Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Jay's optimism on finding a position he was trained for waned by week two. He'd had to come clean with Ashley, but all she'd done was hug him close and tell him everything would be okay. He wished he believed her. Her small income from waiting tables for the lunch rush at the nearby diner wasn't enough to pay the rent on this place for a day, let alone a week. Jay had savings, but they were dwindling rapidly. He was left with two options: find a job outside the city, or find another career altogether. Today he was finally going to give in and look for anything within commuting distance.

At least he'd told the family, so he didn't have to hide in his room to search the available vacancies. There were three possible positions in Boston—that wasn't too far. Maybe he could get a place there to rent if the money was good enough; move the kids and Ashley out of the city to something cheaper and better. Hell, he should think about getting all four of them out of the city. He'd lived and worked all his life around New York, but?—

A news item appeared on Jay's Facebook feed. He clicked it to read the article in the Advocate : two sickeningly happy guys married in Texas and fighting for same-sex adoption. That was another cloud on his horizon, the lack of a love life. Jay wanted happy, and he missed Mark sometimes. Not all the time—after all, the man was a two-timing ass—but the quiet times when they had cuddled and slept in the same bed; those times, he missed. Articles like this gave him hope for one day marrying a man he loved, but, at the same time, made him look at his barren love life with regret. Maybe one day he would find someone he wanted to stay with for longer than a few months. Someone who stole his breath and made him believe in forever.

He huffed a laugh. Mark had disappeared to Florida on a work exchange for six months to "find himself" and to escape Jay's "emotional unavailability."

"You spend too much time worrying about your family" had been the parting shot from his frustrated lover. Of course, that had been after Jay found Mark bending over an intern in their bedroom, his cock quite firmly in said intern's ass. Mark was good at that. Not fucking—he had always been distinctly average in that respect. No, Mark was good at deflecting blame onto other people.

That had been nearly a year ago, and Jay had heard through the grapevine that Mark was back and working in a rival marketing firm. Since Mark walked out the door, Jay's sex life had been as empty and quiet as the job market. Apart from a few casual hookups, his entire social life was barren.

What if Mark had been right about the "emotional availability" thing? Jay could argue he had reasons for being the way he was. He couldn't just up and leave for a weekend at a hotel, or be out for dinner at two in the morning. He had a family to think about. Jay wasn't unemotional, but completely the opposite—he was permanently freaking worried. He worried that Josh was never allowed out to play because their apartment building was right on the main street, he hated that Kirsten had yet another piercing and was falling in with the wrong crowd, and not to mention poor Ashley and her unlucky choices in men who used her as a punching bag.

One link led to another on the site, and Jay spent a good hour reading through posts on a gay support forum looking for one person—just one—who was the same as him, with a family to support and care for and no job. Of course, he didn't find a single person exactly like him. Seemed he was unique. A link to gay-friendly holidays came up, and he clicked it out of curiosity that in this day and age they even had a label for gay-friendly.

The first on the list was a ranch of some kind. In Texas. Deep in thought, he scrolled through pictures of horses and cityscapes and lost himself in dreams of hot days and even hotter cowboys. The thought of going back to the days when no one needed marketing guys to sell things, back to horses and a six-shooter and a simple way of life, was compelling. Then reality kicked in. Josh had English homework he was struggling with—he was behind his class in reading and the teacher had commented that Josh may well have some kind of word-blindness.

Jay searched for "dyslexia" on another screen, and while a PDF downloaded, he went back to have a better look at the ranch. There was a link to more ranch holidays. He scrolled past Double Ds and other cliché-type ranch names. Round about page five he was going to give up because the PDF was 85 percent downloaded, but a name caught his eye: Crooked Tree Dude Ranch. That was a cool name, and the ranch was in Montana. The website was pretty poor—white on black with low-resolution pictures and navigation that didn't always work. He could do better just using free web tools on the Internet.

"Whatcha looking at?" Josh asked from behind him.

Jay quickly minimized the PDF that reached 100 percent as Josh spoke. He maximized the crappy website for… he peered closely at the cursive script that wound its way across the top of the screen to remind himself of the name—Crooked Tree Dude Ranch.

"Horses," he said quickly, "on a ranch in Montana."

Josh clambered on his lap and Jay huffed as the full weight of the small boy landed awkwardly on his knees. Josh wriggled to get comfortable and pushed Jay's hand out of the way.

"Look," he exclaimed. "Horses, and lots of 'em."

Josh had a thing for horses. He collected posters and told stories involving them. Jay always promised that one day, when they weren't in an apartment building, Josh could get a pet. Of course, he had to point out it was likely to be a hamster or a cat, not a horse, but one day…

Something caught his eye as Josh rapidly clicked through pages.

"Go back a page," Jay said.

Josh did, and at last, after some fumbling as an error page came up, there it was, an ad for a job. It took some looking at before it made any sense, but the heading was clear enough.

Business Manager with experience in marketing, websites, and computers.

Salary on request, accommodations and horse included.

Call for more information.

There was a number below, Jay looked at it, then back at the wording. Marketing, yes, he could do that with his eyes closed. Websites? Easy. Computers, he knew enough, and there was software he could use. Business management? He contemplated what that meant? Running an office? Dealing with staff—maybe dealing with a few cowboys?

But… living in Bumfuck, Montana? That was a deal-breaker. He needed to remember he had a degree in business and marketing—that was what he wanted to do with his life, what he had trained for. Cutting-edge marketing in the middle of the most vibrant city on earth. This job wouldn't be pure marketing. It sounded more like they wanted a bit of everything. Still, maybe he should call them, test the waters—what did he have to lose? In the economy today, maybe this was the way to go. Think laterally and use all the skills he had instead of focusing on one. The accommodations sounded good, as did the word "family," but of course it was likely that the salary would be way low down. As to the horse? That was probably a typo.

Jay pushed down the feeling of anxiety curling in his stomach. Ashley would never go for it. Leaving New York was leaving her comfort zone. Kirsten would definitely not agree to go. He wasn't exactly sold on it—except it seemed like the easy way out.

"I wish we lived on a ranch," Josh said wistfully. "Then I could have a horse, and a dog." He clambered down and went over to the TV. One out of four wasn't bad, Jay supposed. He dialed the number, and a woman answered immediately.

"Hello?" She sounded out of breath as if she had run for the phone.

Jay sure as hell hoped the ranch place had a better phone-answering system for bookings than a woman with chronic breathing problems.

"I'm calling about the ad on your website."

"Oh," she gasped. "I'll, um, hang on…."

Jay heard the receiver knock against the wall, or the desk, or the floor, or wherever it was situated, then the sound of shouting, which he could make out easily.

"Marcus! Phone for you!"

"Who is it?"

"Someone about the job!"

"Tell 'em I'll be right down."

"Hello?" the woman said into the phone.

"Hi," Jay replied to let her know he was still there.

"You'll be speaking to Marcus Allen," she said. "He'll be able to help you."

"Thank you." Jay waited until the noises down the line indicated the receiver was being passed over.

"This is Marcus Allen. You're calling about the vacancy?" Marcus sounded more than a little hopeful.

"I don't want to waste your time," Jay began carefully. "I have a few questions."

"Shoot," Marcus said enthusiastically.

"The ad is a little sparse," he began tactfully. "You don't mention a salary or detail any career progression."

"Um…." Marcus said.

That was it. That was all he said.

There was a silence as Jay waited for more. Then Jay realized Marcus was expecting him to say something next. "So, the position itself?" Jay encouraged.

This is awkward. At that point, Jay wasn't sure why he was on the phone. Stupid spur-of-the-moment phone call was his idea of hell. He hated hesitation—he worked much better on absolutes and direct information.

"Salary is negotiable," Marcus said grandly. He added quickly, "Within reason and budgets. There's a four-bedroom cabin that comes with the job. We want someone who… hang on—" Again it went quiet. "—okay, this is what Gabe and Luke wrote for me. We need someone who can move the ranch forward. We want to increase bookings, look at a new website, and social networking, and brochures. We need someone to start immediately, and we're looking at a year's contract, but to start there'd be a trial for three months and the person could leave, no harm done."

"Three months?" Jay asked incredulously. Marketing campaigns took longer than three months to get off the ground. What was this ranch playing at, getting someone in for so little time? What were they expecting? Three months wasn't long enough to write a freaking marketing plan, let alone guide implementation.

"Is that too much?" Marcus said quickly. "Two months, then."

Jay sighed. "I'm not exactly sure what you're looking for."

"Someone to help us out. Nate is working every hour he gets, and the horses take up a lot of his time. Not only that, but he has the hands and the forestry to control. Gabe is lost in accounts and his books, and he's looking for a job in town. Luke is only good at Facebook and that tweetering stuff. My son Ethan is a cop in Missoula, y'know, but he's not here on the ranch, and Nate and I know nothing about any of this."

While it was interesting to be supplied with a long list of totally irrelevant names, Jay couldn't see the point of being told any of it. So Nate and Ethan, something, and whoever the hell else, weren't interested in marketing, and another guy knew Facebook. He pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers then pressed them to his temple where a headache threatened.

"Can I summarize for you?" Jay asked, then continued without waiting for a reply. "What you need is someone to come in and do everything that no one else wants to do." To Jay, it sounded like there were a lot of people doing a lot of things, all of them probably pushing the business side away, then most likely squabbling over what needed undertaking. Whoever took this on would need to be diplomatic, firm, and hard-assed.

"More or less got that right," Marcus agreed.

"And in return that person gets…."

Marcus coughed. "A house, some money, and the use of a horse."

A horse? So it isn't a typo? Of course there's a horse included. Every job should have a horse included!

An email arrived in his inbox and Jay clicked on it as he listened to Marcus expound on the beauty of Montana, the stunning mountains, and the promise of a new life. What he read made him smile. He cut Marcus off mid-flow.

"Thank you. I will call you back when I've had time to consider everything." He ended the call and with a grin, he spun in his chair.

He had an interview with Deeks Hyland! Jay fist-pumped the air. He could consign the awkward conversation with the Marcus guy to the bin. Euphoria had him dancing awkwardly in a circle.

Then reality hit him. It was only an interview, and Mark worked at Deeks, and he'd have to spend time avoiding him, but yes—he had a goddamn interview.

New York 1, Montana 0.