Chapter 4 Onyx #2
Charlie smiled as he straightened. “When she’s like this?”
“Problem?” I asked, already knowing it wasn’t.
“Fuck no, she’s up for anything when she’s this wound up.”
“Enjoy,” I said to him as I left him to make sure my potential problem was kept quiet until her husband was out of jail.
I had no doubt that Angel would negotiate her client’s release with no unwanted attention, and as I headed back to the office, I trusted that when she read Neil’s email to legal telling them to terminate his affiliation with the agency, she would do the right thing then, too.
Well, she had no choice. How she handled it was her problem.
Two hours later, I was on a call with a scout for my brothers and cousin when my office door opened, and one very pissed-off colleague marched across the office floor.
Ignoring her, I continued with my call. “And you’ve seen the tapes?”
I listened to him as he told me he had, and then told me where he had issues with the boys’ performance, his biggest one being that they relied too heavily on each other. I agreed, but when you played with the best, you used the best.
Angel’s hands on the back of the chair tightened as she tried her best not to glare at me, and knowing I was getting to her pushed me to drag the call out by another ten minutes, in which time, she mouthed fuck you and left my office.
Finally hanging up the call, I called my little brother Jett.
“You missing dinner?” Jett said as he answered.
“Had an issue in Nashville that I needed to take care of,” I told him amicably. “Just off a call to Colby Walters,” I told him.
“Scout Colby Waters?” Jett asked me with enthusiasm, making me smile.
“Yes,” I confirmed. “He likes you, all of you, but I need you to start working on something for me now, and we’ll get help during summer vacation.”
“What kind of help?” Jett asked me suspiciously, and I felt the smile tug at the corner of my mouth at my little brother’s immediate suspicious nature.
“You play to Gray and to Ash too much. We need to break the habit.”
“They have the most chance of catching the ball.”
“I know, and I know you pass to them because you’re showing off how good they are, but right now, during the downtime, I need you to remember there are eight more guys on that field.”
I heard him draw breath to start bitching at me, and then I heard him let out a sigh. “I’ll work on it.”
“That’s the little brother I know,” I said with a grin. “Tell Gray he needs to be better on the fake passes too.”
“You’re not our agent yet,” Jett mocked me.
“You better hope I still want to be,” I admonished him as I leaned back in the uncomfortable leather chair.
“Pah, as if you’d let anyone else control us.” Jett laughed, and after a quick catch-up, I went back to work.
He was right, I wouldn’t let anyone else represent them, and although I didn’t like the fact that Angel was making inquiries about them, I was fairly confident that they would stick with me.
Unless she could actually get all three of them on the same team in the draft.
Which would be a fucking spectacular feat, and if it wasn’t me pulling it off, then it would be no one.
How the fuck had she managed even a hint of that? I needed to know who she was talking to or if she was playing me. I wouldn’t put it past her. It’s the sort of shit I would do to her.
But then again, I was a bastard. Thinking about it, I corrected myself. I may be a bastard, but she was every bit the bitch, which is probably why our rivalry was still ongoing; we were well-matched against each other.
Moving in my chair, I cursed the hardbacked fucking thing for what must have been the tenth time today. I needed to get rid of it, and I needed to get rid of it yesterday.
“Liz,” I buzzed my PA. Moments later, she walked through the open doorway, pad in her hand, pen poised. Liz was old school; she took shorthand. I liked Liz. “This chair needs to have an accident.” I watched as she fought the smile as her head dipped. “It’s not funny,” I reminded her.
“It’s a little bit funny,” she hedged. “How long have you let it stay in the office?”
“Six months,” I growled.
“I think you win,” she teased.
Did I? I doubted it. “I’m out all day Thursday. I have to go to Denver,” I told her. “Get creative with why it’s not here on Friday.”
She hesitated, and then she bit her lip as her look turned speculative. “Promise me you won’t fire me?”
“I’m not the kind of man to make promises.”
Liz snorted as she checked that the door was fully closed. “I have a puppy.”
I waited.
“If I was to come back to work tomorrow night with said puppy to collect something, and it ‘hypothetically’ peed . . .”
“Make sure it’s hypothetical and not actual,” I warned her.
“But for the story, it will have to have happened.”
I nodded once to let her know it was okay. “As long as we know it didn’t happen.”
“Would I do that to you, boss?” Liz grinned at me over her shoulder as she left the office.
Which was a timely reminder to check the office surveillance, to see what my employees got up to in my absence, if nothing else.
Yeah, I was a suspicious bastard — better that than a stupid one.