Chapter 26 Kinley
I spent all of Saturday at Wyatt’s, but on Sunday I went home. I wanted to prepare for tomorrow’s meeting without that sexy man distracting me.
I was in love! And my man loved me. It shouldn’t feel like the first time, but it did. Maybe all that time with Mark wasn’t what I’d thought. But this was real, and I was so ready. And that Wyatt said it first gave me a sense of comfort.
I finished my notes just before five o’clock in the afternoon and sent them to Wyatt.
Since we were both meeting with the distributor, I wanted us to be on the same page.
I was pumped to sit at the negotiation table with one of the biggest distributors in the country.
I was even more pumped after Wyatt replied to my email.
This looks great. Tomorrow, you’re taking the lead. I’ll just be there in a support capacity.
He was truly the best boss ever. Sure, I was a little bit biased, but not a lot.
I loved that he gave me this kind of freedom and authority, even with the website—he hadn’t checked on the progress very much while I worked on it and was delighted when it was done.
He had confidence in me, as he did in his entire team, to do what was expected.
The site had been up and running for two weeks. People were ordering on it already with very few snags. For now, Sage and the trio could fulfill the orders, but I knew that soon enough, I’d have to hire more people.
On Monday morning, I went straight into the meeting room. It was still empty, which gave me time to gather my thoughts. After mentally going through my notes, I had a very good feeling about this. I looked up when I heard voices approaching.
Wyatt stepped in with a gentleman who was in his early forties.
“Good morning,” I greeted them both.
“This is Dean Morrison from Premium Wines,” Wyatt said. “Dean, this is my head of business development, Kinley McGuire.”
Dean nodded slightly and shook my hand. “How do you do, Ms. McGuire?”
“Oh, please, just call me Kinley.”
“Let’s sit down. Thank you for agreeing to meet with us,” Wyatt said.
“Of course. I wouldn’t miss hearing about what you’re planning. Your brother only mentioned it briefly. I haven’t gotten the chance to go into business with the Sterling clan, but I’m looking forward to it.”
Hell yes. This was already going in the right direction. He was very open to this arrangement.
“All right, then. Let’s begin.”
I immediately recited my notes. Wyatt didn’t interrupt me even once.
After I finished my pitch, Dean started asking pointed questions about our pricing strategy and our production capacity.
I really liked him. He was clearly smart and didn’t beat around the bush.
That was just as well, because we didn’t have too much time left.
Wyatt was headed to the airport as soon as the meeting was finished.
“This all sounds good. I do have another question, though.” He looked at me. “Your name seems very familiar, but I can’t quite place it.”
Fuck! My heart sank.
Wyatt took a deep breath, and I decided to just get it out in the open. There was no point trying to skirt around the subject. One Google search of my name was enough to bring up horrendous headlines.
“I used to work for BuzzPage.”
Dean’s expression instantly changed, his eyes narrowing. “Right, now I remember. You were involved in the embezzlement?”
“No,” I said, keeping my voice even. I was about to explain when Wyatt jumped in.
“She’s innocent,” he said.
“The investigation was extensive,” I added quickly. “And the jury found me not guilty. Which I am. I was never involved in any of the CFO’s wrongdoings.”
Dean turned to Wyatt. “I’m not comfortable with this. The scandal is still fresh in everyone’s mind.”
“But I’m innocent,” I said through clenched teeth. I’d tried to be professional, but now this guy was pissing me off.
He cut his eyes to me. “Are you?”
“Dean, I trust her completely. The court gave their ruling, and that’s all you need to know. Kinley is the perfect match for my company,” Wyatt said without missing a beat. “And I’d watch my tone if I were you.”
“My tone?” Dean sounded incredulous. “You hired someone who worked with a con artist. Damn, man.”
“Dean, let’s get back to our conversation. What happened at BuzzPage has nothing to do with what Kinley is doing here. It’s beside the point.”
“Unfortunately, I will not have my name attached to your company in any way while Ms. McGuire works here. Innocent or not, she’s tarnished by association. You know how business works; why are you ignoring the obvious?”
Wyatt stood. “Then this conversation is over. Unless you can look past your concern, we won’t be doing business together.”
Dean frowned, jerking his head back as if he hadn’t expected Wyatt to react like this. “You’d forgo an important partnership for an employee?”
“I stand behind my employees 100 percent,” Wyatt said coldly.
I opened my mouth, but I didn’t know what to say. I wanted to defend myself, but why should I? I was not in the wrong here. But I did understand his concerns.
Dean rose to his feet. “All right, then. No point wasting any more time.”
Damn it! I could tell he really wanted to work with Wyatt—but not with me. Still, I wanted to maintain my composure, so I slowly got up and said, “Thank you for your time.”
“Listen, no offense, Ms. McGuire, but you’re deadweight to any company.”
I blinked rapidly as Wyatt repeated, “This conversation is over. I’ll walk you out.”
He looked at me, and I nodded to let him know everything was all right even though I was definitely not feeling that way. But what could he do to change this? Babysit me? Besides, he had to leave for the airport anyway. I hated that he’d have this hanging over him for his trip.
I sat back down, feeling dazed, and closed my eyes. Damn it. I really wasn’t prone to crying, but right now, I couldn’t hold back. Tears rolled down my cheeks. I pressed my palms against my eyes and forced myself to take a deep breath, exhaling slowly.
I tried to pull myself together, but I was too shaken. God, I didn’t want to spend my day moping around the office. What kind of message would that send to the rest of the team?
I made a split-second decision to head home and work from there.
I didn’t have any in-person meetings scheduled today anyway, so this worked well.
If anyone asked why I wasn’t at the office, I’d just tell them that I felt like I was coming down with a bug or something.
I grabbed my bag, putting it on my shoulder, but instead of taking the elevator, I headed to the staircase and walked down quickly.
Once I got outside and into my car, I took a deep breath and started crying again.
I was fumbling with my keys. “Come on, come on.” I didn’t want anyone to see me.
Glancing in the rearview mirror, I saw that I had red eyes and tearstained cheeks.
Gunning the engine, I immediately sped away and took a deep breath.
Once I was away from the building, I could let it all out.
I hadn’t felt so humiliated in a long time.
It wasn’t even just about me. Yes, I felt awful and was upset that he’d treated me like that. But I was more upset that because of me, Wyatt lost a potential business relationship.
A few seconds later, my phone beeped. Wyatt was calling. I connected the phone with the car’s Bluetooth and answered in the most cheerful voice I could pull together. “Hi.”
“Where are you?”
Oh shit. “Um, I’m heading home.”
“This early?”
“Sorry. I feel like I’m coming down with a bug.”
“What do you mean, you’re coming down with a bug? Is this because of Dean?”
Why was I trying to lie to him? “Yes,” I confess. “I just need to—”
“You don’t have to explain yourself to me. That was a shitty meeting. If you need to take it easy today, that’s more than fine.”
I didn’t want to take it easy. I wanted to fucking resign and never show my face there again. How could he just ignore this? Wyatt lost business because of me!
“Listen, I can postpone my trip to Napa.”
“No, really, don’t. I’m fine.”
“You want me to come by your house before I go?”
“You don’t need to coddle me. It was just unexpected.”
“Dean Morrison is a fucking moron, okay? We’ll find other business partners. Don’t worry.”
I was worrying, though. “Sure. Have a safe trip!”
“Are you—”
“Yes, I’m sure. Really, I’ll be okay.”
“All right, then, I’m heading out to the airport.”
“Let me know when you get there, and say hi to Sage and the team for me.”
“I will.”
After disconnecting the call, I started crying again. Wyatt didn’t seem too worried. But I was!
I was hoping that once I got home, I’d be able to relax.
But I couldn’t. This was bad. I’d written off the reaction of that first distributor as a onetime thing, but clearly that wasn’t the case.
How many more partnerships was Wyatt willing to lose before he let me go?
He cared about me, I was sure. But he was also a smart businessman.
I didn’t want to put him in the position of having to fire me.
I didn’t want to be deadweight around his neck, as Dean Morrison had so succinctly put it.
I forced myself to focus on work for the rest of the day, even though it all felt meaningless. How could I make plans for the future when I was branded with a scarlet letter?
As five o’clock rolled over, I moved from the kitchen table to my armchair and picked up my Kindle. I needed to lose myself in one of those batshit-crazy thrillers. But I gave up after attempting to read the same page for half an hour. Usually, books ripped me out of my thoughts, but not today.
I pushed my Kindle to one side and grabbed my laptop from the table. With trembling fingers, I opened my inbox and started to compose a message.
Dear Sterling team,