Even After All

Mattie Davies looked at the display on her phone and groaned. The last thing she needed was her boss calling at five pm on a Friday. It was her weekend off, she had plans - they may not be that elaborate, a book, a bottle of wine and maybe a trip to the park, but they were HER plans for a HER own time.

She sighed, Paul Simmonds had been her lifeline, she owed him a lot. He’d seen the good in her when no one else had, and she couldn’t deny that. Taking a deep breath she lifted the handset.

                “Paul? How are you?”

                “Oh Mattie!” She could only imagine his face at the expression, he was such a dramatic man, how he’d manage to run such a bug business empire was beyond her.

                “What’s happened?”

He sighed again, “it’s Cara. Her and Billy have had a car accident. She’s broken her leg, he’s in hospital with a  fractured pelvis.”

                “Oh no!” Cara was his daughter living in Los Angeles with her husband Billy and three week old twins. The thought of them both being laid up after the trauma of an accident upset her, even though she didn’t know them. Who knew how she’d cope? “Are the twins ok?”

He sighed, “Cara had to go to the doctor, she’s got an infection in her wound. The babies were in bed, her neighbour was keeping an eye on them and Billy drove her.”

Mattie felt awful, that was the worst thing that could have happened to a new mother. “So you’re flying out?” Her heart sank with the realisation that the buck would stop with her for the foreseeable future. “Well don’t worry about things here...”

Paul laughed, “I have no doubts in you, but I wanted to be around when the new consultant comes.”

Mattie felt nausea rising in her throat, “consultant?”

He groaned, “I was hoping to catch you this afternoon, I’ve got a specialist consultant coming, he promises to work out where things are going wrong, why we’re not getting the success we deserve. I’m not finding our shortfalls, and you are far too busy on a day-to-day basis to do anything more. He’s good, he’s a relation of Maria’s distantly,” Maria was Paul’s wife. “...he‘s flying over from New York to help us out, he’s got the Midas touch apparently, he’s turned a dozen businesses around, and he’s confident he can do that for us. I’ll email you all the details. Ok?”

Mattie was trying to process all that he’d just said. She’d worked for Paul, a sixty year old millionaire for two years.  He had made his money in manufacturing, but sold up most of his businesses ten years earlier, he’d only kept his newest acquisition, this leisure complex just south of London.  

It consisted of a golf course which was well known and had a large membership, the hotel and spa were fairly busy, but for most of the time he’d owned the complex, Paul had wanted to see it elevated in status. The location was perfect; he wanted celebrity golf tournaments, society weddings and success on a level that until now had eluded them. And he was becoming more and more insistent on ironing out the creases and promoting the complex. This consultant was the latest in many attempts to attract the calibre of client that he felt they deserved. 

Mattie had her own opinions as to why it hadn’t happened, firstly Paul was small fry. Whilst he had money he lacked the fame of celebrity or the privilege of birth, and instead sat in the middle somewhere...no man’s land.

Then there was the fact that he wasn’t happy to invest further. She felt a replacement chef...someone with a known name and a reputation to match would put them on the map, with an upgrade to the rooms, then some complimentary gold memberships to some reasonably well known but fairly local celebs, would all elevate the prestige of the place. But Paul seemed reluctant to shower anymore money on the place.