Double Dare(270)

And embarrassed suddenly, I turned away, head down, grabbing my towel before making my way outside, going over to sit over behind a tree, making myself inconspicuous. Mr. Jones had so many options, the world at his fingertips, women dying to meet him. And as for me? I was a teenage girl, a complete nobody, and absolutely, utterly out of my league.





CHAPTER TWO


Chris




I’ve known Lindy a long time now. The first time we met was when she was sixteen and she’d come to a company function. Back then she was rail-thin and mousy with huge clunky glasses, and I hadn’t paid much attention except to say hello to my employee’s family.

Because Lindy’s dad, Jim, works for United Electric. We’re a small construction outfit, doing jobs all over Long Island, both residential and commercial, and Jim was a great guy, talkative, outgoing, like a friendly golden retriever always ready to do your bidding.

But there had been some anomalies in his performance lately, some things I couldn’t overlook and I’d had to take it up with him.

“Jim-boy,” I said casually last Friday, leaning back at my desk. “What the fuck is going on? What the fuck happened with that last job?”

Jim got really red, made all the worse by the fact that he had blonde eyebrows. He looked like a red potato with golden whiskers, fresh from the oven. I almost felt sorry for him, the dude was so uncomfortable and fidgety, but I steeled myself. I was the boss and this was business, nothing more.

And he hemmed and hawed, making excuses.

“Costs got out of control, the supplies were more expensive than we thought and you know Danny over with Kamco, he was supposed to extend us credit, but he didn’t,” the man babbled nervously.

But I shook my head slowly, the drivel running through my ears. These were just shady half-truths. Jim was our controller, he was supposed to be on top of the numbers and the problems didn’t stem from supply issues or cost overruns. It was far more serious, a rotten inner core from deep within.

So ignoring the other man’s chatter, I leaned over my keyboard, tapping a few times and pulled up a spreadsheet before turning the monitor towards my employee.

“These are the books from last month,” I said casually, “Your job is to keep on top of them, make sure they reflect United Electric’s daily revenues, our spend, our take from each job.”

The blonde man nodded miserably, so nervous that he was beginning to sweat, and I could see a shiny slick on his forehead. But I was going in for the kill and this was no time to back off.

“And this,” I said pointing to a column numbers, “is less than it should be.”

Instead of denying it, Jim just looked down, nodding, twisting his hands in his lap.

“I know, I know,” he babbled, “I’ll look at it again, I had a feeling something was wrong, the numbers didn’t square up, didn’t meet our estimates …”

I cut him off.

“This has nothing to do with estimates or projections,” I drawled smoothly. “The numbers don’t add up because you’ve been taking from the till, helping yourself to some extra, Jim-boy. Why? Why did you do it? Do I not pay you enough?”

And Jim looked about ready to burst into tears then, his chin quivering, eyes growing moist and bright.

“No, you pay me great!” he protested with a hiccup to his voice. “Thank you Mr. Jones, thank you for hiring me, I didn’t mean to be ungrateful, it’s just that … that …” he mumbled.

I sat silently, expectantly. What could possibly justify stealing from your employer? Shit, I should turn this guy into the feds, this was criminal behavior.

But the tears began to spill then.

“I’m so sorry,” blubbered Jim, his nose running with trails of slime, his chin drooping with sorrow, “but my daughter’s college tuition is so expensive I needed some extra to get us through this next year, I’ll pay it back, I swear.”

I steepled my hands thoughtfully, shaking my head. Jim was disgusting, that was no justification for his actions, there was always the option of student loans, parent loans, or fuck, he could have just come to me for a personal loan. But I got it. A lot of people lied to themselves, telling themselves that they’d just “borrow” some money, they’d take it without anyone noticing, the money would be put back before anyone even realized it was gone. But that’s a bunch of jack shit. That money doesn’t ever come back, it’s gone, flown off to its next destination and the unfortunate part in this case, was that I was his boss and I wasn’t exactly the nicest guy out there.

“You’re fired,” I said abruptly. “HR will have your paperwork.”