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“I was demonstrating to youandto Liam how to inform a customer of the advantages of the protection and service plan.”
“No.” I’m in a hole, I should stop digging, but I’m from a long line of diggers and in some ways, this is the most honest conversation I’ve had with Jonathan Forest since I’ve been working for him. “You were making them think that the product wasn’t good enough on its own, so they’d need to pay extra or suffer a load of aggro they didn’t want. Problem is they were what you might call highly aggro-sensitive people. You nearly put them off the unit completely.”
For a while he’s very quiet, and when he speaks again his voice is very low and very tense. “Are you trying to tell me how to do my job?”
“No,” I say as calm as I can because this is very close to getting out of control, “but selling showersisn’tyour job. It’s not even my job really, it’s his.” I nod in Liam’s direction where—it has not escaped my notice—he and Allie and Allie’s other half were hovering in a cloud of not-sure-how-to-react-to-this. “And he was doing fine. You don’t have to manage every little thing everybody does.”
“Are youtryingto get yourself fired?”
I take a breath. Honestly at this stage I might as well be. “I’m sorry. I know I was out of line. I was just trying to save the sale.”
“The sale,” he insists, cold like, “wasfine.”
And before I can stop myself, I’ve said, “No it wasn’t. Y’know, for a man who says he doesn’t like being sucked up to, you’re not very good with constructive criticism.”
It’s a little dig. Just the teeniest, tiniest digette. But I must have been on thinner ice than I thought what with all the times I’ve said fuck in front of him today, because just like that, it’s as if somebody has flipped a switch. He doesn’t lose it exactly—the impression I get of Jonathan Forest is that he’s not an emotional man even when he’s angry—but he gets very still, and very focused, and somehow seems taller than he actually is.
“Howdareyou.” He’s not shouting, but his voice carries, and he’s got this energy to him that makes it feel like he means really serious business.
“I’m sorry I didn’t—”
“Do you think I letanybodytalk to me that way?”
“Obviously not but—”
“You arefired.”
“Okay but—”
“Your wholeteamis fired.”
“Now hang on—”
He’s taking a step towards me. Not threatening, just closing the distance like he’s about to hand me an imaginary P45. And that what with the stakes and what with my very much needing cooler heads to prevail here, I decide to give him space.
So, I step back.
And I catch my foot on the lip of the Nexa by MERLYN 8mm Sliding Door enclosure, trip backwards, and bring the whole fucking thing down on top of myself.
CHAPTER 5
I don’t know what happens next, but it feels like I’m watching TV and the cat’s stood on the skip button. That lad Liam is pulling a sheet of 8mm tempered glass off me and asking, “You all right, bruv?”
And then he’s saying, “I don’t think he’s all right.”
And someone else is saying, “Give him some space.”
And someone else is saying, “Who’s the first aider?”
And someone else is saying, “Who’s calling the ambulance?”
And then I hear Jonathan. “Hello, Sara? I’ve got an urgent liability question—”
Something that’s probably a face hovers over me and I’ve got the worst headache I’ve had in my whole fucking life. “Look at me,” she says, and I think I am but I’m not sure my eyes are getting the message. “What’s your name?”
I tell her it’s Samwise but that she can call me Sam like, but it doesn’t come out that way—I sort of burble at her.
She pinches my ear, and I flinch.
