“Well—” Wick smirked. “—I can’t fire you until I train at least five more people.”
“Yay!” Edgar said weakly, raising both hands in the air. “I’ll never do it again, I swear.”
I grabbed Edgar’s shoulder and directed him inside. “He won’t fire you. Here’s a little secret—the boss loses files all the time. Come on.”
“Don’t tell him that,” Wick hissed.
I winked at Edgar, then smiled at Wick as he slid his arm around my waist on the way to my office.
The day had started out strangely and just got weirder and busier, though it wasn’t necessarily bad. Almost everyone in the whole damned building stopped by Wick’s office during the first hour after we opened to tell him they thought he did a good job, which had my chest about to burst for him, because as much as I liked to think he was perfect, he had some self-esteem issues. I hoped all this support would go a long way toward building his confidence.
After a boss-sponsored long lunch, Wick’s office was as crowded as I’d ever seen it. My knees knocked against his wooden desk—an antique family heirloom he used with pride—and I glanced around at everyone as I ended a call on my cell phone. I’d been talking to our clients all day, touching base to make sure they were still happy.
Shelby, who was an all-around gem, was sitting on my desk chair in the corner, munching a bag of popcorn and talking in hushed tones to someone. She had on khaki cargo pants today, and they were bulging with pens and notepads that she occasionally pulled out to use. Every now and then she would cup her hand around the phone, then laugh, her ponytail dancing back and forth. She was also doing damage control with clients, but she knew people across the state who worked in various technical aspects of our business, and while I tended to talk to managers, she spoke directly with people on the ground—who would be asked to give input on hiring new members of a team. Xadrian was going to have one hell of a time finding a job after she was finished.
We traded smiles, and she went back to nodding her head at something someone was saying on the other end of the phone.
Sitting cross-legged underneath a window was another man I didn’t see in Wick’s office much. Albion Guthrie was tall and imposing with dark hair and classy stubble, serious brown eyes, and a tendency toward frowning.
I’d never seen him smile.
Add his love of gray suits—never any color for him—and he had a dire aura. Albion led his team with an iron fist. By the time their ideas got to Wick there was never any wiffle-waffling or bullshit because they knew exactly what they were doing, and I’d never heard anything except professionalism from them. I had a feeling Albion wouldn’t allow improper behavior. Ever since he’d gotten back from a client meeting this morning he’d been carefully sifting through Xadrian’s files, searching for any signs of illegal activity.
Albion had volunteered for the job, and I got the feeling Xadrian had personally offended him with his antics. He scowled, and I leaned forward.
“Did you find something, Albion?”
Wick sighed and tossed his cell phone onto the desk, and I turned in the folding chair I’d dragged in next to him earlier, focusing on his pinched expression. Across the desk from Wick the last person in our cleanup party, Bedford Pickett, glanced up. The man was a damned good lawyer and I’d called him first thing. He was close to sixty with green eyes, silver hair, and a beard to match, and his black suit would’ve been worse than Albion’s, except he softened it with a lavender tie.
“How goes it?” Bedford asked, in a deep Georgian drawl that stuck out like a sore thumb in these parts.
“We’ve lost two clients thanks to this clusterfuck, one of which is Galyon Wilkes. He didn’t want a cardboard-cutout hotel for his project by the highway, but the fact that there’s been so much shake-up with the work put him off. He’s going elsewhere, and I had to charge him the kill fee on the contract, which means we’re still taking a loss on our work.” Wick ran his fingers through his hair.
“It’s only two clients,” Shelby called over. She munched popcorn and sat up straighter in her chair, rolling her head back and forth as if working out kinks.
Wick shrugged.
I took a list of phone numbers out of a folder I’d tossed on his desk earlier and handed it to him. “Start calling,” I said, then gave him my best smile.
He glanced down and his bottom lip popped out in something close to a pout. “These are my competitors.”
I nodded. “Yes, it’s a list of our personal contacts at each business. Tell them what happened here. Make sure you outline what a horrible employee Xadrian was and spare no details.”
Wick shook his head and a sly smirk spread across his lips. “You’re positively evil, love.”
“Well, one of us has to be,” I grumbled.
Bedford sighed and straightened in his chair, then drummed his hands on the desk as if in thought. “You don’t have to pay out severance to Xadrian, according to the contract he signed. He violated the ethics clause for certain, and if I dig, I could find other reasons, but that’s the easiest thing to go on. Fight unemployment all the way and give him nothing. As of right now, I’m afraid Maurice’s plan is the best avenue for any sort of satisfaction. As for everyone else who quit, you’re going to be required to provide the severance packages.”
“Fuck,” I snapped, and Bedford hid a smile behind a cough. “What about suing Xadrian?”
Bedford shrugged. “For what, exactly? Slander and defamation are notoriously difficult to prove. You would have to show serious financial loss from this, and that is all vague and open to interpretation. It’s not worth it.”
“We lost two clients.” Wick leaned back against his chair and pursed his lips.
Bedford nodded. “I’m sorry, it’s not a perfect system we deal with. It’s not fair.”
Bern knocked on the doorjamb between my office and Wick’s and all eyes turned his way. He flashed a sheepish grin. “I brought you someone who was too afraid to come alone.”
