Page 71 of The Merger
He shook his head. “You’ve lived in Seattle your entire life and don’t like coffee. How is that possible?”
“I don’t hate coffee. I just prefer it to taste like a candy bar. Thankfully lattes exist.” I reached for one of the files he had on the table. “What are you doing looking through the inventory reports for Easton Vodka again?”
“I was thinking of how smug my brother was last night. He seemed to think he had pulled one over on us. I remembered the discrepancies you mentioned in the sales reports. Jana said the vodka launch was a bust, but here a few months later it was breaking even.”
“We need to get our hands on Malcolm’s accounting records.”
“First we’d have to know where he keeps them. I’m not close enough to him to ask. I’d think he’d have them stored in the office at his Seattle club, but he doesn’t spend that much time there, and it wasn’t opened until a year ago,” he said.
“His first club was in Denver. After college, he went to find himself, or so he said at least. What he found was a group of people who partied all the time. He started organizing bigger and bigger events for them, and fell upon a warehouse he was able to convert. Since he’d been on the verge of being cut off from his dad—sorry, I mean your dad—”
He held up his hand. “You were right the first time. That man has never been my dad. When we first met he pulled me into the company, and God help me, I tried to impress him, but he’s only ever seen me as a mistake. I walked away from him and his bullshit job shortly after we got married.”
I set my cup down on the table. “There’s still so much we don’t know about each other.”
Stryker reached out and took my hands. “We’ve got a lifetime to learn the little things. What’s important is that I love you. The rest is just details.”
I smiled what I imagined was a dopey looking grin. “That’s the second time you’ve said that to me. I don’t think it hit me when you said it before, but you really do, don’t you?”
A crease formed between his eyes. “What, that I love you? Do you still doubt it?”
I shook my head and laughed softly. “No, I think I believe you.”
One of his eyebrows cocked up. “You think? If you don’t know then I’m not doing a good enough job showing you.”
“I don’t know how you could do any more. I’m the one who’s bad at showing it, but I need you to know that I love you too,” I said.
His chair creaked as he pushed back from the table. Patting his knee he said, “Come here, Sunshine.”
I stood without arguing this time and sat on his lap. His hand settled on my thigh and began a distracting motion up and down. I was so focused on the direction of his hand that I nearly missed what he was saying.
He squeezed my thigh and regained my attention. “A couple of years ago I took an assignment in Denver overhauling a corporate law firm. The CEO who took over once the restructuring was finished is a genius at accessing things he shouldn’t be able to get his hands on. Let me give him a call and point him in the right direction. He owes me a favor.”
ChapterTwenty-Seven
Stryker
It took some time to get ahold of my friend Thomas. I finally managed to catch him between rounds of golf. Then I had to wait a few more hours for him to get a plan together to get a hold of Malcolm’s records. In the meantime, Sabrina and I spent the first lazy Saturday we’d ever had together.
We dressed in sweats, cuddled on the couch, and watched movies. It was everything I’d fantasized about for the last few years. Well, perhaps not everything. Last night checked more of those boxes than anything else, but this was a close second. Having her with me, doing something so normal, and feeling the heat of her body pressed into mine filled my heart with peace. Occasionally I’d drop a kiss to the top of her head for no other reason other than I could. Showing her affection, especially after she admitted she was having a hard time accepting the depth of my feelings for her, was my new goal.
My phone rang in the middle of our second movie of the day. She paused the tv, as eager as I was to see what he learned. I answered the phone and put it on speaker.
“Hey Tommy,” I greeted him. “What did you find out?”
“I haven’t gotten my hands on anything yet, but I learned that the venture capital firm that gave him the loan wrote in a provision to have oversight of the company to ensure their funds weren’t misused and that they were getting their share of the profits. It appears they haven’t actually followed through with examining his records though. This pertains to all of the locations, not just the original club. And, would you guess which firm they contracted to conduct the audits?” There was a note of victory in his voice.
“If you say McNeal, Cline, and Tanner I could kiss you,” I replied. That was the name of his law firm and would cut through a lot of bullshit in getting those records.
“As temptingly pouty as that mouth of yours is, I’ve heard I’m late in giving you congratulations on your marriage. Maybe I’ll let your wife kiss you and you can just buy me a beer when you get here,” he replied.
“Get there?” I asked confused.
“I don’t know what the hell you’re looking for, but rather than spending man hours digging through receipts that are likely mostly bullshit, how about you come down here and we search together?” he asked.
“I guess I’m going to be buying you that beer then. I can leave tomorrow as long as I can get a flight out.”
Sabrina took out her phone and her fingers flew over the screen. After a minute her phone chimed with an incoming text. She looked up after she read it. “Jana said that the company has access to a plane they share with another company. The contract has a few more months on it, but after that she plans to let it lapse and utilize the Anderson Global jet when necessary since by then the merger should be complete.”