Page 33 of Bullet
No part of me was constructed to be a complicated guy. Everything growing up was complex and unknown for me. In truth, I hadn’t really spent all that much time thinking about a relationship in my life, but even I could determine that I wasn’t a guy who could deal well with a flighty woman. Not knowing what was going on in her head, not having any clue what was going to set her off next and have her ignoring me—I just wasn’t built for that. My time with Celia was nice, but even as wonderful as she was, it wasn’t worth the stress. Trust issues with women or not, I was not about to be taken advantage of.
Although this certainly wasn’t improving my trust in women.
I threw back the covers of my bed, trying not to let Celia get to me in that way. She’d wasted enough of my time, and after the breakthroughs I’d had after looking through Tess’ notes, or even talking with Seneca, I wanted to try and stay on a path to redemption.
Not all women are like that.
Maybe just the ones I invest any real emotions into?
Whatever.
The cats were scratching at the door, so my time to mull it over was gone, just like Celia. I climbed out of bed and went through my morning routine, feeding the boys, taking a shower, eating breakfast and eventually leaving for the club.
To my surprise, when I got there, Seth was already there waiting. It was rare that anyone arrived earlier than me on any given day, but I was growing to like Seth quite a bit, so it didn’t bother me much to see him.
“You’re up early,” I said as I approached the front door, fishing out my keys to let us in.
“Nicky said you were always here at the crack of dawn, so I figured I’d better start getting used to it,” he replied.
“Used to it?” I questioned, then it dawned on me. “Oh, right, you’re taking over the bookkeeping.” Between everything with Celia, it completely slipped my mind that everything was different starting today. I was officially the Vice President now, and Seth was taking over bookkeeping. “You have experience in it, right?”
“Yeah. I never went to college formally or anything. Honestly, school has just never been my thing, but I’ve always been good with numbers. My mom was an accountant and I’d help her out, and I actually tutored kids in high school. Then my job up until I was offered this position was an office manager at this construction place. On paper, I wasn’t the accountant, but I was the only one there doing any accounting, so you tell me.”
I let us into the Taphouse and led Seth back to the warehouse, grabbing a couple of bottles of water on the way. If only I hadn’t gotten so caught up, I may have actually formulated some sort of training plan. Winging it wasn’t my strong suit.
“What did you have to do that was related to accounting?” I asked.
Seth pulled out a chair at the big meeting table and sat down. “Well, every month I reconciled all the credit cards. I had to manage inventory. I ran all of the month-end reports and zeroed them out against our income and expenditures.”
“Wow. You did all that without any formal training?”
“Yeah. When I got there, some other lady was doing it, but she wouldn’t even show up to work half the time. It was causing trouble for everyone, so I sort of just taught myself how to do it. I’d ask questions of her here and there to try and learn more, but I think she thought she was indispensable and that was why she acted like that, so she didn’t want to share any trade secrets if you know what I mean.”
“Didn’t work out well for her, did it?” I said.
He let out a snicker. “No, it did not.”
“Well, good. If you’ve done all of that then this stuff should come pretty easy to you, but don’t fret if it takes a little bit. Also, do you drink coffee?”
“Uh, no,” Seth replied. “I mean I have before, I’m just not a coffee guy.”
“You may want to become one. Nick’s on this whole kick of expanding things around here, and so I expect the bookkeeping part of this job is about to get alittlemore complicated. I’ll be here to help out whenever I can, just don’t be shocked. He’s energetic about it, so if he comes rambling to you at eight in the morning, you’ll want some caffeinated backup.”
Seth nodded. “Got it. What kind of plans?”
“Well, I don’t wanna get too into it without Nicky’s approval, but the main thing is that we’re going to be looking into building our own clubhouse. A place where the club can really hunker down and grow and thrive. A lot will be involved, as you know.”
Seth held out his arms as if he had itallfigured out. “Idoknow. I managed a construction office.”
All my senses went dull for a second and then I let out a loud laugh. “Holy shit! Youdidjust tell me that. I didn’t even put two and two together! You’re gonna be the fucking M.V.P.”
He gave a slightly arrogant, proud smile. “Anything I can do to help, Vice Pres. I left on really good terms with my old company, too, so I bet I can get us the friends-and-family discount if we go with them.”
“Can you set up a lunch or something and you, me, Nicky, can then talk it out and get a quote?”
Seth nodded excitedly. “I’m all over it.”
How lucky did we get? There was no way Nick knew the specifics of Seth’s accounting background, otherwise, he would have been twice as excited. Something in me shook a little with anticipation at dropping the good news. Part of Tess’ frustration with Nick, at least according to him, was that he always talked a big game, but never pulled the trigger. With Seth in such a good spot with a construction company, I could get the gears moving before Nick could throw a wrench in it and save him from himself. We could be breaking ground on the new clubhouse before the year was over.
