Gripping my bags tighter, I tried not to look as nervous as I felt. I needed the job, and even if Eli made me crazy, I needed to learn to keep more of it inside, or I was going to end up fired. I thought he’d say something about the argument, but he either ignored it or hadn’t heard it. No matter the reason, I was relieved.
“I’d like to see how these turn out as soon as you get some of the edits done. The company is breathing down my neck, and I want to be able to give them an answer soon. I like the quality that they’ve sent, but I need to know how it shows up on camera.” Preston’s even tone made it hard to stay angry.
“I think they’ll look good. I’m not sure about selfies with a few of the fabrics, but with the right lighting, the colors are going to pop.” I wasn’t sure how well they’d sell or even if the shades they came in were something people would buy, but the photos were going to be amazing.
“Great. I’m going to talk to Eli about the actual pieces, but once you have some of the photos done, if you could send them to me and to Eli I’d appreciate it.” Preston nodded and started to head toward the door, his business casual look at odds with the eclectic looks the models and staff were wearing.
In any other office, I would have expected some kind of comment about getting back to their jobs or wasting time, but Preston smiled and shook his head. He said something quietly to several models that were heading out the door with him, but they just nodded and gave him beaming smiles, so it couldn’t have been anything about work.
As I turned to go, I caught Eli out of the corner of my eye as he started to strip off the clothing. Watching him peel down the thigh-high hose wasn’t something I was willing to do, so I started walking away. Brats were my drug of choice, but I knew how bad they were for me, and I wasn’t willing to crash again. I was in recovery and I was going to stay that way.
No matter what it took.
Chapter 4
Eli
Before I could even slam the door, Preston started to speak. He took the fun out of everything. “Business is up ten percent, traffic to the site has increased dramatically, we’ve already sold out of the panties you posted about yesterday, and your rant last night about him almost caused the site to crash.”
Taking the wind out of my sails wasn’t fair.
“He’s an ass.”
Preston nodded. “I’m not going to argue about that.”
“He’s judgmental.” And he thinks I’m a slut. I didn’t say that part, though. For some reason, I didn’t think I could voice the words without it hurting more than it should.
I had a lot of people in my life who judged, and a lot of trolls online who made stupid comments, but coming from Roman it just made me angry. For someone who took photos for a living, he certainly couldn’t see very clearly.
“You’re right. He’s already caused enough havoc to justify firing him.” Preston gave me a look. “In fact, I tried to do that last week when I walked in on you two screaming at each other. You made it dramatically clear that you didn’t want him gone.”
I’d vetoed him—on the mouth.
Preston had been frustrated with me, but it’d sent Roman right over the edge, so it’d been worth it at the time. “The pictures are good.”
Preston couldn’t argue about that. “You’re right.”
And my blog had never been busier. From the posts to the comments from my fans, it was going nuts. “The panties sold out in twenty-four hours?”
“Yes.” Then Preston finally cracked a smile. “And Merrick immediately stormed in and said that someone else would have to take over the computers or the marketing department was going to revolt.”
“Three people can’t stage a coup.” It had to be at least five.
“They can if they’re the only ones who can run the servers and whatever magic actually runs the website.” Preston and I had both given up when the site had moved past the basic five dollars a month plan that we’d initially signed up for to host the damned thing.
At first, trying to do it ourselves had seemed like a good idea, but as the company had grown, we’d both thrown our hands in the air and said we didn’t care. He could make sense of the spreadsheets and data, and I understood the clothes and the marketing side of things, but the computers were Greek to us both.
It’d made me feel better in the beginning when I’d realized I wasn’t the only one who didn’t like them and didn’t really want to learn how to run the actual website, but I was starting to wish I was more help. However, taking anything else on my plate was impossible, and Preston had even said that if I looked at one more responsibility, he’d send me on a vacation—to my mother’s house.
The threat still sent shivers through me.
Plopping down in my chair, trying to ignore how good it felt to sit, I shrugged. “We knew it was coming soon. You started putting out feelers when he started saying the same thing the last time sales went up.”
Preston nodded. “This time he’s serious. There are evidently some upgrades that need to be done, and I sadly had no idea what a lot of it meant. But the basic threat was that it’s all going to explode if we don’t get a full-time IT guy.”
Letting my head rest against the back of the chair, I tried not to close my eyes. It wasn’t late enough in the day for me to even think about sleep. “You wanted to wait until the numbers looked good enough to support the additional payroll. IT doesn’t come cheap. Can we actually afford the new position and the money that’s going to go into whatever he does with the computers?”
“Yes.” Preston answered without having to think. “We started planning for this last year when we hit our goals so early. Don’t you remember that conversation?”
