Page 92 of Good Vibes Only
He didn’t like being told that. His tone became brusque and cold. “Mm-hm. Well, I’ll remind them again, as soon as we get off the phone here, alright?”
My jaw clenched. He was obviously brushing me off. I was going to give himone last chanceto understand that I meant business—but then he went and shot himself in the foot.
“Either way, the work will be done soon and then your neighbor girl can get right back to selling dildos, alright? Okay, bye now—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I said, stopping him from hanging up. “Nah, man. That’s not gonna fly.”
“Hm? Now what’s wrong?” he asked, feigning ignorance.
“What’s wrong? How about your attitude? Or your excuses? Or the disrespect you’ve shown me? And now you’re disrespecting McKayla, who has been nothing but patient throughout this whole ordeal.Weare the dick bags in this situation, Mike. Not her. Maybe you’re okay with that, but I’m not.”
I took a deep breath. He tried to interrupt and get a word in, but I didn’t let him talk because I was just getting started.
“And you know what really pisses me off? The fact that I’m paying a shitton of money to get what I want, yet I don’t feel like you’re listening to me. At all. From the very beginning—”
“Alright, Brett. Slow down—”
“No, I need to say this because this has been building since we started working together. From the very beginning, you haven’t listened to me when I’ve told you what I wanted. I told you I wasn’t wild about a sit-down restaurant and you went ahead and planned for it anyway. I told you I didn’t want the menu designed by that 815 guy, but hey, he’s friends with you, so fuck it, right?”
“That’s not true. He didn’t get the job because of our friendship.”
“No? So you’re not friends?”
“Well yes, we’re friends, but that had nothing to do with him getting the job,” he said. “He’s the head chef at one of the most popular and well-reviewed restaurants in Las Vegas. The entire city of Las Vegas loves his restaurant—”
“I don’t care if the whole damn world loves his food, Mike.Idon’t like it. More importantly, I don’t feel like his food fits my concept. And hell, it’s my business, isn’t it? Don’t I have some say in this?”
“Yourconcept?” He snickered. “Fine, let’s talk about yourconcept. Do you remember what you wanted when you first came to me? You wanted to open a bar, Brett. Abar.And I helped grow that idea into what it is today—a fine dining restaurant and microbrewery. Without me, you’d be the owner of some failing, run-of-the-mill dive bar,” he said arrogantly. “I’m going to make you alotof money with this venture, Brett. So please just sit back and watch the dollars roll in—and stop trying to get in my way.”
“Stop trying to get inyourway?” I repeated. “You work forme.You managemyproject. Your job is not to manage mewhile you go out and do whatever the fuck you feel like with my money.”
“Actually, managing the client and their expectations isa big part of my job,” he said, matter-of-factly.
“Not anymore.”
“What doesthatmean?”
“It means you’re fired.”
“Brett?” Mike stuttered and choked on his words and finally began to backpedal. “Listen, if you’d like, I can call the crew at the brewery and make sure they put the soundproofing panels up today. And if American bar food is what you really, truly want, then we can talk to our chef about that—”
“That should’ve been your attitude from the beginning,” I said, shaking my head. “But now it’s too little, too late. You better call your crew and tell them to stop working, because I want them out of my place immediately.”
“You’re making a huge mistake,” he huffed.
“Yeah, well, we’ll see about that.”
I hung up and climbed aboard the bus. The boys all peeked up at me with these sad puppy dog eyes, looking like they’d just seen a fight between mom and dad, and I knew they’d heard everything.
“So … what about your beer?” Tank whimpered.
“Yeah, what’s going to happen to BarDown?” Brock asked.
“Does this mean we’re not getting our beers?” Connor asked.
I grinned. “Lighten up, boys. BarDown’s still going to open. We’re just going in a different direction.”
Rust gave me a nod when I sat next to him. “You made the right choice,” he said. “Way to stand up for yourself—and for your girl.”
