Page 40 of When the Walls Come Down
My anger melted away under the sweltering heat of guilt. Damn. He’d all but been fired—on Friday. There were no great opportunities. At least none immediately at his fingertips. He probably hadn’t had the chance to fully wrap his mind around any of it yet.
I was wholly aware of how unexpected and distracting our weekend had been. We’d both been blindsided by more than one thing in the past few days.
“I’m sorry.” I rested my hand on his thigh.
He laughed without humor and turned out of my reach, effectively brushing me off. “Don’t apologize. This isn’t your problem.”
“Actually, I think this is both of our problems now, Shane. I picked up my entire life and moved over twenty-five hundred miles across the country to take this job. I can’t afford to lose it. And I mean that both mentally and financially. I spent almost all of my savings on this move.”
His brows pinched. “Casey didn’t pay you for relocation?”
“Well, yeah. He gave me a stipend for the movers and covered all my travel expenses from Atlanta to San Francisco. But if I don’t stay for at least a year, I have to pay it all back. Plus, there were a lot of costs that were not included. Like paying to end the lease early on my old apartment. And I bought new furniture when I got here because I was expecting a steady salary for the next few years. Not even to mention the grand I spent on new work clothes. Before I got this gig, I was a waitress. So let’s be honest, that savings account was a lot like using a cotton ball for a safety net.”
“What the hell were you doing working as a waitress? You have two fancy-ass degrees.”
“Yeah, technically, I do. One from Georgia Tech in Business Management and another from Savannah College of Art and Design in Advertising with a focus in branding.” I shrugged. “They have an Atlanta campus not far from Tech. It felt wrong not to utilize it. Though my current mountain of student loan debt might disagree because, so far, I have no actual working experience. This job was going to be that for me.”
His chin snapped back. “Holy shit. You’re only twenty-four. How the hell did you manage all that?”
I grinned with pride. “Well, there was the fact that I had no life. No friends. No dating. Going to class every day from eight to five. Working at the restaurant every night until eleven. Going home and studying until the sun came up, wash, rinse, repeat.” I pulled my hair away from my face, feeling crowded by it all of a sudden. “I grew up with nothing, so I learned early on that if I wanted something in life, I was going to have to be the one to make it happen. I worked my ass off for this opportunity, Shane. I’m really scared that duking it out with the owner’s brother-in-law over this job isn’t going to end well for me.”
He cocked his head to the side. “And you think this is going to end well for me? Put yourself in my shoes. I’ve spent the last four years growing Bay Brewing’s ad and design department from the ground up. The brewery is Casey’s baby, but before me, he was still traveling around to tradeshows, trying to get bars and restaurants to take notice. I was the one who put the brand of Bay Brewing on the map. And that’s all I’ve done for four straight years. I have no life, no friends, and you’ve seen me on a date. Did it seem like I had a lot of experience to you? My weekends are spent either at the office, on my computer, or working out while thinking about being on my computer. And what? Now, I’m just supposed to turn over the reins to a twenty-four-year-old with no experience?”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh please, this isn’t exactly brain surgery. Besides, having someone new with fresh ideas might be exactly what Bay needs.”
“Ha! Fresh. Right. I call bullshit. Fresh is a fucking synonym for clueless, not young and hip.”
Clueless. Fucking clueless? He could have lit my hair on fire and gotten less of a reaction.
Shooting to my feet, I seethed, “Two weeks, I’ll be running circles around you.”
He stood up, his stool scraping the wood floor as it kicked out from under him. “Two weeks and you’ll have run Bay into the ground.”
We stood there. Nose to nose. Pissed off. Our chests heaving. His jaw ticking at the hinges. It was crazy to think that, just three nights ago, we’d been sitting in that exact same spot. Flirting and laughing.
Now, I didn’t even recognize this man.
And, God, why did that hurt so much?
With a boulder of disappointment heavy in my chest, I shook my head and retrieved my purse off the floor. “I’m not doing this with you. Not here. Not now. Not ever. Casey hired me for a reason. You might not understand the reason, but that’s far from any of my business. Have a good night, Shane. I’ll see you at the office.”
