him on the pillow, waiting for a response from his BODS match.
By morning, he still hadn’t slept worth a damn, so he rose before his alarm, dressed in shorts and running shoes and went for a run. When he got back, he still hadn’t received a return text in response to asking Ariana out.
He opened the app and checked her profile. Still no photograph of the woman he hoped to meet that day. He thought about the redhead. Hell, he’d thought more about her than this Ariana woman. He wished he could get on with the BODS date so he could prove they weren’t going to fall for each other. Then he would ask the redhead out.
With a construction site to run in downtown Austin, he didn’t have time to watch his cellphone for a text. He showered quickly, dressed in jeans and boots and grabbed his hard hat before leaving his downtown condo for the job site.
Though it was Saturday, he expected to see a busy crew working by the time he arrived at eight o’clock in the morning. He’d been paying overtime for the men to show up to work on weekends for over a month now. It was biting into his profits, but he refused to miss the deadline. His reputation as a contractor had been built on his ability to get jobs done on time and within budget. He had contingency funds built in to pay the overtime, so he wasn’t too worried about funds, but the timeline was tight, and he wasn’t sure how he’d bring it in on the due date.
As he pulled up to the site, he swore beneath his breath.
His crew was sitting around, doing nothing. Only half the people he’d expected had shown up.
He met the foreman, Patrick Sutton, in the portable trailer.
Pat stood with a phone to his ear when Dillon entered. He raised a finger to tell him he’d be a minute. “Okay. But be here as soon as you can make it. We have guys waiting on your work.” He ended the call and gave Dillon a tight-lipped look. “Joe Felton didn’t show up this morning.”
Dillon swore. “What’s his excuse now?”
“He spent the night in the ER with his son.”
Dillon frowned. “Is the kid all right?”
Pat nodded. “He has an acute ear infection. He was screaming bloody murder while I was on the phone with Joe.”
“Why can’t his wife take care of the boy?” Dillon asked, irritated that nothing seemed to be going right.
“His wife is expecting their third child. She stayed home with the five year old.” The foreman planted his fists on his hips. “They’re doing the best they can.”
Dillon looked at the ceiling for a second, trying to think. “We need backup. Is there anyone else who can fill in for Joe?”
Pat shook his head. “He’s the only one who knows where he left off laying in the plumbing throughout the building. We have to wait for him before we can start closing in walls.”
Again, Dillon swore. “What do I have to do to speed up the timeline?”
Pat shrugged. “We’re doing all we can. Every construction crew in the city is backlogged with work. It’s a good place to be, but not when you need more people to help out on a job. We can’t get skilled labor.” Patrick’s brow dipped lower. “Have you thought of talking with the customer and seeing if they would be all right extending the deadline another two weeks? I think we can wrap everything up by the end of the month.”
Dillon grimaced. “I’d rather not.”
“I know. You have a reputation to uphold.”
“And it gets us jobs others might not win because people know we’ll get it done on time,” Dillon reminded him.
“We couldn’t have counted on having a month of torrential rain slowing us down. Austin doesn’t get that kind of rain.”
“Until now,” Dillon said, his tone flat.
“And you didn’t have any control over the metal shortage for beams. Who knew the factory producing them would have a line break down and a union walkout that would last for a couple months?” The foreman raised his eyebrows. “Your customer will understand if you’re delayed a couple of weeks.”
“I’m not ready to admit defeat,” Dillon said, his back stiffening.
The foreman snorted. “You might not be, but some of the guys who’ve worked for a month straight, without a day off, are ready to walk off the job.”
Dillon frowned. “I’m paying a hell of a lot of overtime.”
“Hate to break it