do you say? Let’s run away. Forget about the company.”
“I can’t,” she says, still smiling. “My dad would be so mad. And I feel like I owe him.”
“Really?”
She skips ahead a little then turns and walks backwards. “Yeah,” she says. “I mean, like I told you, he really stepped up when my mom died for a while there. He really wanted to be an amazing dad, and now I have the chance to pay him back for it. I can’t just… you know, turn away from it.”
“I get that.”
She turns around and drops back beside me. “Plus, I like America. I don’t want to go anywhere else.”
“We could go to California,” I offer. “Still America.”
“Hm. Tempting. I do have family in California. You know that Divas reality TV franchise?”
“Oh, yeah, there are like ten of them now, right?”
“Six, and yeah, my cousin owns that. Well, his wife does.”
“That’s pretty cool.” I tilt my head toward her. “I didn’t know you were connected.”
“My dad’s sister married this super rich guy. You met her at the wedding, remember?”
“Oh, right. Sylvia Lofthouse.” I sigh. “Maybe they can give us the money to buy your dad’s company.”
She laughs. “You don’t know that family. They’d never go for it.”
“Well, we should try anyway. We’re getting desperate here, remember?”
“Not that desperate.” She’s quiet for a long moment. “We don’t want to be involved with them.”