Chapter Eleven
Grant arrived at Zosca early on Wednesday morning. He parked in the little parking lot around back and took his time walking to the office building. He loved the early mornings, but he especially loved them here. There was a real feel of a new day dawning in the valley—and here at Zosca especially. He believed a new day was about to dawn for the little winery. Chelsea was about to have her day. He was surprised at himself how much he was rooting for her. He wondered how he’d see the situation if Zosca were run by someone else. Would he be so accepting of any other manager who was doing what she was? He was pretty sure the answer was no. He wouldn’t tolerate such sentimentality, not if it detracted from the bottom line. He pulled himself together as he reached the front door. He was spending the day working with her today, and he was looking forward to it. He knew he should try to lay things out for her—show her the errors of her ways, but he wasn’t even sure that he would—wasn’t sure there’d be any point. She didn’t want to hear it. She was just biding her time until she could be free of him and her father and could go about things however she pleased. He was a little concerned about how she’d fare left to her own devices. She was astute enough, but without her father’s influence to keep her in check, she might let her heart lead her into financial trouble.
It wasn’t his problem. He needed to remember that. She was her own person. Zosca would surely become her own company, and she would succeed or fail by her own choices. He didn’t have any influence on what she did. All he could do was the job he’d been brought in to do, which was make recommendations.
“Good morning.”
He smiled when he saw her. She was standing in the reception area, looking as gorgeous as ever. “Good morning,” he replied. “Are you ready for me?”
Her eyes widened, and for a moment, she looked confused. He wasn’t sure if she’d forgotten that she was working with him today or if she thought he meant something else. He’d love to think what that something else could be. Was she ready for him? Ready for him to take her into her office and unbutton that white blouse. Ready for him to lay her back on her desk and …
“Yes.” She recovered too quickly for his fantasy to go any further. “Shall we get some coffee first?”
“Sure.” He followed her through to the break room and forced himself not watch her ass as they went.
She poured two mugs of coffee and handed one to him. “What do you think, should we just get down to business?”
He tried not to remember his conversation with Cameron and Antonio the other night about what kind of business he and Chelsea had been getting down to. “Sure. We’ve got a lot to cover.”
She gave him a wary look before setting out for her office. “And what is it that you want to cover?” she asked over her shoulder.
“Relax. I just mean I want to set out for you everything that I’ve seen so far and the areas where I think you could improve. I also want to hear about your plans—what direction you want to go in and see if there are any suggestions I can make that will help you there.”
She took a seat at her desk and gestured for him to do the same. “Why?”
He frowned. “I thought you’d be pleased. You’ve made it pretty clear that you’re not going to be up for running the place as a purely profit-based concern, which is what your father wants. My understanding is that you plan to go out on your own, and to run things your way, you’ll have different goals, and therefore, I’d have different recommendations.”
“I know that, but why?”
He cocked his head to one side.
“I mean, that’s not your job. You weren’t brought in to help me, so why would you want to?”
He shrugged. He hadn’t asked himself that question until now. “I’d like to feel I’m going to make some contribution here. If everything I suggest is going to be rejected when you and your father part ways, then it’ll kind of be a waste of my time. If I offer you a different plan that you can run with, then at least I’ll feel as though this wasn’t a wasted effort—that I earned my fee, even if not in the way I expected.”
She nodded slowly and took a sip of her coffee. “And that’s all?”
“What else would it be?”
It was her turn to shrug. “I don’t know, I just wondered if …”
He smiled. “You think it’s got something to do with you and me? Like it’s personal?”
She nodded but didn’t meet his gaze.
“Well, to be completely honest, maybe it has.”
She looked up at him.
“I was thinking about it just this morning. I’m not sure if I’d have any time for or interest in someone else if they were running their business the way you want to. I don’t usually factor sentimentality into business decisions.”
To his surprise, she glowered at him. “You think I’m sentimental?”
Oh, shit. He hadn’t meant to get her back up. “Maybe that was a bad choice of words. I just meant that you’re not driven by …” He almost said logic but thought better of that. “Purely by profit. There’s a reason people use the term cold, hard, business sense. There’s no room for emotional drivers in a standard business. You’re more concerned with the welfare of your people and the experience of your customers.”
She frowned at him, but she wasn’t angry. She seemed more puzzled. “I guess it depends on what you see as logical. I believe it’s logical for everyone in a business to benefit from its success. To me, that’s common sense. What I perceive as logic, you see as sentimentality, and what you see as business sense, I see as greed. Why would I want to make two hundred thousand dollars in profit when I don’t need it? I’d be happier making one hundred thousand and giving ten of my employees an extra ten thousand each. To me, that’s logical, but to you, that probably sounds crazy.”
Grant stared at her for a long moment. He wasn’t thinking she was crazy. He was thinking that they lived in a crazy world, where her way of thinking was seen as wrong. He didn’t know what to say, though.
She smiled. “Sorry. I don’t expect you to understand. Why don’t we just get on with what we’re supposed to do? You tell me what you’ve seen so far, and tell me all the cuts my father will be happy to hear that we could make.”
He continued to stare at her for a few moments. Part of him wanted to forget all of that and instead ask her to lay out her plan. But he came to his senses. “Okay.” He pulled his laptop out of his briefcase and set it on the table. She came around the desk and pulled up a chair beside him. Just what he hadn’t wanted. She was too close; she smelled too good. He turned his head slightly and noticed that her cheeks were pink—she felt it too, he knew she did.
~ ~ ~
Chelsea forced herself to stare at the screen. She couldn’t allow herself to be affected by him. For the next hour and a half, he talked her through all his findings. Even though she didn’t agree with them, she could see that he’d been thorough. He’d identified a whole bunch of cost savings they could make, just in his first few days here. Some of his ideas would be useful to her, most of them wouldn’t. It might be true that they could cut three salaries from the distribution team and two from sales. It might be more efficient if they worked his way. But what he wasn’t taking into account was that those salaries weren’t just numbers to her. They were the livelihoods of people she cared about. Okay, so José in distribution might be slow, in most senses, but he did the best he could. She was much happier knowing that his wage was supporting him and his family than she would be if she could show that much extra as profit at the end of the year. No way would seeing an extra profit of forty-five thousand dollars mean anything at all to her if it meant that Sally in sales no longer had a job. Chelsea did her best to accept that in business, profit was king, but she truly didn’t understand why. The satisfaction she got from knowing that she provided employment for a single mom of three teenaged boys was worth so much more to her than any extra zeros on the profit line could ever be.
When they finally stopped for a break, Grant got up to stretch his legs and went to stare out the window. “Is there any point continuing?” he asked. He didn’t sound angry, more like resigned.
“We could. I know you’re making sense.” She gave him a weak smile. “I know Dad will love all of your proposals and think you’re awesome.”
He gave her a rueful smile. “But you don’t.”
“I do think you’re awesome.” Oops. She’d said it before she could stop herself.
The smile on his face was almost enough to make her not regret it. “But not in a business sense?”
She blew out a sigh. “No.”
“Can I tell you a story?”
She gave him a puzzled look, wondering where he was going with this.
“It’s about my grandad. When I was a kid, he owned a winery, right here in Napa.”
“He did? What was it called?”
“Dawson Dale Winery.”
“Oh, wow. I’ve heard of it. There are a bunch of articles about Dawson Dale wines. They were amazing.”
Grant nodded sadly. “They were. However, my grandad was not an amazing businessman. He came here to follow his dream. He wanted to make great wines, and he had a soft heart. Not unlike someone else I know.”
Chelsea smiled.
“He made great wines. He took care of his staff—while he could. What he couldn’t do was make it last. He lost the place. Went bankrupt, watched his dream turn to ashes. I’d hate to think that could happen to you.”
She wanted to be angry, wanted to tell him she wasn’t stupid, that she wouldn’t go bankrupt, but she didn’t want to imply that his grandfather had been stupid. “I don’t either,” she said eventually. “But I’ll always have so many people breathing down my neck—my dad, Cameron—that I don’t think I could go under if I deliberately set out to.”
Grant blew out a sigh and turned back to the window. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I don’t know why I brought it up.”
“No, don’t be sorry. I’m glad you did. Is that why you’re the way you are?”
He turned back around, looking puzzled. “What way am I?”
She smiled. “So uptight. So concerned about the bottom line.” She hesitated. “So unadventurous.”
He laughed. “You think I’m unadventurous?”
Her cheeks flushed. She certainly wouldn’t have accused him of that last weekend! “No, I …”
He smiled through pursed lips. “Even if we just stick to business, I’m not unadventurous. I just prefer to be realistic. I’d love to own a winery, make great wines.” He smiled at her. “I’d even love to hire a staff to help me run the place and to take great care of them, but I need to know the long-term feasibility first. I need to know the bottom line so that I can stay above it and hopefully improve on it. I suppose the answer to your question is yes; it’s because my grandad failed that I think the way I do. That I chose the career I did. Most people see me as the axeman. I see myself as a master gardener. I come into a company and prune off deadwood, in order to ensure growth. I don’t mind getting rid of the deadwood, be it in operations or staff, in order to ensure the overall long-term health of a company. My grandad took better care of his employees than he did of himself. I know you don’t see the attraction in making money just for yourself, but you have to. It’s like they say on an airplane, ‘Make sure you put your own oxygen mask on first before you try to help anyone else.’”
Chelsea nodded. “I can see the sense in that.”
“Sure, but can you translate it and apply it to your business?”
“I think so.”
He gave her a hard stare. “Do you really?”
“What are you getting at?” She could tell he was leading up to something, she just didn’t know what.
“I’m getting at the quarterly bonuses you pay everyone.”
“Oh.” She pressed her lips together. That had been a bone of contention between her and her dad ever since she’d set it up. “They earn it.”
Grant folded his arms across his chest. “I agree. You have a great staff. They work hard, they’re dedicated, they’re exceptionally loyal—though whether that’s to you or to your generosity …”
Chelsea put her hands on her hips. “Don’t think you’re going to upset me. I’m not stupid. I don’t think they work so hard just because they love me. They do it for the bonus. It’s an incentive and a reward which they earn.”
Grant nodded. “It’s crazy, is what it is. Don’t get me wrong, an incentive program, a bonus, can be a great motivator, but the way you’re running it? That’s what’s crazy.”
She stared at him angrily. How dare he call her crazy?
“Don’t look at me like that. If I’m wrong, tell me this, did José earn his bonus last quarter?”
She glared at him. Why did he have to pick on José?
“Well, did he?”
“Not in the traditional sense, no, but he did his best and …”
“And his best wasn’t good enough to get the job done, was it?”
She sighed. José had screwed up and lost one of their biggest distributors a couple of months ago. It hadn’t been his fault, though. “No.”
“But he still got his bonus, right?”
She nodded.
“And so, you just removed the incentive from it. They know they don’t need to give it their all to get their bonus.”
“But they do!”
Grant shook his head. “Even if we don’t argue that point any further, let’s just look at the amount you pay as a bonus. That really is crazy.”
She started to speak, but he held up his hand to stop her.
“Let’s be honest about this. Even if I subscribe to your theory that company profits don’t need to be so outrageous, I still can’t accept what you’re doing. You’re not talking about having hundreds of thousands left over to just sit in the bank. What you’re doing is taking away reinvestment opportunities. You’re stinting potential growth of the company.”
She frowned, but she kind of knew what he meant.
“If you think long-term, are you really doing your employees a service by giving them money that could be reinvested into growing the company?”
She glowered at him, but didn’t say anything.
“Do you think José would rather have his bonus and then lose his job when you go broke, or miss out on his bonus because you used that money instead to strengthen the business?”
She made a face. “You don’t really expect me to answer that, do you?”
“I’d like you to. You see, the way you’re running things looks like you’re only focused on the short-term.”
She blew out a sigh. “Okay, okay. I get it, but I really do want to take care of them. It’s important to me.”
“I know that, and don’t get me wrong, I admire it, but you need to be smart about it. You’re not going to take very good care of them if you get them used to having a decent income and then leave them with no income at all because you can’t afford to keep Zosca going.”
“I get it. So, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying that’s why I want to go through my second set of recommendations. The ones I’d make if you do decide to go out on your own.”
She pursed her lips. “Thank you.”
He smiled. “You’re welcome. I’m really not trying to be an asshole.”
She looked up into his eyes. She already knew that. He wasn’t an asshole. He was a good guy. “Where do you want to start then?”
“Like I said. I think we should start with the normal recommendations I would make at this point. The ones your father wants to hear, and you don’t.”
She made a face.
“I know you’re not going to like them, but I’m hoping that after hearing these, then what I have to say about you going out on your own will seem much less harsh.”
She had to smile. “You mean you’re trying to soften the blow?”
“I don’t want there to be a blow at all. I want to guide you so that you can make the best decisions possible. I’d love to see you make Zosca a huge success doing it all your way.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Is that true?”
“Absolutely.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “Like I said, I admire what you’re trying to do. Maybe it’s because you remind me of my grandad in some ways, and I would love to believe that he could have made it if I’d been around to help him.”
She smiled. “But you’re not sentimental?”
“That really was the wrong word. I guess I am sentimental at heart.”
“I’m glad. I wouldn’t be able to work with you if I didn’t think you had a heart hiding in there somewhere.”
He met her gaze, and for a moment he looked so serious. “I have a heart, Chelsea.”