The Other Foot
Chapter Two
The next morning Cynthia and I were at Brenner Inc at nine sharp.
It was housed in a four-story townhouse down in the Village and consisted of a large number of small rooms and steep stairs. I actually found it charming.
The staff impressed me as fairly competent, if a little nervous around me. Evidently the grapevine had warned them of our arrival and they had an understandable concern for their job security. I chose not to say anything other than to ask suitable questions. Cynthia just hung back as my assistant and made sure that anyone who wondered knew that I was a partner in another firm and that we had worked together for years.
She was just so good at playing the polite bitch.
Steve had met us when we were shown up to his office and had obviously been waiting for us. He suggested that Cyn go off with his own assistant and that the two of us could take a private tour together.
As we moved from one department to another, I asked the questions that needed to be asked but what I was really doing was looking around. It wasn’t so much the physical space that concerned me so much as the people he had working for him.
I was impressed by them. Yes, I know that they were on their best behavior for me, but still, I’m used to seeing through the bullshit and they were good at their jobs.
They were, almost without exception, young, bright and seemed to be producing good work.
The other thing I caught was how much they really liked Steve.
I mean they really liked the guy and he seemed to like them back. The people who worked for me back home didn’t like me, not that I cared. They knew I was good and they knew that working at Vanguard was the top of the local pile, but they though that I was a prick and as far as they were concerned, they were right.
Steve wasn’t like that.
One of his Ad Execs asked me if I had ever worked anywhere other than
I ignored him, but figured that his ass would be grass soon enough that he wouldn’t be worth breaking a sweat over.
An hour later, after we had moved on to another floor the same asshole came up to me and asked if I was the same Kinney who had come up with the Brown Athletics campaign that he heard had come out of Pittsburgh. Yup. Tripled their sales in six months.
Then Steve chimed in with the info that I had also done Poolboy and a few others that made his ears (and God knows what else) perk up.
That shut the fucker up.
So much for the rube from the fucking sticks.
If he’s not hot shit, he’s history and he probably knows it. In fact, he might be toast anyway. He pissed me off.
So Steve had a nice operation going. The product his people put out was good, their rep high and he had the loyalty of his employees and seemed to have their respect. He greeted every single one of them by name and answered everything they wanted to know. He was open and honest with them and I really just liked the man.
Shit.
After we finished with the walk about he steered me back to his office, closing the door behind him and sitting behind his desk. I took one of the easy chairs in front and it was time to talk some turkey.
“So, what did you think? This look like something that you and Vance might be interested in?”
“We’re already interested, Steve, you know that. You also know that you have a top notch operation going here and that we could merge the two companies with a minimum of disruption to either office.”
“There’s a ‘but’ coming, isn’t there?”
I remember that I paused while I tried to figure a tactful way to put this. “I’m curious. You’re a young man” He smiled at me at that. “And you know what you have here. I would like to know why you’re willing to sell controlling interest in something that’s yours when you could reasonably expect to run it yourself for another twenty or thirty years.”
“Brian, I’ve been doing this without a break for almost twenty years now. Between you, me and the walls, I have enough money that it’s not a concern. The problem is that I’m too young to retire without being bored but I don’t want to work the sixty-hour weeks anymore. It’s really pretty simple: In exchange for part of my business, you’ll be here to run the day to day for me and I can come in and work on just the accounts that interest me.”
Hell. That was something I hadn’t counted on. “Steve, you do
realize that I live in
“Vance told me that you’d be put in charge of this office. That was part of the deal.”
Vance, you fuck.
“Maybe we could talk about that.”
“No. We can’t. Either you agree to run this office, or there is no deal.” I guess I hesitated a second too long. “Cynthia said last night you have someone you live with or something. Is that the problem?”
“No, Justin would be willing to move if I did, I guess.” Oh, screw it. “Look, this is the first I’ve heard of this being one of the conditions and I’m not ready to make that sort of decision without even a phone call.”
“Vance didn’t tell you? Right—now you know why I want to work with you instead of him.”
Shit, shit, shit.
“OK, look. Why don’t you go back to your hotel or take a walk
in the park or whatever and give this some thought. We have tickets for the
show tonight at
I pushed myself up to my feet. “Yeah, that’s fair.” I turned to leave; he rose to see me out.
“Brian, I think that we would work well together. I think that we’re similar in a lot of ways and we both know that this is good business for both of our companies. Let’s try to work this out, alright?” He had put his hand on my arm and was rubbing it slightly through my clothes.
Shit. I’ve been on the receiving end of enough passes and come ons to know when I’m being hit on, thanks.
Relocating wouldn’t be the only problem here.
The pisser was that I liked the man. He was smart and successful and had the same interests that I did and was even close enough to my age that we seemed to relate on all kinds of things. We just sort of clicked.
Fuck and fuck me again.
“I’ll see you at
We were walking down the stairs to the street when he added, “You know, you’d get my office. I’d take one of he smaller ones.” He was joking. I knew that, but I was wondering just what the Hell else Vance had promised him.
Ah, shit.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
I tried to get Justin as soon as I got back to the room, but he was still in class or something. I called again after I’d showered and changed.
The second time I had managed to catch Justin in.
“Look, I know that it’s a big change, but I think that it could be good for both of us.”
“It sounds great, but I can’t right now. It’s too late in the semester to transfer and if I quit I’ll lose all the tuition and all the credits.”
“Fuck. Are you sure?”
“Brian, accept the condition and go ahead with the merger if you
think it’s a good idea. You stay in
“You really want to do that? It sucks.”
“Of course I don’t want to do that…Like I said, it’s only for a few months and then I can transfer to one of the New York schools.”
“Justin, we just got back together a few months ago. I don’t want you living hundreds of miles away.”
“I know, I hate it, too, but it will be alright. It’s not like it’s for years and years and you’ll be really busy with the new job. It’s too good for you to turn it down, Bri.”
“You trying to get rid of me, twat?”
“I’m trying to keep you, old man.”
“Ahh…shit, Justin. I hate this.
“I know. Me too. When are you coming home?”
“I’m not sure. Probably Saturday, I guess.”
“I told you, I’ll make it worth you while.”
“I know you will. Fuck…Justin?”
“Yeah?”
“You sure that you’re OK with this? Maybe we could work out something else. Maybe we could delay my move until you could join me or something.”
I could hear the silence coming over the line. Justin knew something was up. “What else aren’t you telling me?”
“Nothing, I’m just not sure that this is the right time for this in relation to us. We’re still new back together.”
He knew I was lying. OK, I wasn’t lying; I just wasn’t being completely honest. He knew.
“Bri, we’ll be alright. We love each other, remember?”
“Yeah, I know that. I’ll call you later, OK?”
“I’m going to a party at Daphne’s. I’ll be late. Call me in the morning, OK?”
“Yeah, sure.” He was hanging up the receiver when he heard, as an afterthought, “Hey Bri? I love you, OK?”
“Yeah, me too.”
Oh, fuck. Well, shit, Kinney. Just because he can’t be hanging on your arm every day doesn’t mean that you’re going to screw this up.
You’ll be OK. We’ll be OK.
Shit, this was too good a deal to fuck up.
We’d be OK.
We would see each other on weekends and talk all the time. We could do this. I could do this. It was only for a few months.
Fuck me.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Steve came up to my room at about quarter after five, apologizing when he came into the room.
I offered him a drink, handing it to him as he sat by the window. I took the chair next to him.
“I was hoping that you’d had a chance to get your thoughts in order about this. Did you talk to you—whatever he is?”
“Justin. I think that we can work out whatever problems there may be. If it’s alright with you, I’ll call Vance in the morning and have him start on the contracts.”
“Well...excellent. Are you sure that you don’t need more time to think this through?” I remember the look on his face when he said that. He told me later that he thought that I would back out or ask for ore time or something. I surprised him with my answer.
“It’s the right thing for all of us. I don’t see any reason to delay a decision that’s obvious.” I drained the JB I’d been working on for a while.
“Alright, then—I’ll have our legal staff get in touch with yours in the morning after we let Vance know that it’s been agreed on. You do know that part of the deal is that you’re promoted to senior partner, don’t you?” He had some of his Chivas. “There should be a nice bonus and raise for you. New York is expensive and that needs to figured into your package.”
“I assumed as much. Neither you or Vance would want it known that a junior was running things here.” I stood up; it was almost time to meet Cynthia. “If you could recommend a good realtor, I’ll start looking for a place.”
“Yes, good. I know a one I think you’ll like.”
So—done deal, or close enough. We went to get Cynthia.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
We ended up at Le Circe to celebrate the merger agreement. It was, as to be expected, fabulous. The show was as good as such things get and Cynthia was dazzled, as she was supposed to be. The kick line of little old ladies using walkers one of the high lights and I delighted in picturing dear old Mom among the group on stage
During the dinner Steve was attentive enough to make his attraction clear but not enough to be obnoxious or obvious. Cyn caught it, of course, and she threw me a few looks—especially when I failed to respond.
After the show, over drinks at Saardi’s, Steve took Cyn’s trip to the ladies room as the opportunity to ask.
“Brian, I don’t want to overstep, but it’s apparent that we’re attracted to one another. I know you have someone at home and I want you to know now that nothing will happen between us—ever—unless you say you so.”
“I…thank you.”
“It’s serious then?”
“Me and Justin? Yes, for three years now.”
“You two live together?”
I nodded.
“And you must love one each other.”
I didn’t answer. What would I say? Of course we loved each other.
“Will he be able to join you here when you make the move? Does his work allow for that?”
Shit.
“He won’t be able to move here for a few months, maybe three, I think. We’ll see each other on weekends until then.”
“I’m sorry. That will be hard on both of you.”
I shrugged. “We’ve been through worse. We’ll be alright.” He was staring at me. I knew he had just gone through the break up of a long-term relationship.
“Well, I just wanted you to know that I won’t be a problem for you. We’ll be working together closely and I don’t want the personal side of things to get in the way. My company is too important to me for that and so are my employees. I won’t jeopardize anything.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I don’t want to jeopardize anything either.”
That’s when Cynthia came back. “So what have you two been talking about?”
I think I was looking at Steve when I answered her. “Avoiding problems.”
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