Page 122 of Five Mountain Daddies

“So, why are you bothering me on my day off?” heasks.

“I have a contract.” I pull it out of the folder I have in my hands and place it down in front ofhim.

He smiles a little bit, confused. “This could have waited until Monday, youknow.”

“No, it couldn’t have.” I hesitate and decide to be honest. “It’s Ingram. He’s getting moreaggressive.”

Neal shifts a bit in his chair. He really does look like a kindly old grandfather, especially in his khaki pants and tucked-in plaid shirt. “We’re aware of his… aggressive tactics. But surely they’re not thatbad.”

“He’s beating miners,” I say simply. “I’m afraid he’ll kill someone before we could get this toyou.”

He looks surprised. “Beating? Killing? You’re kidding me,right?”

“I thought you knew,” I saysoftly.

He shakes his head. “We knew Ingram was attempting to intimidate the miners using his little police hit squad, but I had no clue he was actually… attackingpeople.”

I sigh. I didn’t know someone could be so naïve, but honestly, if it weren’t happening to me, I wouldn’t believe it either. Fact is, I grew up sheltered, just like Neal’s sheltered from the harsh reality of the world. His wealth keeps him safe from men like Ingram and the horrible things they do to keep theirpower.

“It’s bad and getting worse,” I tell him. “I think he’s just as desperate as I am, except he’s willing to gofurther.”

“Instead of hurting people, you just did your job,” he says softly. “Welldone.”

“I’m not sure you’ll think I did a great job once you read thecontract.”

He raises an eyebrow and starts to skim it. “Nothing in here looks particularly awful… although…” He hesitates a second. “I’m not sure how these numbers are going towork.”

“That’s the problem,” I say. “Or, well, the solution is theproblem.”

He murmurs to himself, skimming through, and finally he gets toward the back of the contract. He takes a sharp breath when he reads the paragraph, and he must read it a few times before he looks up atme.

“You can’t be serious,” hesays.

“Veryserious.”

“You’ll have a revolt, Amelia.” He shakes his head, dropping the papers. “The board won’t sign off onthis.”

“They will if you convincethem.”

He laughs a little. “I won’t sign off onthis.”

“Neal, listen. This is the solution to our problem. It works, it’ll make the miners happy, and it’ll keep Evans Energyprofitable.”

“Maybe. But we’ll lose the best of our management class. We can’t afford to hire more people rightnow.”

“I’m not sure we will. And if we do, so what? Fewer managers means lessoverhead.”

He shakes his head. “This won’twork.”

“Listen to me,” I say, leaning toward him, meeting his gaze. “This is the contract that you’re going to sign, or else Ingram’s going to tear everythingdown.”

“Amelia,” he says softly. “I just can’t see ithappening.”

Frustrated, I stand up. I look around his room and all I see is his privilege. I see the same thing at my enormous house and every time I look at my bank account. I see money I didn’t earn, power and privilege I likely don’t deserve. And yet when I go to Samuel’s house, the home of a man that works damn hard for everything he does, I don’t see any of that, although he deserveseverything.

“The managers will still be making damn good money,” I say. “Look at the numbers. I’m taking by far the biggest pay cut, and that cut gets spread out, covering some of the losses. Yes, people are going to come down, and we’ll probably lose a lot of employees. But if we don’t do this, Evans is done in five years, maybe ten.” I meet his gaze. “We’ve been greedy for a long time now, Neal. We can’t do itanymore.”

He shakes his head. “You’re probablyright.”

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