Page 332 of The Parkers' Handsome Holiday
“Hey, can I talk to you alone for a minute or do those lifts really need seeing to right now?” she asked.
I was torn. I wanted to tell her that I needed to get to work. I wanted to tell her that as long as Ian was still there, I didn’t think it was a good idea for me to be seen chatting with her. But she had clearly put down her foot about the fact that she was the boss. Maybe she wouldn’t be so inclined to listen to Ian if he tried to get me fired. And besides, even though I knew that she and I couldn’t be together, that there were still insurmountable barriers there that had nothing to do with Ian’s apparent dislike for me, I wanted her to know that if she needed help around the resort, she could come to me.
So I paused and shrugged. “I have a few minutes,” I allowed. “What’s up?”
“I need some advice,” she said, and my hackles immediately rose.
“If it’s something with Ian and the resort,” I started to say, but Bailey interrupted me, looking around to make sure that no one was in earshot. But nearly everyone had left the conference room already, and those who hadn’t were clustered near the doorway.
“It’s not the resort, but it is about Ian,” she explained. “He’s in some trouble with the casino, and I’m trying to figure out a way to help him out.”
“I don’t know anything about the casino business,” I said, shaking my head. I refrained from adding that, what’s more, there was no reason for me to help Ian out after everything that he had said to me since he had arrived here in Park City.
Of course, I knew all of that was my own fault. He and I had been friends before. He had seemed genuinely happy to see me again the last time that he had been here, when Bailey had first bought the resort. He had asked me to look out for her. To help her out.
I had betrayed that trust. It was only right that he was pissed at me. I probably owed him a little help. But I didn’t really want to chat with Bailey in private about all the shit that Ian had done back in Vegas, whatever it was. I didn’t want to be in private with her at all. That was dangerous.
“Honestly, I think it’s better if you don’t know anything about the casino industry,” Bailey was trying to say. “I need an outsider’s perspective, someone who can look at things objectively and with different eyes.”
I shook my head. “Look, Bailey, I’d love to help,” I told her. “But I really don’t think I’m the right person for that. I’m just a mechanic.”
Bailey looked taken aback, and I could tell that she wanted to say something about that, but I interrupted her this time, glancing pointedly at my watch. “I really need to get some work done,” I told her. “But if I can help you with anything else, let me know.”
For the second time in as many days, I walked away feeling like an asshole. I didn’t want to upset her. But I also didn’t want to get too close to her. It would only end in heartache for both of us. Ian had been right all along; I didn’t belong in their world. And my lack of knowledge about the casino business was only the tip of that iceberg.
CHAPTER 43
BAILEY
Adam was the person I really wanted to talk to about Ian’s issues, but he made it clear that he wasn’t interested in talking about that. I hated those last words that he had said, about how he couldn’t help me figure it out since he was ‘just a mechanic’. That was a little too close to what Ian had said when he had told me that I shouldn’t be with Adam, and it made me wonder if Ian had said something similar to Adam at some point.
But there was no way to ask Adam about it without repeating all the terrible things that Ian had said to me, and I didn’t want Adam to think that I was the one who felt that way about him. Because I didn’t give a shit that Adam worked a blue-collar job. He was good at what he did, and he was one of the most hard-working people that I had ever met.
Besides, Adam wasn’t giving me much time to talk about anything with him. For the second time in two days, he hurried away from me, leaving me aching with all the things that I wished that I could say to him, about how sorry I was about all of this, and about how much I wanted to make things right between us. Things had been off ever since Ian had caught us kissing, and I hated that.
I wanted to tell Adam that Ian had agreed to quit meddling in our relationship. That we could really work things out. But I didn’t have a chance for that now.
I sighed and shook my head. Another time, I promised myself.
For now, I headed out to talk to Kayla about Ian’s situation and see if she had any insight into it. After all, she had been the one to tip me off to it in the first place.
She shrugged when I asked her what she would do in my situation. “Well, I assume that you still have contacts with the business, right?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “But I can’t, like, get one of them to take over Ian’s job. I’m not trying to get my brother fired. And even having one of them step in as an advisor or something wouldn’t work. Ian’s used to having the power now, and it would seem like a massive slight for someone to have to supervise his decisions.”
“Oh no, of course not,” Kayla said, shaking her head. “That’s not what I was suggesting at all. I just figure, someone in that company probably knows exactly what it’s going to take to get the investigation dropped, right? So if you can talk to them and figure out what they want, then you’ll know exactly how to proceed. Or at least, you’ll kind of have the starting point. If you decide not to just do what they want, you’ll at least know where the negotiating table is.”
“That’s a good point,” I said slowly, already thinking through who the best person would be to talk to about that. Kayla was right, I knew; what better way to know what they were looking for than to just ask? It was something that I probably wouldn’t have thought of on my own, but Kayla had always been blunter than I was. Sometimes, bluntness was exactly what was called for when it came to business.
“I’ll talk to you later, okay?” I told her.
“Sure thing,” Kayla said easily. “Good luck.”
“Thanks,” I said, grinning crookedly at her. “And thanks for all your help around here. I owe you about a dozen bottles of wine, I’m pretty sure.”
Kayla laughed. “Let’s have another girls’ day soon,” she said. “We’ll set something up after the holidays are over.”
“Sounds like a plan,” I told her.
