AllFreeNovel
Share Us
EDWIN
Farley takes a measuringtape to the wall, spanning it from one wine rack to the other. Before he can get to where he needs to, the tape snaps back on him. He huffs.
I scoff. “You know, I can help.” I look askance at the designer we’ve hired who is admiring the ceiling rather than helping with the measurementsheasked for.
Farley laughs, an undercurrent of frustration in his voice. “No, no, I can do this. It’s just a tape measure, for god’s sake.”
He tries again. Before the tape measure can snap back, I grab it and hold it up, giving the COO a knowing look.
Farley rolls his eyes. “Sometimes I feel like you’re my dad.”
After looking at the tape, Farley calls out to the designer. “Eight feet and change.”
“Can I have an exact measurement?” His nasal voice echoes off my eardrum in a particularly grating way.
Farley sighs, looking at the tape again. “Eight feet and three inches.”
“Thank you.” The designer makes a note on his clipboard. I release the tape, chuckling at the yelp it elicits out of Farley when it snaps back into place.
Marty Villanueva was so impressed with the club after speaking with Sonia that he not only signed on for membership but also donated the money to have a whisky room built off of the wine cellar. “That way, my wife can keep an eye on me,” he explained.
I don’t know what Sonia did to make him so generous, but I’m not surprised. Everyone at the club loves Sonia, employees and members alike. She pours everything into her job and doesn’t cut corners. She always wears a smile, looks her best, and manages to straddle the line between authority and friend with everyone that I’ve never seemed to manage.
I think she’ll get a raise at her quarterly review. Seems only fair considering how much she’s brought to the Lyons Club already.
Not to mention how much she’s brought to me.
Farley huffs. “The construction will be a nightmare.”
I can’t help but agree as we watch the designer pace back and forth across the floor. “We’ll leave that for the professionals to figure out.”
Farley scoffs. “They’ll have to dig out a whole new room! Surely that will make it nightmarish to be in the club.”
“You know we will spare no expense to make sure the construction is soundproof and well ventilated.” I pause. “And if we have to shut things down for a day here and there, then so be it. We can’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”
With a pout, Farley responds with a simple, “Neigh.”
I shake my head. “You’re impossible.”
“I don’t know how I feel about all of this. We can’t justspring this on Sonia, she just started. And you know how our members can get when things change on them.”
Yes, they can get…difficult.
The designer points to a corner. “Can we get a measurement over here?”
Farley sighs. I pat him on the back. “Look, you keep measuring without killing yourself, and I’ll get Sonia to get her opinion, alright?”
The mere mention of Sonia’s name gets hot around the collar. I avoid saying it myself to avoid going up in flames.
If all it takes is her name to make my blood boil, seeing her sends me into a whole new stratosphere. Which is why I try my best to stay away.
Who am I kidding? I’m not trying my best at all. Not by a long shot. I offered to get her, didn’t I?
“Sounds fair.” Farley’s attention goes to a bottle of red on one of the racks. “Oooh, a nineteen-seventy-five Yellerman pinot noir?”
I narrow my eyes at him. “And no sampling the merchandise.
I head back into the main atrium of the club, greeting members as I go, fielding complaints, concerns, and a compliment from Trudy Heller, who hasn’t stopped hitting on me since I was twenty-three.
