Page 133 of Make or Break

I couldn’t stop myself from answering his question with a question. “Don’t you think I am?”

He kept silent.

Tundra looked at him, but my brother was staring at me.

“Let me run it down for you. I’ve been booking the musical acts and trivia nights for the past eight weeks, Lark looks them over and approves - occasionally tweaking them. I’m the one handling the inventory. The trademark for the restaurant has to be protected in order for us not to lose it - and Lark hasn’t overseen that because it’s—”

“Too secretarial, is what he said in church,” Tundra said.

I set my paper plate on the TV tray. “The only thing I haven’t dealt with much are customer disputes. Lark also hasn’t had any of us closing out registers, but I’m capable of counting cash.”

Ryan nodded ever so slowly. “I’m aware of you doing most of that, but my point is if you’re handling that - how are we gonna grow the customer base? You had a bunch of marketing ideas six months ago, hearing everything you’re doing on top of working the floor, it’s no wonder those ideas haven’t been implemented.”

He sort of had me there. Most of my ideas six months ago were seasonal and focused around spring and summer promotions.

“What are you getting at?” I asked, not knowing if he knew Volt had asked Tundra to consider managing the restaurant.

Ryan glanced at Tundra and back to me. “I’m getting at the fact that regardless of whether Tundra takes Volt up on his offer or if we’re working with Beast for a few months, you’re going to need at least one, probably two assistant managers to pick up the slack. Your real goal is to open another location…and another after that so that franchising can be on the table.”

“That’s true.”

Ryan put his paper plate on the table. “Nobody is gonna have your back the way me and Ricochet will.”

Tundra cleared his throat.

Ryan jerked his head toward Tundra. “Okay, and him, too.”

That brought us to the heavy subject matter we were ignoring. “Will you have my back though? Yesterday, you voted for me to be pushed out of the bar and grille.”

My brother leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “You don’t know how much I regret that.”

“Do you regret it? Or do you feel guilty because I was taken afterwards? I’m not trying to bust your balls here, but I’d have never thought you’d vote the way you did on both issues.”

Ryan twisted his head toward Tundra. “You shared freely with her.”

“Yep.”

Ryan looked at me. “It’s no excuse, but having Dad, Block, and Tiny there made things more tense. My temper got the better of me, and I let that influence my vote instead of giving it more thought.”

On one hand that sounded too easy, but on the other hand, I knew Ryan was more of a thinker than me or Killian. He could deliberate the easiest decisions to their death. Unless he was pissed off - then he’d throw caution to the wind and follow his roiling gut.

“So, you don’t believe I’ve violated the contract?”

He shrugged. “That’s up to a lawyer to decide. Seeing as nobody’s enforcing that, I don’t care.”

“You don’t care?” I asked, my tone dripping with skepticism.

Ryan sat up straight again. “Okay, it isn’t that I don’t care, but Punc made a great point. That same language could be used against me and Ivy - plus the club didn’t give him the shit they were giving you. That’s not right.”

I nodded.

“Do you forgive me for fucking up yesterday?” Ryan asked.

I tipped my head toward Tundra. “Are you cool with him? Or are you going to give him crap at some later date?”

Ryan’s lips tipped up. “No. He must not have told you, but we hashed things out in the parking lot yesterday. We’re cool.”

My eyes slid to Tundra and back to Ryan. “That was incredibly smart of you.”