Page 9 of Sweet Spot

The rest of the soccer players lifted their beers and waters in the air. “To Captain Jeri!” Everyone whooped and drank to the team captain.

“Well?” She asked, cocking an eyebrow and subtly nodding towards the bar.

I shrugged. “Not bad.”

“Ask him out,” she whispered.

I shrugged again. “We’ll see.” After my disastrous non-date I wasn’t about to force myself into another. Isaac lived down the street. I was sure to bump into him again. Maybe we could keep flirting and see where things landed after we got to know each other better. “I think he’s your neighbor.”

“Oh?” She examined him closer. “The corner house two streets over sold a few weeks ago. New boat in the lift and had the pool resurfaced last week. I haven’t seen them yet but Nan said she saw two guys with dark hair and that is definitely two guys with dark hair.”

Mei hung on every word we said and tugged on my hand. “An excuse to lure you over here more often.”

“Hey, I have the whole month off. You’ll see plenty of me.” My work was on a contract-by-contract basis and after working the last three years non-stop I decided to take a whole month off before accepting any more work. I was excited to have no plans other than vague ideas on how to relax in different ways.

“Yes, but now you have an extra excuse to hang out with us this month.”

Mark gave me a nod from the doorway. I nodded back and returned to my seat as Mark began banging a ladle against an empty pot, singing happy birthday along with the whole staff and restaurant. Two lit sparklers stuck out of the cake. Ruth set the cake in front of Jeri while Shawna placed the pirate hat on Jeri’s head.

My friend beamed, her hands waving for more singing and cheering as the song made a second round. I let my gaze wander back to Isaac and found him clapping, singing, and glancing at me.

My breath caught and my skin sizzled when he smiled. Then he looked back at Jeri and finished the song. Sexy. Just intrinsically sexy. I shivered, then realized it wasn’t just me. My phone also vibrated in my pocket.

I had a missed call from an old client, Max Huntington. His job was the one that started me on this whole three-year whirlwind of work. He had emailed a few times over the years. Why was he calling now? I stepped outside and called him back.

“Hey Kate!” His strong voice answered right away. “I’m sorry to call you on a Friday night. I didn’t realize what time it was.”

“It’s good to hear from you, Max. I assume it’s important if I’m getting calls from the man himself.” Max owned the Miami Pythons hockey team, as well as Huntington Distribution and Huntington Industries, but it was the Pythons that he hired me to fix. A disaster of communications and work environment that took nearly a year to correct. The changes were so extreme and the success so obvious that it set my meal ticket. I had my pick of jobs after that.

“It is,” he said, the tone in his voice changing immediately.

“Don’t tell me you fucked up my hard work.”

“God no. I was an arrogant son of bitch but I’ve learned from my mistakes. Trust me, the Pythons are running smooth as silk.”

Then it was a favor or a friend. Maybe a favor for a friend. “Well that’s good to hear.”

“I talk about how you saved my ass so much a friend of mine asked for your contact information. He’s…an arrogant asshole too.”

There was a difference between jerks who actually thought they knew everything and leaders who never had to question how much they knew before. Jerks I couldn’t fix and wouldn’t work for. Assholes ready to learn and change were my specialty though.

“Go on.”

“My friend had good intentions and big ideas, but he screwed up and now he needs to fix his mistakes quickly. Before everything unravels.”

I saw my month off evaporating. “How quickly?”

“Yesterday.”

It was always yesterday in my line of work. “Will he let me do my job?”

Max sighed and I heard the creak of a chair in the background. “I think so. He’s desperate enough to listen and the timing is especially grim, so he really doesn’t have the space to cause you too much trouble.”

I wouldn’t really know if I was willing to take on the client until I had specifics and Max wouldn’t give me those until I signed the non-disclosure agreement. “Send over the NDA. When I get back from dinner I’ll sign it and send it back. Call me when you’re ready and we’ll discuss.”

“Thank you, Kate. I wouldn’t have called if it weren’t such a big deal.”

Last minute desperate big deals paid more, so there was an upside to cancelling my vacation. “I’ll talk to you in a bit.”

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