“Oh, man. I haven’t had fried chicken in years. Bring it on!”
Chase took one look at me, holding his daughter and burst out laughing. “I cannot wait until you have kids, man. It’ll be interesting to see how you do as a father.”
I rolled my eyes while handing Joanna back to Margo, who slipped onto the back porch.
“Are you suggesting that I’d suck as a dad, Chase? Because if memory serves me correctly, you weren’t exactly father-material back in college.”
It was our weekly hangout night, where we just sat in front of the television and drank beer. It was a way to catch up with each other since we were both so busy. We usually ordered a pizza, but I was more than happy to have some of Margo’s fried chicken. That woman could cook up some of the best food in all of Florida.
“Whatever, man. All I’m saying is that one day, you’re going to have a brood on your hands and be up to your ears in diapers.”
I pictured myself with three or four kids, all screaming for my attention at once while I tried getting ready for work.No, thank you.“Yeah, me with kids. That’ll be the day.”
“It’ll happen just when you least expect it,” he said while handing me a beer from his armrest cooler. It was ice-cold too.
“How come Margo dipped? Does she not like me or something?”
Chase shot me a look while opening another beer for himself. “Why are you so paranoid all of a sudden? No, the waves are starting to pick up, and Joanna loves to watch them. I wouldn’t be surprised if she turns into a water baby.”
“What’s a water baby?”
“You know when you can’t get your kid out of the water.”
“I thought every kid likes to play in the water.”
“Nope,” he said while changing the channel. “I hated the water growing up, but Ginger was a water baby. She used to spend hours in the ocean or pool, refusing to get out even when it was time to eat.”
I nodded while sipping my beer, not wanting to discuss Ginger too much. Chase was very protective of his little sister, so much so that he had refused to give me her number last year. He had ended up giving her mine, which at the time felt like a slap in the face. Although everything seemed to be working out just fine.
“Well, hopefully, mine will be a water baby because I love swimming. I wish I had more leisure time lately, but all I ever do is work. Speaking of which, how’s work going for you?”
He shrugged while landing on a home shopping channel, pitching some outdoor grill that seemed to get his attention. “Work is work. I’ve been thinking about getting into the pressure-cooker business, but I’m still doing research on how it works.”
“I’m assuming that with your touch, it would be something you could control remotely.”
“Of course,” he said matter-of-factly. “What about your job? Anything new?”
“I officially broke things off with Ria.”
Chase slammed his beer bottle down onto the coffee table before turning to face me. “Please tell me that you’re serious this time, man.”
“Hell, yes, I’m serious. Ria invited me out for drinks the night before I left for the States, and I made it abundantly clear that I’d text her to let her know if I could meet her.”
“Let me guess: she went anyway and was pissed you didn’t show up.”
“Yup,” I said while chugging the last of my beer. Chase promptly handed me another one. “Between the two of us, Ria and I haven’t had sex in several months. We’d only been getting together to discuss work after-hours because I thought that maybe there’d be a spark between us, but there’s nothing man. And when I look back on it, the sex was good but not great.”
“Well, your next step should be to get rid of her as a business partner.”
He was right, but Ria was so involved in my company that it would be a huge pain in the ass to get rid of her. I was hoping Ginger would find something so she’d just up and quit, then I could transfer the job responsibilities to someone already working for me.
“Speaking of which, I suspect that she’s been embezzling money from me for quite some time.”
Chase nearly dropped his bottle of beer that he’d just picked back up. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Because I knew you’d be on my ass about firing her, and it’s not that simple. Do you know how many hours a day I work? And do you know how hard it is to find someone trustworthy to look into this sort of matter?”
As a billionaire, I attracted people who only wanted money. Which was why I had trusted Ria to look over my books. She had a successful, steady job, and her family was pretty well off too. If she were in desperate need of cash, she sure didn’t act like it.
