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For the majority of the call, I stayed back, letting Landon take the lead. He had come up with a few ideas that were very promising, and after I tinkered with them a little, I was certain they could help catapult us into doubling our profits for the rest of the quarter. This was obviously great news to the investors, and the team was ready and raring to go at implementing the changes needed.
After spending some time fielding questions from the investor gallery, I signed off the meeting early and closed the laptop. Stretching my arms high over my head, I looked over at Amanda, who crumpled her eyebrows at me momentarily. I tried to smile, but I knew it was a pitiful attempt at masking the stress. Standing, I went over to the couch and sat down, leaning back and shutting my eyes for a moment.
My thoughts went to the bar and the image of it smoking. It was so devastating, and I felt the loss not only for myself, but for my brothers, too. I needed to get to the bottom of it and this Danny character as soon as possible, and the added stress of the meeting had doubled up on me. I simultaneously felt motivated to figure out what was going on with the bar and wrung out completely dry and like I wanted to go to bed.
Amanda ended the call and turned off her tablet before turning to me. I could feel her eyes on me, so I opened my own and peered at her across the room. When she opened her mouth to speak, I lost track of what she was saying, distracted by her ruby-red lips. Shaking it off, I asked her to repeat herself midsentence.
“That’s what I was talking about,” she said.
“What?”
“You seem awfully distracted. I don’t know how many of the other investors noticed, but I did, and so did Landon. He messaged me privately during the call to ask if you were okay. Are you okay? I mean, I know things are stressful, but is there something else going on?”
Coming from anyone else, that might have seemed like prying, but Amanda knew me well enough that I wasn’t offended. If anything, it made my heart feel warm that she was seemingly so concerned. However cool I thought I was playing everything, it obviously wasn’t cool enough to fool her.
“No, nothing else is going on, just the bar,” I said. “Between the call and the investors and the bar and my brothers, it’s just a lot.”
“I understand that,” she said, looking deeply into my eyes. I could feel her concern in that gaze. “I just want you to know that I’m here to help you with anything you need. You don’t need to worry about it. Whatever I can handle on my own, I will, and if you are needed, I will make sure you stay in the loop and I remove as much of the stress as possible.”
“I know. And I appreciate that,” I said. “I really do. I have no idea how I would get along without you in my corner.”
“Poorly,” she said, deadpan.
I laughed. “You might be right.” I stood, heading to the nightstand where I kept my wallet. Stuffing it into my pocket, I turned back to her. “Well, now that the call is done, I am going to go head out and take care of some things. If you’d like to join me, you can or you can stay here at the hotel. Either way.”
She seemed to debate for a moment and then came to a decision.
“I think I’ll stay here actually. I have a few things I need to take care of myself. If you need me for anything, just give me a call,” she said.
“Will do. Thanks again, Amanda,” I said. She smiled and nodded sheepishly, and I left.* * *As I arrived at Mason’s, my phone started ringing. Since it was a rental car, I didn’t have my usual hookup of display and Bluetooth, so I had to fish it out of my pocket. I thought it might be Amanda, changing her mind, but when I looked at the screen, I saw it was my PI.
“Find anything out?” I asked almost immediately.
“Well, hello to you, too, Mr. Anderson. Yes, as a matter of fact, I did find something out,” he said.
“Sorry. What did you find?”
“Well, it isn’t exactly great news for your theory. It turns out Danny has been getting himself into trouble recently, doing a lot of gambling and racking up debt,” he said.
“Is that so?” I asked.
“Yes, and the gambling debt is rather large. It’s more than just a couple days’ profits from the bar. He’s in pretty deep right now, but he seems to be making good on his payments. One of the bookies he owes isn’t too far from where you saw the money exchange. I’ll be honest, Tom, I think what you saw was a man paying off part of a debt, not paying for a job.”
