10.
Jamie
“You’re late,” Clarice McDaniel hissed, her face stretched with worry as Jamie hurried into the warehouse office space she’d rented when she’d started her company, Barton Designs. Five years later and they had taken over the whole rest of the building, yet things weren’t really any better for her. She still felt just as behind now as she had the entire time she’d run the business, their cashflow somehow always an elusive thing.
“I know, I know,” Jamie said, walking past Clarice as she fell into step next to Jamie. She said it with a note of apology; Clarice, as Jamie’s assistant, was perpetually stuck trying to cover for Jamie’s tardiness problem, but that was a tall order. She did it with grace and a smile, though Jamie had a sneaking suspicion that the fun of making excuses for her had probably gotten old months ago.
“The banker’s name is Mr. Penny,” Clarice said, walking very uptight and professional. Her cheekbones were high, her skin a dark chocolate shade, her eyes filled with constant worry. She was a damned good person to have in your corner, Jamie reflected. “So get your laughs out before you go in.”
Jamie stopped. “Why would I laugh about—oh, Penny, and he’s a banker. Yuk yuk, got it.” She adjusted her blouse, brushing at the big dust spot down the left shoulder where she’d dropped it while stripping down to her costume. “Anything else?”
“What happened to you?” Clarice said, trying to help rub her shoulder clean but spreading the dust around instead. “You look like you fell under a float at the St. Patrick’s Day parade.”
“Kyra and I had a big blowup this morning,” Jamie said, brushing herself off where her pants had similarly picked up dirt from casting them aside in a hurry.
“Blowout,” Clarice corrected, and when Jamie looked at her questioningly, Clarice said, “because blowup makes it sound like it might have had something to do with a doll.”
Jamie peered at her in confusion. “What?”
“Never mind.” Clarice shook her head, back to business. “Mr. Penny, remember his name. And no—”
“Laughs, yeah, I got it,” Jamie said, and then opened the door to her office and breezed in. “Hello, Mr. Penny, I am so sorry for being late—”
Jamie stopped just inside the door, because the man waiting for her wasn’t entirely what she was expecting. She’d figured old, balding maybe, in a fancy suit.
So when a handsome young man wearing a shirt with the top button undone rose to greet her with a smile on his face, she wondered why Clarice hadn’t mentioned that little detail in her briefing about names and stifling laughter. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Barton,” Mr. Penny said, extending a hand that Jamie shook after only a moment’s delay.
“Thank you for waiting,” Jamie said, a little sheepishly, as she eased behind her desk. There was clutter everywhere, just like on her dining room table at home. She vaguely recalled the days before she opened the business as being perhaps slightly less cluttered, but it felt like there had always been stuff lingering in every space she could cram it in. “So … um …”
“Right,” Mr. Penny said, brushing a little overhanging brownish-blond hair off his forehead as he spoke. “I have the extension paperwork here that you filed, and there are a few areas of concern for us …”
Jamie paused, swallowed hard, and felt like her chair had just dropped her a solid inch without warning. She checked, but no, it was still in the same place; it was her stomach that had dropped. “I know that the last thing you probably want to hear from people you’ve lent money to is that they need more time and more money, but …”
“It’s not our favorite thing to hear,” Penny said, looking a little distracted, a pen poised over a clipboard that had materialized in his hand, “but when a small business is expanding quickly, it’s not unusual.” He looked up and she saw green, green eyes. And that smile … “Looking over your numbers, I see some positive signs. Your growth in revenue over the last five years is impressive. Your margins are the sticking point.”
“They’ve been a little hampered, I know,” Jamie said, pushing her own blonde hair back behind her ear. “I’ve had to hire more people than I anticipated to keep up with the demand.”
“Have you thought about outsourcing?” Penny asked, looking at the papers.
“Uhm, I—I would really rather keep the products made locally,” Jamie said, feeling as though Captain Frost had just blown a breath of cold wind down her back. “We were founded on Staten Island, and the idea of shutting things down here, I mean—I employ forty-eight people—”
“Sure,” Mr. Penny said, and he started to drum his pen on the clipboard. “But there are opportunities to manufacture your designs for a lot less cost overseas, which means you could … well, actually make money within the next few months.”
“I just … I can’t do that, Mr. Penny,” Jamie said. She felt like screaming in her own head; not only was this fairly handsome man asking her to do something she desperately did not want to do, but he was doing it so politely she felt bad for refusing. “I know these people and I can’t … look them in the eye and put them out of a job.”
“Well,” Penny said, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. His motion gave Jamie a clear look at his legs, which seemed pretty muscular under the khaki pants. She forced her eyes back up to his. “If you have to close your doors, you’re going to have to do that anyway, but there are other options we could look at to expand the margins before embracing such a … drastic measure. But you’re essentially butting up against the wall for growth. If you add any more people, your expenses are going to soar to the point where you’ll either have to raise your prices considerably or you’ll need to shut down.” He gave her a sympathetic look. “We can probably bridge you with at least some of the loan you’ve asked for. Your credit’s still good, and we’ve backed you thus far, and we do have high hopes things are going to take off for you, but … speaking frankly, just between you and me … if you can’t get your margins up, and soon, you’re going to continue running this business as nearly a non-profit.” He shrugged. “Which would be fine, if that’s what you were registered to do. But you’re not. It’s a for-profit company, and if you don’t turn a profit …” He made a face, all filled with sympathy. “Then it becomes a very expensive hobby in which you lose money and time and … well, years of your life. I’d hate to see that happen.”
Jamie just sat there, listening, feeling like a frog was stuck in her throat. She knew that everything he said was true, with one additional twist of guilt: If I wasn’t Gravity Gal—ugh, that name—I could be doing more around here to make things take off. Like I was before …
She forced a polite smile. “You … had some other ideas for helping to make us profitable?”
“A few, yeah,” he said with a certain youthful energy. “If you look at this …” He was probably almost twenty years younger than she was, and Jamie closed her eyes for a second, trying to put aside dirty old lady thoughts about a much younger man in order to try and get her business back on track.