I Hated You First by Rachel John

Lauren

 

 

 

Another Tuesday morning meeting had me squeezed in between Herbert and Evan at the conference table. After yesterday’s first ownership meeting, I had a better idea of what my dad meant by ownership. He basically wanted to make sure that if he died, the company would continue on without him. Until then, Parker and I were regular employees who happened to own shares.

I was secretly relieved. Parker was livid. But then, when wasn’t he?

John looked around the table at all of us. “I’ll be at the trade show in Las Vegas this weekend, and I plan to come home with at least two new mini excavators and possibly a new skid steer. But that means we need some equipment sold this week to offset costs. I asked Lauren to look over what’s not renting. Give us your past sixty-day, six-month, and year-long losers in the different categories.”

With all eyes on me, I pulled up my spreadsheets and went over what I thought needed to go and why. It was important to keep our fleet up to date, especially when we could use the new purchases to offset our tax liability at the end of the fiscal year.

What I didn’t include in my presentation was the other numbers I’d run. I tracked who bought what and when. Five of the six sell-off suggestions had been purchased by Parker. In my opinion, he needed to be pulled from acquisitions and put solely on fleet management. Which probably meant swapping roles with Clay.

I was not looking forward to picking that fight. To Parker, spending company money was prestigious, a status symbol of his importance. Clay just wanted to fix stuff and stay out of the way. Which was exactly why they needed to switch. Clay was living below his abilities, and Parker wasn’t focusing on his strengths.

How I wished the company was just a chessboard and I could move pieces around at will. Guys could say whatever they wanted about being the tougher sex. They were way more touchy feely when it came to their egos.

That was why I planned to start with the guy with the smallest ego, which funny enough, was Clay. He was all bark and no bite. Plus, I’d be armed with cookies. Or, at least, I would after I made them. I texted him after the meeting, watching from my desk while he pulled his phone out and looked at it.

Lauren: Fine. Tonight. Seven-ish p.m. Chocolate chip cookies. Provide ingredients and the recipe, or else.

Clay: Or else what?

Lauren: Or else you don’t get cookies.

Clay: As you wish.

He turned and gave me a smolder Princess Buttercup would have swooned under. But not me. No swooning here. I stared him down before turning to my computer, focusing on looking bored and unconcerned. Whatever. Clay just liked to mess with me. Just like I liked to mess with him. We were… messy. I wasn’t sure when my feelings for him had morphed from Parker’s annoying friend into a complicated person I wanted to get to know on my own, but a part of me wished I could go back to ignoring him. Real ignoring, not this denial of how aware I was of him at all times.

How had Jenny put it? I sat up a little taller around him. I felt more. I wished she wasn’t right.

I put my phone away so I wouldn’t be tempted to check it. No more texting Clay at work. Someone was bound to catch on, the way gossip and rumors flew around here.

Dad wanted another ownership meeting with Parker and I right before I planned to leave for the day. I sighed, knowing this wouldn’t be quick. I’d have even less downtime before I was supposed to call Noble.

I met up with Parker just outside of Dad’s office.

“Do you know what this is about?” Parker asked.

“Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Get in here, you two.” Dad waved us in before turning to our tax guy, Barry, who was sitting in the corner looking like he was trying not to take up space. He glanced at the two of us before shuffling the papers in his lap nervously. He was a timid guy in general, but I had a bad feeling about what I was about to hear.

Dad motioned for Parker to shut the door behind him, and then rubbed his hands together. “Let’s get right into it. Barry’s here to help us with the paperwork. The long and short of it is, after meeting with him today, we think it’s best if we get the ball rolling on this while the two of you are single. If either of you were to marry and get shares of the business after the fact, your spouse would be entitled to half in the case of divorce. It’s a lot harder to take something that became yours before the marriage. And I hate to be crass about this, but it does happen.” He looked to Barry to confirm what he was saying.

Barry gave us a nod. “This is true. We also plan to put in a clause that in the case of your death, your spouse would get a payout from the company in return for cutting all ties to the business. The shares would revert to the other owners and not the living spouse. There would be no unexpected ownership transfer.”

Parker leaned forward. “So you’re saying, you’d take care of my wife and kids financially, but you’d take back the company’s shares?”

“Exactly.”

I frowned. Nothing they were saying was wrong; clinical maybe, but not wrong. But all I could think about was Clay being left out. We were signing paperwork today? If there was ever a time to say something, it was now. As fast as we were moving on this, it would soon be too late for regrets.

“What about Clay?” I asked.

Dad’s eyebrows furrowed. “What about him?”

Parker hitched up his pants and turned to look at me. “Yeah, what about him?”

“Did you ever consider making him an owner? He’s sort of like another kid, and he’s just as invested in the business as the rest of us.” Something I’d been so sure about managed to make me feel unsure the second it left my mouth. Especially based on the expressions from the other three in the room. Had I been wrong in thinking he should be included?

“You didn’t say as much to him, did you?” Dad asked, staring me down.

“No.” It came out automatically, and the panic hit me all at once. Because I was lying. I was lying to the two people who knew when I lied. I’d never been good at it.

“She did.” Parker ran his hands through his hair. “She totally did. I can tell.”

“Well, why not him?” I asked, trying to get back to the point. “It’s just, this is moving really fast considering you told us yesterday to be patient—that it was a process that would take years. I thought there’d be a better time to discuss this, but I guess it’s now.”

Dad sat back down and looked at Barry. “To be honest, it hadn’t occurred to me to include Clay.”

“You’re considering this?” Parker asked, looking from Dad to me and back again. “If I was the one who brought it up, you would’ve turned it down flat. But because Lauren says it, why not?”

I refrained from rolling my eyes. “This isn’t about us, Parker. And why didn’t it occur to you? Clay’s your best friend.”

Parker threw his hands up. “So this is about being better than me. Great. You win.”

“That’s not it at all.” I didn’t want to do this. It was like we were proving, right here and now, why we weren’t mature enough for this. Squabbling coworkers were one thing. Squabbling owners were a disaster.

I turned back to Dad. “I’m not getting engaged tomorrow. Neither is Parker. Can we reschedule this for next week, or next month, and have some time to think about it? Because right now I feel like rejecting ownership altogether, but you’ve always taught us that important decisions shouldn’t be made while we’re upset.”

“Yes, we’re done for today.” Dad shooed us both away, but called us back before we made it to the door. “We didn’t get a chance to discuss the last ownership issue, and I want you to think about it before we meet again, considering the disaster this meeting’s turned out to be. Owners cannot date employees of this company. Not now or in the future.” He was looking at Parker, but he wasn’t fooling anyone. He meant me. Yeah, Parker had dated a receptionist once, but nobody put up a fuss when she quit a few weeks later. He had been lucky enough to date an employee who wasn’t good at her job.

I stared my dad down. “Why do we have to make a rule about it? For the last time, I’m sorry Boyce quit.”

“This isn’t just about Boyce. I don’t want anyone taking advantage of either of you. And I don’t want a culture of drama around here any more than we already have. Just think about it.”

I hated when he was as logical as he was controlling. “Fine. I’ll think about it.”

“Good. But there is one more thing. We do need to know if you talked to Clay about sharing ownership, Lauren.”

My stomach clenched. Back to this. “No. It was just an idea I was throwing out.” I left before I had to lie harder to cover up what I’d done. In my worry about losing my chance to say something, I’d forgotten Clay’s fear that I would—that I would try to micromanage his career. I stumbled to my truck and got in, throwing my bag across the seat. Why hadn’t I asked for more time first instead of immediately mentioning Clay? Now I was clinging to a hope that nobody would talk to him about it unless they planned to bring him into ownership. I had just gambled with Clay’s future, and there wasn’t a thing I could do to fix it. Clay was going to hate me, and for once, it would be justified.

I drove home at a snail’s pace, my mind so caught up in the meeting I passed streets without remembering the drive at all. It was freaky and frustrating, and I drove like a grandma just to be on the safe side. I carefully pulled into my parking spot in the apartment complex and ran upstairs.

Jenny was sitting at the kitchen table eating grapes. I ran to her and hugged her from behind, which made her laugh until she turned and saw my face.

“What’s the matter? You look like someone picked you last for kickball.”

“Never happened. I’m a kickball champion.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Good for you, blondie. But seriously, what’s the matter?”

I plopped into the chair next to her and stole a grape from her bowl only to put it back, earning me a glare. I had very high grape standards. No squishiness whatsoever.

Jenny picked it up and examined it before tossing it into the garbage. “I don’t know what this grape did to offend you, but I’m not eating your cast-offs.”

“I’m really wishing today that I had a punch-the-clock kind of job. One where you go home and think your boss is the worst, and don’t have to feel guilty about it because it’s nothing personal. Like when you’re a kid and you think your teacher lives at school. No life beyond what you see. That’s how I want to see my boss.”

“What did your dad do this time?”

“Tried to pass on his hopes and dreams. Apparently there are a lot of tax implications and rules associated with that.”

“Ah, the ownership thing. What sort of rules does he want you to follow in exchange for the keys to the kingdom?”

“Promising to never date an employee of the company.”

Jenny leaned forward and studied me. “And you want to date somebody there? Who?”

“I don’t want to date anyone there. I just don’t want to be told I can’t.”

“Not even Clay?”

“No, I don’t want to date Clay.”

“Except you’re going over to his house tonight, right?” Jenny looked pleased with herself.

“He’s forcing me to make him cookies. It’s not a date. It’s actually payment for agreeing to go on a date with someone else.”

“A date with someone else, but with you,” Jenny clarified. “A double date.”

I stood up and paced around the kitchen. “I should just call the whole thing off, shouldn’t I? I’ll call Noble right now and tell him never mind.”

Jenny tossed a grape at me, which bounced off my shirt and rolled across the kitchen floor. “Is it rude if I ask you to pick that up for me? I just wanted to get your attention.” She laughed at my deadpan stare and jumped up to get it herself. “Lauren, if you’re not ready for ownership, you don’t have to do this. You’re twenty-three, and you have your whole life ahead of you. Just say you’re not ready.”

“Except my dad wants to plan it all now before Parker or I get married and our future spouses have a say and money ruins everything.”

“Man, your dad is such a downer. And I get it. The business means everything to him. But does it mean everything to you?”

“I used to think it did. Now, I’m not sure.” I got out a frozen dinner and studied the instructions before popping it in the microwave. Jenny was right. I didn’t have to have all the answers today. I didn’t even have to know why I was going over to make cookies for a person I had no intention of dating. Sometimes, people just wanted to make cookies and eat them, without any ulterior motives.