Page 34 of Confessions of Pain
Ethan was mumbling almost incoherently, but I could make out most of the words. Jeremiah looked incredibly worried as he watched his lover try to control his fury. Gabe…myGabe had eyes only for me. There was nothing but disgust and hate swirling in those gray depths. Stormy. The color of his eyes reminded me of a nasty storm on the horizon and all the dangers accompanying that storm were directed straight at me. I lifted my chin and dared him to give me everything he felt, all the anger and hate. I deserved it. I’d waited on it for years, always hoping his anger would eventually drive him back to me.
A large man stumbled down the hall, holding the side of his head like he was afraid it might tumble off his shoulders at any given second. I recognized him as the security detail for the front door. Malcolm, I guessed. At the moment, I feared more for Malcolm than I did for myself. Not only had he gotten clocked by Jax, but he was about to get his ass handed to him by Ethan. As best I could tell, his was the only luck worse than mine.
“Sorry, sir,” Malcolm muttered as he flexed his jaw, checking for breaks, no doubt. “That guy was…was…hell, boss, that guy had some moves I’ve never seen before.”
Ethan crossed his arms over his chest in frustration. “Do I need to remind you that you were a Navy Seal less than two years ago, Mal? Moves you haven’t seen? You have more ways of killing a man than Crayola has colors of crayons! What the fuck happened?”
Jeremiah stepped up. “Calm down, Ethan. Everyone is fine,” he snapped irritably. Then, with a faint blush, he looked at Malcolm and said, “I mean…you are fine, aren’t you, Mal? Nothing serious, right?”
“Nothing serious,” the security man answered with a blush of his own. “Except for my pride. It may never recover.”
“It shouldn’t!” Ethan thundered. “He touched my brother, Mal! My brother!”
“Shut the fuck up, Ethan,” Titus interrupted with an extra bite to his voice. “I enjoyed it. He’s hotter than hot.” Turning to me, he said, “No offense, of course.”
“None taken.” Let them all believe I belonged to Jax. What did I care? Gabe no longer wanted me.
“Let’s just move past this,” Gabe growled as he took one step in my direction. “Add extra security to the exits with automatic lock doors where we have to buzz people in.” Looking into my eyes, he added, “That will keep him out, won’t it, Kels? You wouldn’t want yourboyfriendfucked up, would you?”
I snorted. Like they could hurt Jax. “If Jax wants in, he’ll get in. I’ll do what I can to make him understand he isn’t welcome here, but he’s just worried about me.” When Gabe’s eyes darkened, I quickly added, “I’ll explain everything to him tonight. He’s not…he’s not my…”
“You won’t explain anything tonight. You’re working late. Date night will have to be cancelled. Sorry, kiddo,” Gabe countered with a deadly smirk, daring me to defy him.
“I can’t work tonight, Gabe. I have plans. Sorry.” I did have plans and they did involve Jax, but it was nothing like Gabe was imagining.
Gabe took a step closer. We were only inches apart. As I inhaled his scent…felt his body heat, my body responded like a drug addict to his favorite drug. It wasn’t until I felt my eyelids fluttering that I realized how horrible a job I was doing at trying to hide my reaction to him. My eyes snapped open and I retorted, “Not tonight, Gabriel. I’m busy. Anyway, there’s nothing to do. If the machines go down, they’ll call me and I’ll come in. Other than that, we’re dead in the water until we hear about the military contract.”
“You’re working,” Gabe growled.
“He isn’t,” Barbara hissed. She knew exactly what I did every single Thursday of my life and she wasn’t about to allow anyone to interfere with it. “He said he has plans. Back off.”
Titus cleared his throat and said, “Actually, there is a lot of planning that needs to be done.” He looked at Gabe, then me, and said, “The military contract was awarded to Morganston Textiles a half hour ago. They’ll be placing their first order by the end of the day and from what they are telling me, the contract is going to be front-loaded, so we’re about to be head-over-ass busy.”
“Front-loaded? What does that mean?” Gabe asked.
“Military contracts are normally issued for three-to-five years in length. They list a minimum and maximum the military plans to order. Front-loaded means they are going to probably order the maximum quantities during this first year and they’re going to want delivery accelerated,” I answered. Excitement bubbled through my veins. This was my dream for the factory. Military contracts were our only hope for survival and they’d just been awarded one of the biggest ones issued since the reduction of military spending. It was a fucking dream come true for the employees and we would potentially have to end up tripling our production capabilities, which meant hiring more people. Trenton Falls was a poor community, and every job we could offer helped tremendously.
I should be jumping for joy, but the thoughts that Morganston had been awarded the contract just because Ethan, Titus, Jeremiah, and Gabe knew the awarding officer left a bad taste in my mouth. It was not only illegal, it was immoral. While I wanted to help the community, I didn’t want to pull the ‘it’s all in who you know’ card. My father and Wayne and pulled that shit at every opportunity and I’d promised myself to be better than them. They’d set the bar pretty damned low, but here I was, doing their same shit.
Titus clapped me on the back, interrupting my pity party. “Don’t even think it, Kelsey. The contract was awarded before Ethan even had a chance to talk to his friend. When we called to inquire about the status, he told us straight out that Morganston Textiles had been awarded one hundred percent of the contract.” He winked at me and said, “He said you did a damned fine job with your proposal, especially for a newbie. He’s excited and ready to get busy. As spokesman for Morganston Textiles, I told him we’d do everything in our power to fulfill all their demands and as quickly as possible. We can do that, can’t we, Kelsey? You aren’t about to make me out to be a liar, are you?”
Wow. We’d gotten the contract without the help of pulling strings. A sense of pride washed over me, pride for my hard work, the dedication and loyalty of our employees, and all the extra shit Barb and Courtney did to help make it happen. I couldn’t stop the smile that spread across my face, even if my answer to Titus was not going to make him happy.
“There may be some problems with the yarn supplier, but that’s it. Our credit isn’t worth shit and we’re on a pay-before-delivery basis because of all the underhanded, dishonest shit Wayne pulled. Once we get past that, everything else will fall into place…with the hard work of the employees, of course.”
“Excellent,” Titus answered quickly. “We’ll be good, then. It should just take a phone call and they’ll be able to easily get credit insurance on us. If they balk, we’ll pay cash before delivery.”
He was obviously not at all worried about credit issues and from everything I’d found on Google, there was a solid reason for his confidence. Ethan and Titus had more money than the Roman Catholic Church. And, yet, they acted nothing like my family.
I cleared my throat and said, “Okay, that’s great news for the company and employees. But, uh, the quoted yarn price for the first year of the military contract runs around thirty dollars per pound of yarn and if they max out the first-year contract, you’ll be looking at needing around fifty thousand pounds of yarn for the first six months.”
“Thirty dollars a pound for freakin’ yarn?” Gabe bellowed in disbelief. He glared down at me and asked, “Did you get railroaded on pricing?”
I rolled my eyes but never got to answer his smart-ass, uneducated question. Barb cut in, using her don’t-dare-mess-with-me mother tone. “None of this matters. Every one of us realizes how important this contract is to the success of this company, but Kelsey has plans tonight. He isn’t available to work over, make plans, or celebrate success.” Then she turned to Gabe and said, “No, we didn’t get railroaded on yarn pricing. Kelsey and I are both friends with the supplier. We received the same quote that the rest of the companies did that bid on the contract. Clearly, this is a business you don’t understand. Shocking.”
Barb’s insubordination was going to get her fired, and I didn’t want to see that happen. Not because she was a mother hen where I was concerned—Barb was the mother I’d never really had—but she, like Jax and Evie, needed to stop trying to protect me. It had been over two years since I’d had…trouble. I was stronger.
I turned and gave her the sternest look I could muster. “Barb, I’m fine. If Gabriel needs me to work overtime to help with the production planning for the contract, then that’s what I’ll do, and I can make my own decisions about that. I can rework my calendar and reschedule my session. Like you said earlier, this contract is vitally important to the success of Morganston Textiles. You and Courtney spent way too many hours helping me handle the paperwork and submitting wear trials to let my schedule impede success.”
