Eli asked Joey, “how well do you know Dylan?”
Joey shrugged, we were classmates in school, but we never hung around together. He was one of the rich kids. To be honest, I don’t think I saw him hanging out with anybody. He was always kind of quiet and kept to himself.”
I asked, “didn’t he hang out with that Hopkins kid?”
Joey nodded, “maybe a little bit. I just remember when we got to high school, he started to play sports, his old man was a real ass.”
Eli asked, “what do you mean?”
Joey said, “well, Dylan was an ok athlete, but he wasn’t the jock that Dawson was. Scott was one of those parents that was always yelling from the stands. Things like, get your head in the game, you can do better than that, shit like that.”
I chuckled, “yeah, Dawson was definitely the golden child.”
Eli said, “you know I want you to be happy, Caleb, but I don’t know if I trust him.”
I sighed, “I get it Eli, I promise I’ll be careful. Hell, I still don’t know what this is all about yet. I’m not even sure if I will ever hear from him again.”
Joey said, “come on, let’s go get that pool finished, Eli wants to go skinny dipping you know.”
Eli grinned, “kiss my ass, redneck.”
Joey shot back, “again? Didn’t I do enough of that last night city boy?”
I rolled my eyes, “I’ll be out in a few minutes.”
I took another drink of my coffee. What did last night mean? Would Dylan really help Scott try to get that recipe from me? I saw the way he cowered when Dawson yelled at him at the store the last time I saw him. Damn it, last night felt so right, and I really wanted to see where things would go with us. I guess Eli is right, I need to be careful.
I joined Eli and Joey a few minutes later and by early afternoon, we had the pool cleaned up and ready for water.
I said, “I think we should have a professional pool guy come out to check the pumps and filters over before we fill the pool. I have no idea how long it’s been since there has been any water in there.”
Eli of course, had to add his opinion, he grinned, “oh, yeah, let’s have the pool boy come over, that’s always a good start to any porn movie.”
Joey shook his head, “you really do have a one-track mind, don’t you, city boy?”
Eli grinned and shrugged and I said, “we can find someone tomorrow and call them.”
We ate a quick lunch and had a beer, Eli and Joey left for the rest of the afternoon. I pulled out my laptop and did some work. We were going to have another busy week at the brewery, more upgrades were coming, and we would have some of our new employees starting. I was in bed before Eli got home.
We got to the brewery Monday morning and got right to work. Brad was glad to have Jim’s help and was off to his next project. With the new warehouse help, Joey was going to spend more time visiting new bars and expanding our territory. Hal and I were going over plans to move conveyor lines around as John had suggested. Not only would it be more efficient and increase productivity, but we would also have extra sections of conveyors to use should we expand and get a second line up and running.
Eli had finalized our new updated logo and labels, as well as the labels for our new beers. He was also working on updating our website to appeal to a younger audience. The new label included a QR code that was tied to the website so that customers could leave their feedback.
Eli stepped into my office, he grinned, “the new website has been up for three hours, and we already have over 50 hits, Joey is giving everyone he talks to a card, so they can find us online. It looks like it’s starting to work.”
I nodded, “yeah, that’s a good start. What else should we be doing, as far as advertising?”
He said, “I’m going to start working on some posters and signs to put in the places that already sell our beer. Just trying to get the new logo out there and remind everyone we are still here.”
I smiled, “sounds good, anything new on getting a distributor?”
He shook his head, “nope, we have a long way to go before we have enough sales to appeal to any distributor.”
I sighed, “we’re kind of stuck here, aren’t we? We can only produce so much beer, we can cover orders for now, but if we get more customers, we might not have the capacity to meet sales. If we don’t have sales, we don’t have a distributor. It’s a damn vicious circle.”
Eli nodded, “yeah, I really think we need to put a plan together to maintain for the next month or so. At least on the sales side of things. We keep making the upgrades and start to build stock so we can flood the market, starting with BoroFest.”
I asked, “what do we have to do to sell at BoroFest?”
He shrugged, “I’m not sure, I’ll go start making phone calls.”
I nodded, “thanks, BoroFest sounds like the best place to make a big splash.”
He said, “speaking of splash, I called the pool guy, he should be at the house now. He’s checking everything over and will leave everything we need to maintain the pool. I told him to go ahead and fill the pool when everything is good to go.”
I chuckled, “you should be able to go skinny dipping by the weekend.”
Eli grinned, “that’s my plan.”
Eli and I went home that night to find the pool filled and all the supplies we would need to maintain it. There was also a list of instructions and a note that said it would probably be Friday or Saturday for the water to be warm enough to swim in. That didn’t stop Eli from stepping down the steps, “just to try it”. He only got in up to his knees before he stepped back out, skinny dipping would have to wait a few days. The water was still too cold.
The next day we were back at our tasks. I heard Hal walk in from the production floor and at the same time I heard someone walk in the front door.
Hal said, in not a very pleasant voice, “can I help you?”
The man said, “it’s nice to see you too, Hal. Is Caleb in?”
Hal said, “I think he’s in his office, I’ll go ask if he wants to see you.”
The man said, “that’s ok, I know the way.”
I was looking at my door as Scott Patefield walked into my office. He had aged since the last time I saw him, but he was still a very attractive man. I could see where Dylan got his good looks. Scott had the same eyes that I had looked into a few nights ago.
Scott said, “it’s good to see you Caleb, you look right at home behind your grandpa’s old desk.”
He looked as if he was starting to hold his hand out to shake mine. I crossed my arms and sat back in my chair. I said, “Scott, what I can do for you?”
He sat down and said, “I heard you were in town and just wanted to stop in a say hi.”
I nodded, “ok, thanks. If there is nothing else, I’m in the middle of something right now, so…”
He said, “you aren’t serious about trying to get this brewery running again, are you?”
I sighed, “I am very serious about this Scott.”
Scott shook his head, “but you have no idea how make beer, it would be much easier for you to just sell out.”
I nodded, “yes, it might be easier, and I may not know a lot about brewing beer, but I have some good people to help me with that.”
He chuckled, “yeah, all the rejects your grandpa liked to take in, like a bunch of stray mutts.”
I took a deep breath, “Scott, I am very busy right now, thank you for stopping by. I think you know your way out.”
He said, “don’t be stupid Caleb, I am here with a legitimate offer to buy your brewery and all the recipes. You can take the money and run. Go back out west and enjoy your life.” He laid an envelope on my desk.
I looked him in the eye as I pushed the envelope back to Scott and said, “The Malloy Brewery is not for sale, thank you for your time.”
Scott narrowed his eyes at me as he stood up and growled, “you are just as stubborn as your old man and grandpa, you really should think about this. The offer is good until the end of the week.”
He turned and stormed out the door, Hal and Eli immediately ran into my office.
Eli asked, “how much was the offer?”
I took a deep breath as my heart rate began to return to normal, I shrugged, “I don’t know, I didn’t open the envelope. It’s still laying right there.”
Hal asked, “are you going to open it?”
I thought for a moment and took the envelope and ran it through the paper shredder that was next to my desk.
Eli sighed, “well, I guess it’s back to work then.”
I nodded, “I guess so.”
Hal smiled, “sounds good to me.”
Eli said, “before you leave Hal, I have more info on BoroFest.”
They both sat down as Eli began to fill us in.
He said, “so, this is the 10th year of the festival. It’s put on by a group of volunteers and has gotten bigger every year. They raise money by selling sponsorships, they have bronze, silver, gold and platinum levels. Bronze costs 500, silver is 1000, gold is 2500 and platinum is 5000.”
I asked, “and what does each level get us?”
Eli said, “bronze gets us listed on their website and a banner at the festival. Silver gets the same plus being announced between acts during the festival. Gold gets the silver stuff, plus it gets us listed on the posters that are put around town. Platinum gets all that but our listing on the poster is bigger and we are mentioned on all radio and tv ads as well as having our logo is displayed on a big screen between the big name acts that perform every night.”
I said, “so the more you give the more advertising you get.”
Eli nodded, “yep, the festival has mostly area bands and singers trying to get noticed, they perform all day. But there are three main headliners, one each night, that already may have a record deal. They are usually opening acts for the big stars but don’t have a big enough following for their own arena type shows. People like Kane Brown and Miranda Lambert have all played here in the past.”
I said, “so we could get our name in front of a lot of people.” I paused and then asked, “so what about beer sales, how are they handled?”
Eli sighed, “well, Patefield already has the contract for this year.”
My heart sank, “so we can’t sell our beer there this year?”
Eli said, “not necessarily, the guy I talked to said that they allow all kinds of vendors to set up at the festival. They have a bunch of food trucks, a couple of smoothy vendors and even a coffee guy.”
Hal asked, “would they let us set up as a vendor?”
Eli said, “the guy wasn’t sure, he would have to check with the rest of the planning committee.”
I asked, “when is their next meeting?"
Eli smiled, “Thursday night, we are already on the agenda, and I am the newest member of the committee.”
I said, “what?”
He grinned, “they are always looking for more volunteers to serve on the committee. They plan this thing all year long, you have to book these acts, sometimes two years out. Someone one has to line up port-a-potties, trash dumpsters and a bunch of other things. Someone has to do all the advertising, there are a lot of details to take care of. The committee is made up of business owners and community leaders, Patefield has a guy on the committee so why shouldn’t we?”
I smiled, “alright, it looks like Eli, and I have a meeting to get ready for. Hal, keep after our upgrades so we can start to ramp up our production in case we are able to get into BoroFest. I assume I can come to the meeting since we are on the agenda.”
Eli nodded, “yep, you will be representing The Malloy Brewery.”
Hal left to help Brad and Jim, Eli and I got busy getting ready for our meeting with the BoroFest Planning Committee. I, of course, was having a little trouble concentrating, my meeting Scott Patefield caused me to think about Dylan. What was his real reason for coming to see me? What would Scott think about him spending the night? I took a deep breath to clear my head and got back to work.
If we could set up as a vendor, just like the other food trucks and other similar vendors, we could at least start to get our brand in front of a lot of people. I just had to decide which level of sponsorship would suit us the best. $5,000 was a lot of money that we could put to good use elsewhere, but it would give us the most exposure. I made a quick call to Tom Henderson to make sure we had the proper permits in place, he said that he would check into it and if not, he would get started on getting what we needed. By the time we ended our day on Thursday, we felt like we were ready to present our case.
We arrived at the meeting and Eli explained his connection to the brewery and assured them that I would be representing Malloy, and he would abstain from any discussion or voting that the committee would do concerning the brewery. We didn’t want to seem like we were doing anything inappropriate. They gave Eli a quick explanation of the festival and how the committee raises the funds to operate every year. While the sponsorships were the main source of income, they also made money from the admission paid by those that were attending the festival. They also charged all the other vendors a fee to sell their wares at the festival. Besides the food vendors, there were a lot of others selling crafts, t-shirts and artwork.
The meeting started, Eli was sitting at the table with the rest of the committee members, I and several others were sitting in the chairs that were lined up along the outer walls. We would go to the podium to speak when they got to us on the agenda. Eli of course quickly fell into the advertising group and was already sharing ideas, he really was good at his job.
They got to my portion of the agenda, and I approached the podium and introduced myself and gave a quick overview of getting the brewery back up to speed. A few of the members seemed to like the idea of Malloy beer being more available.
I said, “we are planning to release a couple of new products and a redesign of our current beer, and we thought that BoroFest would be the perfect place to kick off our relaunch.”
One member said, “but we already have a contract with Patefield Beer, so we really can’t buy your beer.”
I nodded, “yes, I understand that. Can you tell me if the contract with Patefield is exclusive?”
The chairman flipped through some papers, and said, “well, it is exclusive in that all the beer we buy needs to come from Patefield.”
I said, “so you buy the beer from Patefield and sell to the festival goers. It’s another source of revenue for festival, correct?”
They all nodded in agreement.
I smiled, “could Malloy pay to be a vendor and sell our beer, just as all the other food vendors do?”
They all exchanged looks, one member said, “technically, yes, but then we would lose the revenue from our beer sales.”
I said, “fair enough. Can I ask how much you make on each bottle that you sell?”
The treasurer of the group said, “Patefield sells us the beer for 2.50 a bottle and we charge $5.00, and he takes back any beer that we don’t sell.”
I grinned, “I will pay you the vendor fee, and by the way, I would like two spots. We will bring our own coolers and tables and man our own booth. I will sell our beer for $6.00, and I will give the committee $3.00 for every beer we sell. Plus, I will give you a check tonight for a platinum sponsorship, whether you allow me to sell beer or not.”
The room fell silent as all the committee members looked at one another. One man said, “Scott ain’t going to like this.”
The chairman said, “Scott’s been making a lot of money off us for the last ten years, maybe we need to give our fans more choices. We are still going to sell as much beer as we always do and get our cut of all those sales.”
Another member asked, “why do you want two spaces, Mr. Malloy?”
I said, “I want to sell our beer in one space, and give away samples of a couple of more beers that we are planning to introduce in the future. We will of course, check ids for the sample booth, just as we do for the sales booth.”
After some more discussion and me answering some more questions, a motion was made and seconded to allow The Malloy Brewery to sell beer at this year’s BoroFest. The motion passed 13 to 1, Eli, of course, abstained. I was sure that Scott would be getting a phone call as soon as the meeting was over. The one nay was from Gene Adams, the same man that had said Scott would not be happy that Malloy was coming to the festival. I later learned that he worked for The Patefield Brewery.
Pleased that I had sufficiently stirred the pot, I took my seat. Eli and I rode together so I would have to wait for him to go home. I listened to the rest of meeting, it really did take a lot of planning and work to put a festival like this on.
They started to talk about advertising and the lady that was in charge of printing the posters held up the current sample.
She said, “here is what the posters will look like this year, once we have all the sponsors in place, we will finalize it. We need to have it to the printers in four weeks. As you can see, we have the nine platinum sponsors on the top, after tonight I will have to add Malloy, of course. So that makes 10 platinums.”
I noticed that the Patefield logo was on top in the center, the other eight were side by side below it. They were all the same size, but because it was alone at the top, the Patefield logo appeared more prominent.
The chairman asked, “has the printer given you an estimate of the cost yet?”
She nodded, “yes, it is a bit higher than last year, so it will make our advertising budget a bit tight.”
Chairman said, “we were expecting that.”
Once she gave the committee the cost, I said, “excuse me, I’m sorry to interrupt, but The Malloy Brewery would be willing to pay the cost of printing your posters, if you will put our logo on top, right next the Patefield logo.” Again, I got a dirty look from Gene Adams.
The committee quickly agreed and again, with only one nay vote, it was decided that I would be allowed to pay for the printing of the posters.
They discussed the rest of their business, and I went out to my truck to wait for Eli. Five minutes later, he climbed in with a big smile on his face.
He said, “you may not have started the feud between the Patefields and Malloys, but you sure fanned the flames tonight.”
I chuckled, “yeah, I guess I did. Scott stopping to see me yesterday must have riled me up a bit more than I thought.”
The next day, Eli and I updated everyone on our successful meeting, and we quickly moved into planning mode. We would need to start batching our new beers so they could ferment and age in time to be bottled for the festival. I was expecting some repercussions from Scott all day, but nothing came.
We went home after work, Eli and Joey were planning another evening at what had become their favorite bar. After they left, I went back to work on another one of the spreadsheets that I was rapidly becoming famous for.
I sat at the kitchen table and opened a beer to get to work, when I heard a knock on the door. I was a bit surprised and delighted to see Dylan standing there.
I said, “hey, come on in. I just opened a beer, can I get you one?”
He nodded, “sure, that sounds good.”
I closed my laptop and put my papers back in my bag, still not sure of Dylan’s intentions.
He said, “this really is good beer, to be honest, I do like it better than my dad’s”
I smiled, “thanks.”
We sat in awkward silence for a minute. I sighed, “ok Dylan, I’m sorry, but I have to ask this, what the hell is going on?”
He suddenly looked worried, “what do you mean?”
I asked, “why did you come to see me?”
He looked down and picked at his beer label, “I just wanted to see you.” He took a deep breath, “God Caleb, I have had the biggest crush on you since high school. I was just a goofy looking kid, I’m sure you never even noticed me. When I saw you at the store that day, you looked even better than I remembered. I started to get those feelings again, and I just had to talk to you.”
I sighed, “well, I did notice you in high school and have you turned out damn hot and I want to see you too. It’s just that I am a little suspicious.”
He asked, “about what?”
I said, “you have to know the history between our families. When you said that your dad wanted my beer recipe, well, I just thought that maybe he put you up to this.”
Dylan’s shoulder sagged as he shook his head, “that fucking brewery. Caleb, you have to believe me, I couldn’t care less about that damn beer. I don’t want to work at that brewery, I never have and never will.”
I asked, “why don’t you quit and find a different job then?”
He said, “you don’t just walk away from my dad. I think the only reason I was born, so he had a back up to Dawson, you know, an heir and a spare. He has been grooming us to take over that damn business since we could walk. I have never been able to do anything right, Dawson is perfect and I’m not even close.”
I said, “I don’t think Dawson is perfect. In fact, I think you are a hell of a lot closer to perfect than he will ever be.”
I stood and pulled Dylan to his feet and wrapped my arms around him, he looked up at me with his sad eyes. I leaned in and kissed him, pushing my tongue into his mouth. He was soon doing the same. We made our way to my bedroom, shedding our clothes all the way down the hall. We fell onto the bed naked, our hard cocks rubbing together as we continued our passionate kiss. We moved around to suck each other, Dylan tasted just as good as he did the first time I sucked his cock. He did have the sweetest tasting precum. I fondled his nuts as we continued to orally please each other. I moved a finger down his crack and found what I really wanted. Dylan gladly spread his legs to give me full access. I sucked him deeper as I began to finger his hole, bringing out moans of approval. I had to taste his pucker. I rolled him onto his back and pushed his legs into the air, Dylan grabbed his ankles to aid me in my endeavor. I was right, his ass tasted just as good as his cock. I spread his cheeks apart as I darted my tongue in and out of Dylan’s love tunnel. I looked up to see his head writhing back and forth as his white knuckled hands gripped his ankles tighter. Once I had his hole sufficiently lubed, I moved up for another kiss. I aimed my pole at its target and slowly pushed in as I pushed my tongue down Dylan’s throat. Our lips never parted as I picked up speed, sending pleasure coursing through every nerve in my body. From the sounds Dylan was making, I can only assume he was in the same state. I felt my sperm begin its trek until I was powerless to stop it from shooting out of my cock and into the deep recesses of Dylan’s insides. He let out a final groan and sent his seed flying, covering our heaving chests in his cream. We kissed until my deflating manhood slipped from his cum-filled hole and our breathing returned to normal.
We held each other for a few minutes, then got up for a quick shower. We pulled on our underwear and went back to the kitchen for another beer, and I made us something to eat.
Dylan said, “I promise you Caleb, my dad and brother did not send me here to spy on you. I’m sure they would flip out if they even knew I was here.”
I smiled, “let’s make a deal then, neither of will even say the word beer, unless we are ordering one to drink.”
He grinned, “it’s a deal.”
I asked, “would you like to spend the night again?”
He nodded, “yes, very much.”
We cuddled together and were asleep before our heads hit the pillow. I woke up the next morning with my arms still wrapped around him. He turned to me and gave me a kiss.
I grinned, “hey, the pool should be warm enough today, you want to go for a swim?”
He said, “I didn’t bring a swimsuit.”
I raised an eyebrow, he laughed, “oh, you want to go skinny dipping.”
I nodded, “yep, I want to beat Eli to the punch.”
We ran down the hall naked and out to the patio. We both dove in and gasped, the water was still a bit cold, but it didn’t take long to get used to it. We splashed around a bit, and I pulled Dylan in for a kiss. We broke our kiss when we heard the patio door open, and Joey and Eli came running out and jumped into the pool. Joey swam to the side and immediately jumped out, giving us a great view of his beautiful bare ass. They hadn’t noticed us already in the pool. Joey shivered and shook out his hair as he turned around, his uncut cock was flopping with every shake. It was clear why Eli liked Joey, that cock and ass were exactly what Eli drooled over whenever we watched porn.
Joey said, “it’s a still a bit cold, city boy.”
I couldn’t resist, I said, “we think it’s just right, redneck.”
To be Continued…
