Chasing His Brother's Bride

Busted

Brix stared at his best friend and confidant and the folder he was holding in his hand.

Evidently, he had misheard the name of Mordecai’s assistant. Jolie. Not Julie. Jolie. He’d called her yesterday and she hadn’t corrected him. The little b***h. Was she toying with him? He hated liars. Despised them. Granted based on what his friend was suggesting, there was a damn solid reason she was lying. She was very likely f*****g petrified and, he admitted, with very good reason.

His closest friend Malik stood in front of him on Friday morning with a blank expression.

“It’s why she panicked when she saw me.” It was a statement of fact. “She didn’t just go die in a hole somewhere but she’s here, in Boston of all places, working in my new company.”

“You going to call it in?” Malik’s question hung between them.

“Do I have a f*****g choice?” He rubbed his temple frustratedly. “Did she show up to work this morning or did she run?”

“She’s here.” It was clear his friend was impressed.

“Ballsy”

“Or she is waiting for you to make the first move.”

“She knows who I am. There’s no way based on her reaction she doesn’t know Elio is my father or the sack of s**t Val was my brother.”

“How do you want to play this?”

“Leave the file. I’ll go through it. Who did the dig?”

“Johan. I told him to be discreet. I didn’t look through it. I saw the name Jolie and checked the first page to verify her parents’ names and confirmed it is her. The name Jolie is too rare. Like you, I heard Julie when he introduced her.”

“Let’s give her the day. Put a man on her to make sure she doesn’t run. If she hasn’t come to me by end of day, we go to her.”

“Your father has been looking for her for a long time. He still has her old man under surveillance and makes him work for him.”

“Her father f****d up. He stole.”

“Yeah, and your brother broke your father’s biggest rule. Leave the innocents out of business. He took an innocent as a payment.”

“We need to know what she knows,” Brix made a face. “I’ll call him and see how he wants to handle it but only after I talk to her. He gave me a job six years ago and she ran before I could do it.”

A knock on the door interrupted their conversation and Brix took the file and shoved it in the top drawer of the desk. “Come” he called out and grimaced internally when the HR manager poked her head in. Something about this one made him want to get tested for every STI known to man from sitting next to her yesterday. The thick makeup, short skirt and low blouse were punctuated by over-the-top veneers and fake tanner. She reminded him of a a secretary in a bad seventy’s porn.

“Mr. Beckwith, I wanted to touch base with you on the conversation we had yesterday. I would like to set up times to meet with the staff.”

“My PA will be here on Monday. She will reach out to begin scheduling my one on ones with the staff.” He shut her down hard. He c****d his head to one side as she smiled widely at him and he noted the big smudge of red lipstick on her teeth. He ran his tongue over his teeth in reflex wondering how a woman couldn’t feel it. As her smile widened, he realized she’d taken his tongue movements as approval of her. He felt bile rising in his chest at the thought.

“I feel perhaps we got off on the wrong foot yesterday and so I only want to ensure you know I am open to whatever,” she drew the word out as if it held ten syllables, “you need from me.”

He saw Malik make wide eyes behind her back. There was always one in the ventures he took over who threw herself at him. They had been wondering which one it was going to be. Neither of them had guessed this lady though. She was engaged to Solomon’s nephew and while he suspected neither her or her fiancé were the loyal and committed kind, he had to wonder what was up for her to throw herself at him on day two, especially since he was certain she was Elaine’s mole.

His friends often said he was the worlds biggest asshole. He needed to shut this down and what better way to do it by being said asshole. “I’m not good with subtleties. Please explain exactly what it is you’re open to?”

She blushed and looked over her shoulder at Malik who lifted an eyebrow at her curiously.

“Um, perhaps this is a conversation we could have one on one?”

“No. Whatever you’re about to say to me will be reported verbatim to my head of security.” He leaned backwards. “There isn’t anything about my business he doesn’t know.”

She opened her eyes wide at his words and waved a finger between them, “oh gosh. I misread the room again, didn’t I. Are you two a couple? I’m sorry. Jolie said I was shitty at reading the room yesterday and it appears she was right!”

“Excuse me!” Malik interrupted.

Brix laughed as his friend clearly felt it a personal insult to be considered his partner but then her words clicked in his brain. “What do you mean Jolie said you misread the room?”

Macey paled as he honed in on her words. “Well, nothing I only …”

“Sit, now.” He motioned to the chair and smirked as she intuitively took a step backwards and Malik blocked her, leaving her no choice but to take the seat. “Were you and Jolie gossiping?”

When she hesitated, he put on the countenance he knew most of his enemies froze at and leaned forward over the desk, “Macey, you have thirty seconds to spill it and I want the truth or I’m pulling surveillance from every angle of this building to find out what you said. I will also pull Jolie into this office and get her version of events if I don’t think for a moment, you are truthful. I don’t like liars. I don’t tolerate bullshit. If you want to keep your job, start talking now.”

She bit her lower lip, dragging more of her lipstick across her teeth before flopping into the chair and spewing her guts, “Their department is always acting so high and mighty, talking about efficiency and numbers without any real understanding of the finer nuances of human relations. They’re a bunch of damn robots. I was annoyed they threw my department under the bus yesterday. Their actions mean two women who are used to a standard of living will now have their salaries greatly slashed. I told her I thought she was a snitch because her big mouth put my department in your crosshairs. I feel if she had shut her mouth, you would have left us alone but she said you weren’t the kind of guy not to be thorough. I presumed it was because she knew you but she said she didn’t. She said part of her job is to watch and observe in meetings to make sure she knows what her boss needs before he even knows he needs it, or some garbage.” She rolled her eyes as if she didn’t believe the woman, “she said because she noted you didn’t rely on your lawyer to ask questions and you didn’t touch your coffee because you were observing everyone in the room and taking it all in, she knew you weren’t someone who would let things slide.”

He exchanged a look with Malik who lifted an eyebrow.

“She knows how to read a room, huh? You find this problematic?” he listened to her tone.

The blonde shook her head, “it’s not her job. Her job is to be Mordecai’s pen and paper. She shouldn’t be pretending to be in a position she isn’t. She isn’t a manager. She’s an admin assistant. That’s it.”

“Yet,” Brix leaned back in his seat, “she figured out more than you did in only half the time in my presence than you were in. What’s her background? You’re the HR manager. Did you hire her?”

“Mordecai hired her himself. Told Elaine and Solomon he wanted to poach an admin assistant from a friend of his because she was exactly what he needed. She used to work for a small bookkeeping company for peanuts. His friend couldn’t afford to pay her more and she was looking for a better paying job and his friend knew it. He wasn’t upset about it. Her recommendation letter from him was one of the best I’ve ever read.”

He nodded, “so what you’re saying then Macey, and correct me if I’m wrong,” he folded his hands in front of him on the desktop. “You have a woman who is so damn good at her job her former employer willingly let her go so she could make the money she deserves to make and you would begrudge her this because she doesn’t have the title of manager.”

Macey swallowed, “no, I’m saying she needs to learn her place. She can’t be talking back to her superiors the way she was.”

“Really? You just came into my office to offer me s****l favors which, as the head of HR, you should know violates company policy on s****l harassment. I would surmise she found you offensive, as I have, and felt the need to put you in your place.”

He watched as her mouth opened and closed in stunned shock at how blunt he was. He saw Malik mouth the word “asshole” behind her and knew he’d been rude but needed to make sure this never happened again. He dug through the drawers of the desk which two days ago belonged to Solomon, again reminding himself when his PA arrived, she would be tasked with cleaning this thing out and buying him a desk which better suited him. He found what he was looking for and passed a mirror to her.

“I believe this is Solomon’s but you have a little something,” he tapped his front tooth as he shoved the box of tissues across his desk. Satisfaction at her humiliation was oozing off him and he knew it. “Macey, if you want to keep your job, stop finding fault for your fuckups with other people. You allowed fraud to be run from your department and you had a budget which was impacted negatively by said fraud. It allowed the company to lose money. I want this company to make money, not lose it. Moving forward it is your responsibility to hold your team accountable. You like the word manager so much Macey then you better live up to it. I have several people within BrixWith Holdings who are deserving of the title of manager and they wouldn’t hesitate to move to Boston. Don’t make me replace you with one of my own.” He watched her bright red face get redder as she put the tissues tight in her fists and blinked back tears. “I also never, ever, want to hear how the head of my HR department in this company, singled out staff for doing expressly what I asked them to do. If I find out you harassed anyone else under my employ, I will terminate your contract so fast your pleather skirt will catch flame. Am I clear?”

“Yes sir,” she mumbled.

“Now, go. My PA will be here on Monday. She will reach out to you to arrange the times for my individual meetings with all of the staff in HR. Before then, please send me an electronic copy of the files of the employees.”

“You want the electronic copy of all the employee’s files?”

“No. HR employees only,” he saw her eyes widen in fear. “It seems to me based on what I’ve seen thus far, your department is the weakest link. If the HR manager is sexually coercing people, throwing her weight around because she’s in a position of seniority and not seeing the value of the employees because they lack a title, I’m very concerned with how the department is actually being run.” He pointed to the door, “now go back to your office and have those files to me before end of day. Oh, and Macey, don’t mess with the files or change data. I want to see them how they are right now. Understand?”

She nodded and raced out of the room, not even pausing to close the door behind her.

Malik moved to close it and leaned against it, “that was harsh. You were channeling your inner asshole pretty well.”

“I had to shut it down. She’s going to be the gossip and so let her be the one to put the fear of God in all of them,” he grinned as he linked his hands behind his head leaning back in the seat. “Also, Miss Jolie lied to her. Said she didn’t know me.”

“If you were hiding from you, would you say you knew you?”

“f**k no. I’m a scary motherfucker.” Brix laughed at his joke. “She read the room though. Knew I didn’t touch my coffee. I didn’t see her put a single straight glance in my direction yesterday. Not once. She is good.”

“Which means she may have seen a lot when she was with Val,” Malik sighed as if the notion troubled him. “Your father is going to want to make sure she keeps her mouth shut about what she saw and heard.”

“She will. I’ll see to it personally.” He smirked at Malik who shook his head. “She has until end of day today to come to this office and present herself or I’m going to her. If I go to her, I will be far less pleasant and she isn’t stupid enough not to know how this family works.”

He considered Macey’s words. The girl was observant. Saw things most missed. If she was right, then it meant much of Val’s bullshit he brought home instead of keeping to their business establishments were seen by a third party who had a hell of a grudge. As second in command in the family, it was his job to make sure their business was kept private. Cacciolas valued loyalty and silence. He was going to reinforce this to the hazel eyed woman and he found himself strangely relishing the prospect.