Bro Code by Kendall Ryan
“It’s the least I can do. I really can't apologize enough, Mark.”
“I appreciate that, Ava. And the flowers, too.”
His appreciation does nothing for the pit of guilt in my stomach, though. I was half hoping that he’d tell me that this wasn’t at all my fault, but I know that it is without him pointing fingers. I am the one who ordered that engine, and I was the one who didn’t have anyone check to make sure it was installed properly. I'm responsible.
“At least you seem to be in good spirits,” I offer. Kind of a lame attempt at a silver lining.
Mark glances at his arm and gives his fingers the tiniest wiggle, proving the whole limb isn’t out of commission. “The doctors didn’t seem too worried about things, which certainly helps,” he says. “They said there are a few smaller fractures, but the break itself is pretty clean.”
“Well, I don’t want you to worry about anything. Your job, your paycheck, your family. It’s all going to be taken care of. Just focus on healing, okay?” As I say it, I realize I haven’t the slightest clue how I’m going to make it happen. Can I afford to pay an employee that isn’t working? Maybe not, but I'll do the right thing. A little voice in the back of my head points out the other side of this. That I can’t afford to be sued.
“Thanks, Ava. And thanks for stopping by.”
After Mark and I say our goodbyes, I step out of his hospital room and take my first deep breath of the day. Mark is going to be fine and so am I. He’s as good as family, and as long as I treat him that way, I’m not at risk of him taking legal action against the company. Accidents happen, right?
As I round the revolving door, the sterile warmth of the hospital gives way to the cold slap of an Indiana winter night. I start crunching numbers—what’s two months’ pay for Mark? Will I have to hire a contractor in the meantime? I don’t know how much further I can stretch a budget that’s already spread paper-thin. How did Dad make this work? He never seemed stressed about money or the factory until the day he got sick and couldn’t run it anymore. Or did I just not notice? Did Nick see a side of Dad while we were growing up that I was too young to make sense of?
Hopping into my car, I crank the radio dial all the way up. I don’t even care what song is playing. All the noise in my head needs to be drowned out, even if just for the drive home. I allow my mind to wander back to Chicago, back to passionate nights with Barrett where everything was simpler and, for just a few days, I didn’t have the weight of a whole company on my shoulders.
* * *
“How about we go see a movie?”
I’m usually in my office at this time on Monday mornings, but I told the guys at the plant to take a three-day weekend after Friday’s mess. I need the time to budget and get in touch with a few contractors to help me re-order the engine and get it installed safely. Mom, in her typical crusade against me running the plant, has spent all morning suggesting other ideas about what I should do with my “day off.” She insists that I need to relax after all of last week’s stress.
I try to remind her that this isn’t, by any means, a day off, that I have tons of very important work to do, but it all goes in one ear and out the other. I’m hunched over the desk in the spare bedroom we long ago labeled as Dad’s office, running numbers for Mark’s next two months of pay. Mom hovers over my shoulder, shaking her head. “I think you need to take a break from this, sweetie. We could go get coffee. I’d pay for us both to get pedicures if you want.”
“Mom. I can’t take a break right now. Can you please just let me work?”
“All you ever do is work,” she grumbles, rolling her eyes. “Maybe you need to go back to Chicago and see Barrett. You were relaxed after that. You need to go out there again.”
“What I need to do right now Mom, is sort out Mark’s workers’ comp and hire a contractor. Please, just let me get this done.”
The doorbell rings and Mom abandons her post over my shoulder to answer it, backing out of the office with her hands up in surrender. “Fine, fine, do what you need to do. Just don’t work yourself to death.”
I tune out whatever is happening downstairs and laser in on the insurance document I have pulled up, but not even a minute passes before Mom’s voice echoes back up the stairs.
“Ava, honey! It’s for you.”
I push back from the desk in a huff. Hopefully it’s Megan making another surprise visit because I don’t think I can muster up the energy to politely turn anyone else away. As I descend the stairs, the stern looking gentleman standing on our front porch is completely unfamiliar to me. Maybe he has the wrong address?
“Ms. Ava Saunders?”
I guess that’s a no to the wrong address. He rifles through his briefcase and offers up a packet of paperwork. “You’ve been served.”
What? I snatch the paperwork out of his hands and tear open the seal. The word “summons” stares back at me in thick, daunting letters. I can feel my heartbeat behind my eardrums. Mark is suing me? This has to be some kind of joke. After all this company has given him for the past thirty years?
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
The courier shakes his head and latches his briefcase. “You have thirty days to answer the complaint that is listed for you on the paperwork.” With a cordial nod goodbye, he’s heading down the driveway, leaving me slack jawed and trembling.
Mom swings the door shut and I can feel her sympathetic stare, but I can’t manage to lift my eyes from the paperwork in my shaking hands. We stand like this for a good while before I finally say the only thing that comes to mind.
“What the hell am I supposed to do?”
“Call Barrett,” Mom says, as though it were obvious. “He’ll know exactly what to do.”
Every muscle in my body tightens. She’s right, as an attorney, Barrett would easily be able to walk me through this, but we haven’t so much as texted since I came back. How pathetic would it be to come crawling to him looking for free legal advice, admitting that while he's flourishing in the city, my life here in Indiana is falling apart?
“No,” I mutter, swallowing the lump in my throat and trying to gulp down any bit of confidence with it. “I can handle this on my own. I don’t need Barrett.”
I repeat it over and over in my head. I don’t need Barrett, I don’t need Barrett, I don’t need Barrett. How many times do I have to repeat that before I actually believe it?
Chapter Twenty-two
Barrett
I told myself after the weekend with Ava that everything with her would stop, but it seems like life has other plans. I find myself standing on her parents’ doorstep yet again. After knocking twice, I glance through the window, wondering if she's even home.
Mrs. Saunders is the one who answers, and she's all smiles. “Barrett, I'm so glad you could come! How did you drive down here so fast?”
I was already halfway here, but there's not a chance that I'm going to explain to Ava's mom why that is. “Let's just say I was in the neighborhood. And it seemed like you really needed my expertise.”
“You're such a sweet boy,” she says, shepherding me inside the house, “or a good man, I should say. It's been a long time since you were a teenager tossing a football in my yard.” She chuckles as I follow her inside.
The house smells like she's been baking something, but Ava isn't anywhere in sight. As if reading my mind, she smiles and points up the stairs. “She's in her father's office. Going through old contracts to see if she can make the best of everything.”
“Injury claims can be a really tough fight to win, especially if the accident happens on site.” I'm not trying to burst her bubble, but there's only so much I can bend the truth in a situation like this. “I'll go talk to her.”
I haven't made it two steps before Mrs. Saunders puts a hand on my elbow, worry written all over her face. “You know how stubborn she is. She was just trying to do the right thing by keeping the factory open. Her heart's hanging on her sleeve.”
“Yeah.” Ava's alwa
I can't let whatever we have—had, I remind myself— jeopardize everything else. But how am I supposed to play this hand with the cards I've been dealt? There's only two ways this can go, and I'm going to have to make the best of it.
Mrs. Saunders lets me go, and I head up the stairs. The door to the office is open an inch, and it doesn't make a sound as I walk on through. Ava is hunched over the desk with an absolute mountain of papers, but she’s so focused, she hasn't noticed me. I knock on the doorframe to get her attention, only to get a sigh in response.
“Mom, how do you expect me to finish all this work when you keep interrupting every five minutes to ask-” Ava spins around in her chair to make her point, dropping the file in her hands the moment she sees me. “Barrett.”
“Hi.” I smile, the same way I feel compelled to do whenever our eyes meet. Even with exhaustion and stress lining her face, she's so damn beautiful. So young and innocent.
If we were alone, if I was here for a different reason, I'd close the door behind me and pull her into my arms for a lingering kiss.
Ava doesn't return my smile, though. Instead, she bends down and starts picking up the file she dropped, shoulders tensed. “I told my mom not to call you.”
“When's the last time your mother listened to you?” I ask.
“Just shy of never,” she admits, setting the file back onto the desk.
“I'm not here to be your attorney.” That much is the truth, even though the raised eyebrow leveled my way says she doesn't believe me. “How about you just tell me what the problem is?”
“Come on. My mom has to have told you that much.” She bites her lip, but I can tell she wants to say everything that's on her mind. “One of the workers at the factory was hurt. It looks like the damage will be permanent.”
“Hurt how?” There's a lot of ways a case like this can swing.
“An engine on one of the machines crushed his arm. He said it wasn’t that bad, but I guess he was wrong. If that wasn't awful enough, it looks like the safety certificate on the machine expired a month ago. My father's been out sick, but it was still his responsibility, and—now it's mine.” She frowns, her shoulders looking so tense that it's taking everything in me not to step over and give her a massage. “He's suing, but if I pay everything he's asking for, the plant goes under. If I don’t, there’s a possibility he may not be able to work for the rest of his life and his family won't have anything to live on.”
“Doesn't sound like there's much room for negotiation,” I say. “You have any other options?”
“Burning money in court going back and forth over a case I'll probably lose anyway.” She reaches up to try and rub the tension from her brow. “I want to give him the money, Barrett. I don't want his life destroyed because we weren't paying attention. But that means everyone else gets screwed over by the plant falling apart.”
Damned if you do, damned if you don't. “I'm not sure what to tell you, Ava.”
“That's okay.” Her laugh is dry with fatigue. “It's my problem, not yours.”
“I hate seeing you like this.” I close the distance between us in a few steps, and she rises up out of her seat to meet me. “Come here.”
Pulling her into my arms, I exhale when her face comes to rest against my chest. She presses even closer, reaching around my back to return the hug. For a moment she's quiet, taking in deep breaths as a shudder goes through her from head to toe.
“You're so confusing, you know that?” Ava sniffles, but stays exactly where she is. “You keep saying we can't do this, but then you keep doing sweet things, like inviting me to stay with you for the weekend and running down here to try and problem solve with me. What is this?”
I don't have a good answer for that. If I was honest, everything would unravel. “Listen, work has me in an awkward place right now. I thought I was a couple of years out from partner, but they told me I was on the fast track if I can get the deal I'm working on to go through.”
She leans back to look at me, shock and happiness lighting up her eyes. “Barrett! That's great. Why do you feel weird about it?”
“Wouldn't you feel a little strange if something you'd been chasing for years just suddenly dropped into your lap with a nice red bow on top?” I ask.
She shrugs. “Yeah, I guess, but I'd still go for it.”
With her so close, I can't help myself. I move down to kiss her, wanting to wipe all that worry off her face. She leans up into me, returning the kiss with so much sweetness that I have to savor it, lingering against her lips until she's given me everything.
“I wish things could be different between us,” I admit in a whisper.
She opens her mouth to answer when I hear someone coming up the stairs. We immediately step back from each other, and she quickly smooths down her hair before Mrs. Saunders pokes her head into the office.
“Barrett, would you like to stay for dinner?” Mrs. Saunders makes it sound more like a plea than an invitation, but I'm not sure I've ever turned down an opportunity to enjoy her cooking. “The rolls just came out of the oven, and I have enough pot roast for everybody.”
“Mom, you invited him,” Ava says with a slightly exasperated smile, “you knew exactly how much to make.”
Her mother dismisses the accusation with a huff, and I quickly step in to intervene. “Of course. I'd love to stay.”
* * *
Mrs. Saunders sets the table as Ava and I sit down next to each other, mashed potatoes and green beans filling the space between the pot roast and rolls. A dish of gravy takes up the other side, and I'm about to reach for my plate when Mr. Saunders comes up from the den.
“I was wondering who I heard walking around up here,” he says, then starts hunting through a cabinet until finding an unopened bottle of wine. “It's good to see you, son.”
“It's good to see you, too, sir.” I watch as Mrs. Saunders passes her husband the corkscrew, but his hands struggle with it some, the tension not quite enough to make it pop open. “Let me get that for you.”
He surrenders the bottle with a sigh, shaking his head before sitting down at the table. “I swear, half my body is giving up these days. I guess it's no surprise the factory is doing the same damn thing.”
Ava's jaw tenses, and everyone but her father sees it. Her mother hurries to get a few glasses so I can pour the wine, and when I hand the first one to Ava, she thanks me under her breath.
“Let's not think about all of that tonight,” I declare, holding up my own glass once all of them are passed around. “How about we have a toast?”
Ava raises her glass, and looks at me. “To?”
I meet her eyes, then look away. “To doing the right thing, no matter where it takes you.”
Everyone takes a sip from their glasses, and then plates are filled and we begin to eat. Ava's gaze lingers on mine, as if she's trying to decipher my toast. If only I knew what doing the right thing was.
Even Mr. Saunders relaxes after the wine makes one more round around the table, asking me about my work in Chicago. He's never studied law himself, but whenever I talk about it, I always get the sense that he's really listening. Mrs. Saunders chimes in once in a while, although she mostly looks happy that we're carving through the food.
Once the dishes are taken care of, I thank everyone for dinner, and excuse myself to the door. It's a three-hour drive back home, and there's no way I can let myself stay here tonight, not with Ava so close. She knows it, too, following me to the entryway with a wistful sort of smile on her face.
“Driving back tonight?” she asks.
“I have to. Work in the morning.” I was barely able to pull enough coverage tonight, and I've made my promises. Breaking them just isn't in the cards.
She steals a look over her shoulder. Both her parents seem occupied in the
“Guess I'll see you later.” She runs the back of her knuckles down my shirt, brushing over my abs. “Things always work out like they're supposed to, right? Even if it's not how we planned.”
“Exactly.” I have to believe that. I have to take the next step forward.
There's a sadness in her eyes when she closes the door behind me, and I'm left standing on the snowy porch by myself feeling empty and alone. Shaking my head, I pull out my keys and start making my way back to the car.
No matter what I might feel inside, this is the way things have to be. She deserves more than I can give her.
Chapter Twenty-three
Ava
To say that things are falling apart isn’t exactly true. In order for things to fall apart, things first have to be together, and the more I think about it, I don’t think I ever really had things together.
The thought is a depressing one.
I took on this business with blind optimism and a business degree, ignoring all the red flags in favor of looking out for my employees. And where did it get me? In the throes of a legal dispute with next to no money to guide me out.
Sitting at my desk at the factory feels like sitting at mission control for a space launch and slowly realizing there is no fuel in the rocket. I’m not sure if there’s any possible way I can get us back to Earth without crashing.
My stomach twists with nerves and I take a deep breath. What I need is a massage.
I read through the court summons for what feels like the thousandth time. It all feels more like an episode of some legal show than my actual life. With the new (correct) engine installed and quadruple checked by the contractor I hired on, the usual sounds of the warehouse have resumed—the low buzz of chatter coupled with the whir of the machinery.
Everything is back to nearly normal for my staff, minus Mark. Word can get around quick in the factory, though. I wonder if any of them know that Mark is suing, if they have any idea what kind of hot water the company is in.