Page 123 of Left on Read
“That’s bullshit.” More anger filled my chest. “It’s not like we can control the damn weather.”
“I don’t get how they’re claiming that cleaning up isn’t working.” Gray flexed his hands, his shoulders as tense as his voice. “We worked our asses off fixing shit that should never have needed to be fixed in the first place.”
“Exactly!” Noah exclaimed. “We wouldn’t have had to do it if they’d given us the proper shit to protect the site when they knew that storm was coming.”
“This is bullshit,” I seethed. “We’re just supposed to put in all these extra hours because some asshole behind a desk said so?”
“It’s not just that. Jerry’s cutting out our per diem too.” Zane’s voice was even and quiet, two signs that he was doing everything in his power to hold in his rage.
Noah stepped closer to him and put his hand on Zane’s shoulder. Zane flicked his gaze to Noah, his expression softening.
“For the rest of the job?” I asked.
Gray cracked his knuckles, his face ruddy and his shoulders tense. “Nope, for the whole job.”
“How? It’s part of our checks.” Realization dawned on me. “No fucking way. He’s taking it back after he already paid it to us?”
Needing to read the email for myself, I opened the app and clicked on it.
It took me a moment to skim it to find the important parts, and I had to go back and read a few paragraphs twice because letters moved around more when I was angry and it made reading harder, but it was right there in black and white.
Between the cut on our overtime and clawing back the per diem, our next three weeks of checks were going to be half of what they should be for this clusterfuck of a contract.
“How the fuck are we supposed to survive on half our pay?” Gray demanded. “And those fuckers still expect us to drive our asses up to two hours each way, do a full day’s work, and put in extra time just so they can tell their investors the build is on budget? No. I refuse. I’m not doing it.”
“What can we do?” Noah slung an arm over Zane’s shoulder.
My brother was practically vibrating with rage. The only things stopping him from losing his shit were his iron-clad control, and Noah.
“If we walk off,” Noah continued, “then we get no pay, and we’re out our jobs. And it’s not like we can afford a lawyer to fight this. Even if we did manage to find someone to take the case pro bono or whatever, the developers have six-figure lawyers on retainer. We’d lose way more trying to fight this than just rolling over and accepting it.”
“What the actual fuck?!”
The four of us glanced at the door.
“Sounds like Bubbles read the email.” Noah sighed and gave Zane a little squeeze.
“Did you get another email from some company too?” I asked Noah, who seemed to be the only one of us calm enough to explain things right now. “Is that the email you were asking about just now?”
He nodded grimly. “Jerry sold the business to them. They basically put us on notice that they’ll be restructuring and reorganizing things when this build is done.”
“The fuck does that mean?” I demanded, my own anger nearing a flash point. I needed answers, but I also needed to get away from all this before I put my fist through the wall.
“Google says it’s what happens when businesses are bought and the new company changes a bunch of stuff.” Gray sighed and raked his hand through his hair, his shoulders slumping in defeat. “That’s reading like they’re putting us on notice that we’re getting fired.”
“They won’t fire us because we’re not employees. They just won’t renew our contracts.” Zane drew in a deep breath, held it for a few beats, then blew it out. “That’s why Jerry flipped us from salaried to contractors over the summer. We won’t get any unemployment benefits or severance or anything because a contract ending and not being offered another isn’t the same as losing your job. We’re fucked.”
I saw red. This had been in the works for that long?
Blindly, I opened my texts with Hayden.
River: our boss is fucking us over and Im so mad I feel like im gonna put my fist through the wall
Hayden read the message, and the little text bubble appeared. I blocked out my brother and friends as they kept talking about the emails and what that meant for us.
Hayden: what happened? Do you want to call me?
“Did you fuckers see this shit?” Bubbles, one of the guys working on the far side of the house, came stomping into the room and waving his phone. “What the actual fuck?”