Werewolf Single Dad 2, page 28
That was, until I remembered my van was still hiding in the garage with a bullet hole through the window.
And if it was Frost who orchestrated the hit on me, I damn sure wasn’t going to let him see his guy had almost put a silver bullet through my skull.
So, duct tape and cardboard box in hand, I patched my wagon’s window up, and I hit the road ready for a Frosty reception.
Chapter 14
The roads were packed with traffic, but nowhere near as much as was going around inside my head.
The more I got to thinking about it, the more I started to panic that I was going into this meeting with Frost wholly underprepared.
Was I freaking out about the fact I hadn’t requested Casey or Grace come into the meeting with me, or was it all going to be okay, since this was just a first draft reading, and nothing was contractually binding yet?
Mine and Frost’s interactions had all been logged on the AWOO portal, so they knew the first stage of drafting the contract was happening today, and no one had seemed to flag a need to be present for our initial meeting. But I couldn’t help but wish I was taking Grace into this meeting, just to make sure Frost kept to his best behavior.
And then there was the whole other ball game of the risk of Frost luring me into his office just to kill me in private rather than risk a messy public clean-up that wouldn’t go down too favorably with AWOO.
But then, if that was Frost’s plan all along, why would he have put that nasty hit out on me?
If it even was him who did it.
Ah, man, this was all too much of a juggling act. I was starting to feel carsick, and I was barely traveling at twenty miles per hour.
As I drove away from the city center, the traffic on the roads eventually dispersed, and I followed the GPS’ directions down a clear path to Frost’s office.
Even though I was feeling slightly apprehensive about meeting Frost, and meeting in a small room where sharp implements were present would have only made things worse, I was a little bit sad when the GPS sent me past Frosty’s Fried Chicken, because if I was going to be slaughtered, I was hoping to at least get a complimentary chicken and waffles breakfast out of it first.
I suddenly thought of Peter Jackson’s Bad Taste, where the aliens harvest humans to make into burgers, and any hankering for fried chicken I had soon left my body.
I’d never eaten werewolf before-- or wererat, raccoon, or hamster-- but I’d also never eaten chicken as juicy as what they served at Frosty’s, and I suddenly found myself feeling slightly suspicious as to what we loyal patrons were putting into our bodies.
But then again, I’d had three Twinkies and a Code Red Mountain Dew for breakfast, so I couldn’t say shit about fuck.
I guessed it would be weird for a businessman who owned several other businesses to conduct all his meetings in a back room of his one fried chicken restaurant, and I quickly let go of the possibility of being chopped into skinny pieces and served up on a warm toasted bun.
I still had my suspicions about the origins of his meat, though.
Hey, maybe Frost had shares in the Hilton, and we’d be conducting our business meeting in a spa over a glass of champagne.
I’d greatly prefer that, as the chances of me being murdered in the back room of a fried chicken shop hugely outweighed the chances of me being murdered in a hot tub at the Hilton.
A murder is surely very unhygienic, and I’ll bet Frost wouldn’t want to lose his five-star hygiene rating, but these rich bastards have the means of hiding all sorts of depraved goings-on…
Eesh. How about I just settle on the notion that Frost hasn’t brought me to a meeting to murder me?
And anyway, even if that was the case, I’ll bet I was three times the size of him when we shifted, and he probably knew it, too.
If he had any brains in his head, he wouldn’t even try it, or those brains would soon be spilling out of his head.
Of course, when my GPS took me to where I actually needed to be, it was just a regular old office block on a busy street.
I drove a loop in my van and found a place to park further down the road so Frost wouldn’t see the busted window if he walked out with me after the meeting. Though, I’d already thought of a few excuses in my head on the off chance he were to ask what happened to my window.
Considering how late I ended up running when I left, I actually got to the entrance of the office at ten AM on the dot, and I knew Frost would understand me being a couple of minutes late by the time it took me to navigate the elevator and find his actual office.
But lo and behold, it was only 10:01 when I stepped through the door to Frost’s office, and the gray-haired millionaire was so engrossed in his phone he hadn’t even realized the time.
“Ah, Mike!” Frost put his phone face down on the table and rose to greet me. “Good to see you, that’s a very sharp suit!”
“And you, sir.” I shook Frost’s outstretched hand, and I couldn’t help but notice we were both gritting our teeth slightly due to the whole two-Alphas-in-an-office thing. “Thank you, I actually borrowed it from mmm-y father.”
I was about to say ‘Mr. Felder,’ but I realized I still hadn’t let on that Trent and I lived together, and I wasn’t about to divulge said information now.
It was fine, I’d just have to remember my father was alive and well and lending me his finest suits in any future conversations I had with Frost.
“Your father is clearly a man of impeccable tastes.” Frost sat down at the table and opened a black file, and he pulled a thick stack of paper from inside. “Not terribly good for the planet, all this paper, I know. But I find when going through a contract with someone, it’s so much better to have the physical copy right there in your hands so you can make sure the i’s are really dotted and the t’s are thoroughly crossed. I expect you’ll want to take this away and go through it with your lawyer if you have one. Though, I can assure you, my team and I have worked around the clock to ensure this contract is absolutely perfectly balanced and beneficial to us both. Now, make sure you concentrate very hard and read every single word of the small print, but I’m confident you’ll find the contract terms more than satisfactory.”
Frost handed the stack of paper to me, and his bright blue eyes stared piercingly into mine.
“I’ve no interest in fleecing people, Mike,” the Alpha said with stern resolution to his tone. “Takes up far too much of my valuable time and energy.”
Oh, yeah?
I’ll be the judge of that.
“I don’t doubt that for a second, sir.” I spoke with just a hint of suggestiveness in my voice, and I tilted my chin to look down the barrel of my sights at Frost. “You wouldn’t be here today if you were some kind of conman, I’m sure.”
Frost’s lips couldn’t help but peel back into a snarling smile, and the old entrepreneur picked up a glass of water and silently toasted the proceedings, before taking a long, deep drink.
I started reading through the contract on my own, and Frost sat in stern silence at the head of the table while watching me like a hawk.
At a first glance, the contract looked good. I knew a lot of the flags to look out for thanks to my years working in sales negotiations, and so far, this contract seemed fair.
There were clear conditions regarding purchase price, inspection periods, and a big clause on zoning conditions, which made sense, because Frost was buying my land to establish at least one other location of his restaurant, so of course he’d want to clear it with me, the seller, that I wasn’t going to kick off about anything new he built there.
I went along each clause with my pencil poised and ready to circle anything unruly, but there really didn’t seem to be anything to contest.
I even found my shoulders relaxing, and I was trying not to let out an amused chuckle.
Surely it would have just been less work to kill me and take my land like any other Alpha would have.
But Frost had clearly stated he wanted to “keep his hands clean” and pave the way for a new type of peaceful commerce between Alpha werewolves, which was something that really aligned with my morals, so I was happy to engage in a bit of pencil pushing to get there.
I’d gotten all my info about Frost being an extremely hard nut to crack from Trent, but as far as our meeting was going, Frost really did seem like a reasonable businessman. He just had to bolster his way to get where he was, like all businessmen did.
Aside from studying business and economics at college with me, Trent had never really got into the werewolf rat race. After graduation, he worked as a dishwasher in a diner, and that’s where he got his idea for what his own restaurant should sell. Granted, he’d executed his idea extraordinarily well, but he’d already told me he wasn’t met with much resistance over his idea, because it was the first time anyone had ever thought to open a restaurant that sold primarily raw meat, and it caused quite a lot of excitement in the shifter business world. If anything, Trent found himself surrounded by a load of eager yes-men, and he got his lawyer to crack the hard nuts, so he’d never really been at the forefront of business negotiations like this.
Meanwhile, I’d graduated and went straight to a white-collar job in sales, so I was a little more seasoned against hardy businessmen, whereas Trent may not have been.
But maybe Trent was just too soft-hearted to handle the heat of a boardroom meeting. From my experience, Frost was being totally transparent and totally respectable in his silence while I scanned the pages of the contract. We’d been in this room for about forty minutes by now, and he hadn’t said a single word to distract or derail me from what I was reading.
But if there was one thing an Alpha werewolf couldn’t hide from another Alpha werewolf, it was the scent of fear, no matter how weak, and when I dragged my pencil along a certain clause about Earnest Money Provisions, I suddenly caught a whiff of anxiety emanating from Frost’s anal-- no, wait-- adrenal glands.
The clause said something about Frost putting a non-refundable down payment down, but that seemed to be acting as a buffer for the small print underneath that mentioned something about the final sum of money being lowered if the surveying results came back with “unexpected results.”
“Oh, that’s just for the big stuff like if there was a nuclear power plant on the land that blocked me from putting my business up.” Frost let out a forced laugh as he leaned over to check the clause I was clearly going to query. “I’ve got to protect myself in this, too, don’t I?”
“Of course you do, sir.” I spoke calmly, but I didn’t look in Frost’s direction as I carried on scanning through the contract. “I’m just putting a reminder there to double-check on it later.”
Of course I understood Frost had to protect himself in this deal, but something about the wording of that clause was too loose for my liking.
‘Unexpected results.’ That could mean just about anything. You could be walking through the park and unexpectedly see a dude walking a duck on a leash. Would that then be at a cost of one thousand dollars off my land price?
God forbid it was two ducks, and one of them was wearing a tutu.
I carried on scanning the contract, and I noticed Frost was getting a little bit fidgety in his seat.
Nothing at any point screamed out “DANGER,” but the more I looked, the more and more vague language I was coming across, and the more I turned away from the rose-tinted glasses that I had started to look at this business deal, and even old Frosty himself, with.
Trent had told me Frost had certain ways of playing dirty, and I needed to make sure I kept that in mind.
After all, the dice are always loaded when the rich are the ones rolling them, and they didn’t get to keep all their money through being charitable.
An hour or more passed, and Frost’s cool demeanor was starting to get let down by his pesky habit of flinching ever so slightly whenever my pencil got close to a clause he knew was a bit sticky, and I ended up marking more points than the ones that flagged up to me, just to let him know I was onto him.
But, all’s fair in love and war, and when I’d reached the end of the contract, I closed it up with a smile and turned my attention back to the man at the head of the table.
“I think everything looks pretty great to me, Frank,” I said. “I’ve made a couple of little points, but they’re more for my benefit than anything else. Just definitions I didn’t understand and think it would be valuable for my lawyer to explain to me, that sort of thing.”
“Oh, well, I’m here right now, and I can tell you anything you need to know.” A look of elation spread across Frank’s face as he extended his hand out to review the contract, and he proved a bit too keen to be charitable for my liking. “I’d like to note down what you’re querying anyway, so I know to check with my team that there’s been no unfair or unclear warning on their part.”
“Of course.” I handed the contract over to Frank, who began flicking through it immediately.
“Ah, I can see you’ve marked the Extended Due Diligence clause. That just means we both are granted enough time to decide the sale is right for us both. I don’t believe you’ve visited the land I intend to buy from you, have you, Mr. Brewyer?”
“No, I haven’t.” I felt a sudden knot in my gut. What was he trying to catch me out on?
“Ah, then you haven’t done the necessary checks that assure me there are no dilapidated buildings or burst oil pipes in the areas I intend to build upon.” Frost sat back tall in his office chair, and the scent of fear faded into the air. “It’s a six-acre plot of land, Mr. Brewyer. Ninety thousand dollars is a lot of money. You must understand I need time to survey the land I intend to buy before I buy it.”
“I get that,” I said with a nod. “Take all the time you need.”
“Ah, now I just need that in writing!” Frost laughed, and I didn’t understand why, but I was definitely back on the side of not trusting this guy as far as I could throw him.
Though, for a guy with my strength who could probably throw this guy a fair distance-- and would probably quite like to-- that turn of phrase turned out to be a moot point.
Frost carried on tutting and muttering to himself as he saw the points I’d earmarked and noted them down in his ledger, and I could tell it was a paper-thin attempt to make me feel stupid, maybe so I’d buckle and tell him to go ahead with the proceedings in an attempt to save face.
But, unfortunately for Frost, I’d come to terms with the fact I was not always the sharpest tool in the box quite some time ago, and no such pride was going to compromise my position here.
The seasoned business mongrel could scoff and guffaw and try all the intimidation tactics he wanted. I was still going to get Casey on the case to scrutinize that hole-filled contract with the finest of fine-toothed combs.
Frost finished making his counter notes against my earmarked points in the contract, and he dropped the thick stack down hard on the table, despite my outstretched palm being ready to take it from him.
“Of course, I encourage you to take the contract to your lawyer to look through. I’ve noted down all the clauses that concern you, and I’ll have my team ready to revisit if any issue should occur.” Frost leaned forward in his seat and fixed his Paul Hollywood eyes on my face. “But I feel the need to remind you, Mike, that I draw no pleasure from giving anyone a raw deal.”
“I’m sure you derive pleasure from it, though, sir,” was what I really wanted to stay, but I could sense the anger simmering in the ice-cold negotiator, and I decided I wanted Frost to cool down just a little bit, so I opted for the more lighthearted response.
“Not unless their name is Trent Felder,” I said with a forcedly expectant smile.
“Has Mr. Felder expressed dissatisfaction with our business dealings?” A slight snarl caught in the back of Frost’s throat.
“No… it was a joke, sir.” I was starting to feel somewhat threatened by Frost’s presence, but I did really well to keep the lid on my own emotions, which was more than I could say for the seasoned businessman, who’s friendly facade was clearly cracking under the slightest bit of pressure. “You would obviously derive pleasure from giving Trent a raw deal… because you want to explore partnering with him to serve raw meat.”
“Oh!” Frost snapped into realization and smacked the tabletop with unbearably forced laughter, and it was like Dr. Jekyll had taken the reins once more. “Very good! Yes, indeed I would derive quite a bit of pleasure from that deal.”
Frost and I laughed our best corporate laughs, but we need not have gone to the effort.
The disdain we were currently feeling for each other was thick on our faces.
With friends like Frost, who needed enemies?
“Well, I think this might just conclude our meeting, don’t you?” Frost asked.
“I think so, sir,” I replied as I picked the contract up and placed it under my arm.
“Terrific.” Frost stood up from his chair and escorted me out of mine. “You take that contract back and have whoever you want to have look over it, and you get right back to me with any questions via that workspace on the AWOO portal. And of course, I will be uploading the document to the workspace post-haste so AWOO may read over it, and you’ll see there’s nothing untoward happening here.”
“Of course, sir,” I said with a sickly-sweet smile. “I just want to make sure I’m understanding everything and making the right decisions.”
“Of course, sport. Don’t sweat the legal jargon, it’s difficult stuff.” The Alpha businessman patted my back in one final swing at condescending me, and this time, I really had to grit my teeth to be able to walk past him without swinging for him.
But I was all about keeping my friends close and my enemies closer, and I twisted my scowl into a delighted smile and turned around to face Mr. Frost with my arm outstretched to shake his hand.
“Thank you for meeting me today, Mr. Frost,” I said with a big fake grin as I tried to pull the Alpha’s arm off at the socket. “It’s a real pleasure meeting with you.”
