Vipers' Nest

By S D Johnson

Finn Ryan knows an opportunity when she sees one, and in the ailing Roslin Enterprises she sees a big one. She knows she’s a diamond in the rough, but she knows how to play the game and she’ll do what it takes to succeed. Even if that involves seducing the owner’s son...

Henry Gallagher realises Finn Ryan is just what his company needs. His son Jonathan, married to a domineering eco-maniac, is a disappointment. Maybe Henry doesn’t entirely trust Finn, but he can certainly use her to fulfil his ambitions.

The question is who controls who in this seething viper’s nest?

• Language: English
• Publisher: eXtasy Books Inc
• Release date: Jan 12, 2024
• ISBN: 9781487439873

Book preview

Family and business can make deadly bedfellows.

Finn Ryan knows an opportunity when she sees one, and in the ailing Roslin Enterprises she sees a big one. She knows she’s a diamond in the rough, but she knows how to play the game and she’ll do what it takes to succeed. Even if that involves seducing the owner’s son...

Henry Gallagher realises Finn Ryan is just what his company needs. His son Jonathan, married to a domineering eco-maniac, is a disappointment. Maybe Henry doesn’t entirely trust Finn, but he can certainly use her to fulfil his ambitions.

The question is who controls who in this seething viper’s nest?

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Vipers’ Nest

Copyright © 2024 S D Johnson

ISBN: 978-1-4874-3987-3

Cover art by Martine Jardin

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.

Published by eXtasy Books Inc

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Smashwords Edition

Vipers’ Nest

By

S D Johnson

Dedication

For my family and friends and my darling Heidi.

Chapter One

Henry Gallagher yawned loudly. He was bored and he let it show, flustering the candidate pitching to be Head of Sales and Promotions at his company.

Do you want me to go on? the young man asked.

Not really, Henry replied.

The candidate blushed deep red. Would you mind if I asked why?

Because I’m bored. All you’re doing is reading aloud the words on your slides. I can do that for myself.

The young man closed his laptop and gathered his notes. I’m sorry I wasted your time, sir.

So am I, son, Henry said. Believe me, so am I.

The candidate left the room.

That was so rude, Henry’s son, Jonathan, said. You could have let him finish. I thought he made some good points.

Henry looked at his son in despair. Do enlighten me, he said, exasperated by his son as much as the candidate. The idiot had sat there nodding and smiling encouragingly throughout the candidate’s dismal performance. What illuminating points did he make?

He said we have to find a new customer base. Jonathan repeated the message of the opening slide.

"We know that. He was supposed to tell us how to find it. Henry sighed again. Death by PowerPoint. They could have all submitted a handout and we could have read them, shredded them, and saved ourselves a lot of time by not interviewing them."

Maybe the last candidate will be different.

And pigs might fly. He picked up the phone to tell his secretary to bring her in.

*

Henry was surprised Finn Ryan’s arrival aroused his interest. He knew at once she had something about her. Her energy and confidence appealed to him immediately. He took in her appearance as she set up her laptop.

He decided she was attractive in an unrefined way. The suit she was wearing was, he thought, almost certainly one hundred percent polyester. It made that cheap friction noise as her sleeve brushed against the body of her jacket. The garment looked as if she’d bought it from a down market store. Those were the very places where he’d bought his indestructible crimplene suits and nylon shirts in the old days. The days when he knew, and could afford, no better. Before old man Roslin had kitted him out.

Her hair was long, and she had straightened out every natural wave, bend, or kink. He realised she’d used a henna dye to create its harsh deep redness. That was a colour he hated and was too extreme for him. He also disliked her heavy makeup.

I expect, he thought, her nails are false and red. He checked as she assembled her notes and handouts into order. He was pleased to find he was correct. He was also correct about the cheap plastic stiletto shoes she was wearing. He knew he could read people well.

She walked purposefully to their table and handed them what appeared to be a brochure. The document was in full colour and professionally finished.

This contains a copy of all my slides and a summary of the points I will be making. You can read them at your leisure as I’ll be concentrating on my vision for your company. She held out her hand to each of them in turn. I’m Finn Ryan. Are you ready for me to begin?

Henry straightened himself in his chair, hopes rising. Maybe this woman would be worth listening to.

She wasted no time in getting to the point. Your market share, she said, is shrinking. The pandemic forced people into internet shopping and your goods aren’t available in the big supermarkets. A lot of your small stockists have been forced to close their doors and no one is queueing to take over their businesses. The high streets are full of coffee shops and charity shops and that isn’t going to change overnight.

You’re telling me. Henry was only too aware of the crippling drop in sales.

Your traditional market has disappeared. It will take something radical to get you trading with the big hitters. My plan will take you first to the high-end operators and then, by developing a budget line, into the big supermarkets where the volume market lies.

Henry Gallagher felt a surge of excitement deep inside. That was a feeling he hadn’t had for years. He’d given the company everything he had for over forty years and had felt as if he’d come to the end of a cul-de-sac for some time. His visionless accountant son had given him no hope, no path to follow. He’d prepared the depressing figures week after week. They had headed relentlessly downwards but he had not come up with a single idea of how to reverse the trend.

The team I work with has taken my company’s products and got them into Lakeland, John Lewis and, of course, Waitrose, so I know how to deliver. I’ve watched and learned every move they made. Their cheaper range is now in the big supermarkets. I’ve been involved at every step and I’m able to bring that knowledge here.

What she said was true, Henry reflected. The company she worked for had a significant product range—bakeware that had taken off like nothing he had witnessed before. Even high-profile TV chefs were recommending their wares on their shows.

The company I work for can’t offer me career progression right now. Their sales team is rock solid and well-paid. I’m ready for challenge and I can’t get that where I am. I want to use what I’ve learned. Your company could be what I’m looking for.

Henry allowed himself an inner smile. This woman had some nerve. He was the one looking to make the appointment.

Allow me to present a new vision for your company. First of all, we need to rebrand and redesign your range to create an upmarket, eco-friendly version customers will be willing to pay a premium price for. While we do this, your existing range of cleaning products will continue to keep the money trickling in. I’ll be doing everything I can to get stock moving. Once our premium range is established in the market, we can look at adapting the new products into an economy range and get that into the big supermarkets. That’s where the real money will come from.

The surge of excitement Henry had felt was growing. He listened enthralled as her presentation took them through her vision.

The future is green, she said. You need to eliminate every environmentally unfriendly ingredient in your products. There’s been plenty of work done in this area, so your chemist should be all over this very quickly. Then the vision can emerge.

Henry looked across at his son. He could tell Jonathan was disengaged and he felt the usual stab of disappointment that his boy had no entrepreneurship in him. He lived to create spreadsheets but did not have the insight to find ways to make the graphs reverse their downward trend.

Stay with me, she said. The future is green. With a tweak, all your products could be manufactured in a subtle shade of green to underline this.

Henry smiled to himself. This woman was the opposite of subtle in every way he could think. Her heady perfume was pervading his nostrils but her ideas excited him.

Theo Jones, a graphic designer friend, has produced some prototypes for your labels. We used olive green, along with gold, to convey quality. She pressed her remote and her vision of product labelling appeared. The actual products will be a much lighter shade of that green.

Rowan and Willow replaced Roslin as the product name.

Wait a minute. Jonathan was suddenly both engaged and enraged. They’re my sons’ names.

I know. She pressed the remote once again to reveal a picture of Rowan and Willow Gallagher, lifted from social media. "There are no Roslins left in this company. The Gallagher name won’t shift your products, but Rowan and Willow as the new product name could. This is a family company, looking to the future, and those boys are its future. They also have market-friendly names."

She started to reel off a list of successful high-end companies synonymous with quality over the years with two names. She had only cited Mappin and Webb, Waring and Gillow, and Farrow and Ball when Jonathan interrupted her.

Ridiculous, he said. Look at them. We’d be a laughingstock. Their mother would never agree to exploit them commercially.

Henry ignored him. He was looking at the mock-ups of the labels, not his grandsons. This guy is good, he said. Those ooze quality.

Theo’s brilliant, she said. But at this moment he’s cheap because he’s still unknown. With his talent, the sky will be the limit for his fees. We come in at his start-up rates.

Henry nodded.

Dad, you can’t seriously consider using my boys, Jonathan said.

Henry studied the image on the screen and his heart sank. Two scrawny, androgynous boys of twelve and thirteen, with long, lank hair, dressed in shapeless cotton dungarees worn over thick, ethical, hand-knitted sweaters, stared at him with dull eyes from the screen.

If they’re the future, he thought, God help us. We’d only be using their names. Their image would need to change, he said out loud.

It should be Willow and Rowan. Willow is the oldest.

Henry fixed his son in his stare. We would go for the most market-friendly, he said.

Finn Ryan pressed her remote and a version of the label with Willow and Rowan as the trade name appeared.

Rowan and Willow works better for me, Henry said, satisfied after having seen the two versions.

Their mother won’t agree, Jonathan protested. And she won’t allow us to change their image.

So be it, Henry replied. But do remind her she lives off the profits of this company.

The bitterness in his voice was palpable.

We could change the colour of the packaging for seasonal products, Finn said. Red at Christmas, for example.

Henry was impressed by the way she’d ignored the family tensions and continued with her presentation. He was impressed by a version of the labels in red and gold, admiring the neat transformation achieved by changing the background colour, and thinking how easily their chemist could tweak their range for a Christmas output.

We would need to develop a signature scent for the main range, something classy and distinctive but rooted in nature. We could spice it up with cinnamon or something for the seasonal range.

Henry found himself nodding in agreement. He sensed Jonathan was no longer listening, yet he was being inspired. His brain was in overdrive in a way it hadn’t been for years, and it felt good.

Finn finished the presentation by outlining the way the budget range would carry the ethos of the premium products but would be priced and packaged in line with similar products already on supermarket shelves. In the meantime, we keep selling the existing range as hard as we can to keep the money coming in as we develop the new line. She smiled. Any questions, gentlemen?

Henry stood and extended his hand to her. No questions at the present. We have your handouts to consider, but I’d like you to email your presentation so we can look at it again. He shook her hand, noting it was cool and dry. The other applicants had had hot and sweaty handshakes. That told him this woman was totally in control, even in an interview situation. You’ll hear from us in due course as we have other applicants to consider. He was too wily to show his enthusiasm right then.

Thank you, Mr. Gallagher. She released his hand. I look forward to working with you.

He liked her style. The role required a degree of arrogance, and she had plenty of that.

*

The next day father and son met to discuss the appointment.

I thought the third chap had something about him, Jonathan said.

Henry looked at him in astonishment. How on earth does wet lettuce appeal to you?

"You surely can’t be thinking of appointing her?"

Have you read the material she left?

Jonathan shook his head.

He looked hard at his son. Despair descended as he took in his appearance. He was wearing crumpled linen trousers and a long, collarless shirt. His ethically sound clothes and open sandals annoyed Henry more than ever that day. He decided, once again, his son looked like a no-hoper.

He watched him shuffle uncomfortably in his chair. For God’s sake, you’re supposed to be the eco-warrior in the family, he said, his irritation clear. Surely you or your hippy wife could have come up with those ideas. That girl walks in, hands us a complete package, and you can’t be bothered to look it over. She even included costings for a move to recyclable containers.

Jonathan looked hurt. Gabby isn’t part of the company, and she is very protective of the boys. My job is number crunching, not product development.

And the numbers you’re crunching are heading down the toilet and you think you’ve resolved your responsibility to the company by giving me a graph to prove it?

You’re giving her the job? Why call me in if you’ve already made up your mind?

Because I want you to work out a water-tight incremental pay deal for her. I don’t mind putting an attractive package in place, but it must be performance-linked. She’ll be judged on sales and increased profits. You can crunch your way through that. She’s got to earn every penny. He stared hard at his son once more. Unlike you. He meant that to hurt and was satisfied when he saw his son flinch. He waited for a fightback, but none came.

I talked to Gabby last night. She will not allow you to use our sons’ names for commercial gain, Jonathan said petulantly, changing the subject.

Up to her, his father replied. I don’t have to pay their school fees. Remind her of that as you sip your chamomile tea together this evening in the highly desirable house I bought you.

He saw the hatred in his son’s eyes and wished he would turn that resentment into a spark of energy for the company that would be his one day. He could handle the hatred, it was the apathy that sickened him.

Gabby says come for lunch on Sunday so we can talk. She wants to put an end to all this, once and for all, Jonathan said.

You come to me, Henry replied. I’m no fan of mung beans. I’ll get Joan to cook something bland and unappetising for you lot. I’ll expect you at two.

*

Joan, his housekeeper, was wrapped in her customary white apron, hard at work in the kitchen. She’d been in post long before he and his wife had moved into the house and her son, David, had grown up alongside Jonathan. She’d supported them both through the loss of Miriam, his wife. Henry was as fond of her as he was of any living being and their conversations were always frank and relaxed.

Jonathan and the vegan vulture are coming for lunch on Sunday. Could you rustle up some beige, bland concoction for them?

My cooking is never beige and bland, she said. I can do vegan and vegetarian as well as anyone.

You can do Klingon as far as I’m concerned, as long as you have a steak for me, he said.

And a bottle of your favourite Shiraz, I suppose. She nodded towards the bottle as he opened it and poured himself a glass. I can get some ethical stuff for them.

Henry wrinkled up his nose. Gnats’ pee. He chuckled. Let’s give her a fright and serve the boys a glass of coke.

You’ll land me in trouble. Bottled water for them. Why the stupid woman doesn’t realise the stuff from the tap is just as good for them, I’ll never know.

I appreciate you doing this, he said. They’re not the easiest to cater for with all their dietary peculiarities. He took an extra-large, fortifying swig of his wine. And all their weird ideas.

*

It was Sunday, and Joan and Henry had only just finished their late-morning coffee when they heard a car crunching on the graveled drive. My God, they’re here already, over an hour early. I’m sorry, Joan. He put a false smile on his face. Action stations. Stand by your post.

I’m chained to it, as you very well know. Joan laughed at his silly smile. Don’t worry. I can bring lunch forward.

Henry headed to the hall to let them in. Hector, his Golden Labrador, ambled in front of him, tail wagging. Hector liked visitors and fussed around their legs as they came through the door.

Don’t touch the dog, Gabby said. It’s not hygienic. She sighed loudly as the boys ignored her and knelt to pet him.

Come through, Henry said. We’ll sit in the garden until Joan’s ready to serve our lunch. We can have a drink while we wait.

Grandpa, can we go in dad’s tree house? Willow asked.

It’s not safe, his mother said. That rickety old ladder is a death trap.

I’ve had the gardeners sort it. They’ll be fine. I’ve had some stuff put up there so you can make it into a den, he told his grandsons. He loved seeing the boys animated, and he loved irritating their mother.

The boys scampered off. Henry watched them with a heavy heart. Their mother molly-coddled them. He knew she’d objected to the splinters they’d got the last time they’d climbed up to the tree house. Why, he wondered, should young eco-warriors be worried by a