Page 61 of An Angel's Share
“Why?” asks Jonno. “Why doesn’t it? As far as I am aware, the more stimulated the baby is, the better. In a positive way, of course. Shouting and not letting the mother eat, that might cause an issue.”
Liam’s face has gone bright red. “That was a misunderstanding. All sorted now, isn’t it, darling.”
I don’t agree or disagree. Not in my book, it isn’t. He hasn’t apologised for it to me. Not that I want one. I can’t stand the man.
Suzanne distracts everyone, coming in with tea and cakes as I look at my watch. “Right, let's see who wants to be here, rather than being paid to be.”
“Don’t be naïve, Aoife, we are all being paid to be here. No one is doing this for the love of it.” Liam shakes his head at me in disgust. “They’ll be off when they’ve got a better offer. Not one of us wants to stay here forever.” His voice drips with condescension.
“You speak for yourself, Liam. I do. I will stay for free. I love it here. So if they think they’ll bide their time and leave, fine. But they’ll be nose to the grindstone until then. No more freeloading, those days are gone.”
He practically laughs in my face. “We’ll see.”
Jonno takes a step towards him, fury burning from him, but Marshall hangs onto his arm. Dad shakes his head at him, but they both curl their lips at Liam. Somehow, Liam has defied the odds and become stupider. I didn’t even think that was possible.
28
Jonno
Four gone.She is totally amazing, fronting it out without batting an eye. I’m itching to get my hands on her. But I need to maintain my dignity, and not throw myself at her feet. I fucking want to. Long to run my hands up that figure. I was practically coming in my pants when she slammed her hands on that table. Fuck me, she is magnificent.
The only survivors? Patrick, who looks like hellfire is in his veins. Liam, the biggest dickwad on this planet. His cousin Chris, who is the head of Export. And the head of Legal.
Patrick fires into life the instant his arse hits the chair. “Well you’ve done it now. We’ve no marketing, no HR, no strategy, and no partnerships left. Who do you think will run all this lot?”
“Well, we will have to do some of the work until we can fill positions within the ranks. We never had lots of heads before. The O’Clery brothers did most of the work, and tobe honest, we haven’t grown much in the last ten years, so the workload can’t be much more.”
He huffs out a laugh, clearly thinking she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. She fronts him up and asks outright, “Patrick, do you want to be here? Because this day is not getting better. We’re going into the numbers now, so you can see where we’re at. We’ll all have to get on with it.” She’s not backing down, her eyes flashing at Patrick and his remaining minions.
“And whose fault is that?” Patrick hits back.
She throws up her hands. “I’m assuming if you’re still here you want to be. Let’s get moving forward, work hard and look for ways to move these numbers upwards.” She’s putting a positive spin on it. But in Patrick's next statement, she may have played directly into his hands.
“I have a plan for that. Liam, can you get out the business plan we worked out. It’ll be a total game changer forO’Clerys.Exactly the type of business we need. The clientele we pitch at, our demographic.”
He’s starting to gush, so excited about his plan. He is infectious, I'll give him that. The only problem is, his infections are proving a deadly virus to the balance sheet.
I raise my eyes to Liam, who is fussing with some paperwork, the laptop, and now the projector. Fuck me, they’ve gone all out on this presentation. I look across at Dermot, and see he’s put his head down. Jesus, even Patrick’s own dad knows he’s an idiot.
For the next hour, we sit through the most ridiculous plan for the purchase of the local golf course. Full colour projections, fancy graphics, expansion plans, the holding of an international golf open. Increased membership and fees. Only one bit mentions whiskey, and that is the selling of it in the barand the sponsorship of events. The total cost is eye-watering. But the projections in five years make it all back and us all millionaires. How can we resist such a get rich quick scheme?
Patrick sits down with a flourish, looking around the room for his minions to tell him how amazing that idea is. I see the head of Legal put his head down. Patrick is playing to an audience of two—himself and Liam. I decide to do Aoife’s dirty work for her. I can see with the curl of her lip exactly what she thinks of his idea.
“Can I ask an obvious question?” I point towards the projection which has an amazing aerial photograph of Greystones Golf Course with the sea and countryside surrounding it. “Is the golf course actually up for sale? I haven’t seen anything about it locally, or even in the business press. I thought the Irish Greystone family owned it?” I’m intentionally making the distinction from us, the English branch of the Greystone family. “Marshall, with your relationship with them, do you know if they intend to sell?”
I pause and let that pertinent question hit home. “And secondly, the acres of land you want to buy—next to the golf course, for your resort—is that for sale? Again, I’ve not seen any notifications for land sale.”
The minions deflate, but Patrick and Liam do not. If anything they seem more brash. Patrick starts with confidence, “No it’s not for sale, per se. But let’s be right, everyone has their price. And the Greystone family here, we know, are a bit hard up for cash.” He smirks at that. Obviously he doesn’t like the Irish Greystones. Although to be honest, I don’t think he likes the English ones much either. “All the—in fact, most of the land around here is now owned by a property company. Not connected to the area.So I’m sure they’ll be happy to sell to us. What were they called Liam? You checked them out, right?”
Patrick is so dismissive, full of his self-importance. If you’re local, you do as he says. Don’t own the golf course? No problem. Don’t own the land you want to build your resort on? Fiddlesticks, we’re sweating the small stuff. Patrick isn’t.
“Yes, a company registered in the Isle of Man.” Liam has his notes out. “Usual faceless property company, too much money and just out for a quick buck.” He grins at us all as if we know the sort. “Rookwood Property International,” he reads from his sheet, and my heart stutters.
I’m careful that I don’t catch Marshall's eye. That company belongs to Kitten. The little devil has been buying land near Marshall's home, protecting it and them. I almost grin.
“So let me get this right. You’ve done this fabulous presentation.” Because it really was. “But you have no idea if the parties involved will sell?” I let my tone of voice show my thoughts, my incredulity
“Well, no, we know they will want to sell when we approach them.” Patrick, the eternal optimist, is just about to lose his shirt, his money, and his marriage in a shit property deal.
