At Wits' End - Kenzie Reed Page 0,83
town and brags about it nonstop. Her ability to land a man is what gets her out of bed in the morning. I mean, it used to be.”
Frustration coils up tight inside me. I’ve never been a relationship guy, and I don’t know how to have this kind of conversation. And I’ve got a vitally important meeting coming up. “I don’t know what to tell you, Sienna. I’m trying to be supportive. Just tell me how. Do you want me to just agree with everything you say right now?”
“No. I’m sorry. I don’t know what I want.” Sienna’s face crumples. “I want you to come home. I want my mother to come home.” Her voice is husky with sorrow.
I’d give anything to teleport home and take her in my arms. She’s alone, and going through hell, and I should be with her.
“I miss you too. Let’s change the subject. I don’t want to fight with you. How are Aceto and Ducktape?”
She smiles wanly. The circles under her eyes are like thumbprint bruises against her pale skin. “Oh, they’re right here! I know they’d want to talk to you.” She moves the phone and points the camera at the dynamic duo.
Aceto looks away from the screen and yawns. “Hey, Aceto. Please go easy on the couch, will you? You have scratching posts. Use them.” And then I frown at Ducktape. I don’t like having to be a hard-ass, but someone’s got to do it. “All right, Ducktape, I hear you pecked at Aceto, and that’s not cool. I don’t mean to be a dick, but he’s literally your only friend, and you may want to ask yourself why that is.”
“Are you talking to a duck?” Graham entered the room when I wasn’t looking. He was walking towards me, but he starts backing away and holding his hand over the lower half of his face.
“The duck needed talking to.” I squint at him. “What are you doing?”
“Whatever you’ve got, I’m afraid it’s contagious. Some kind of brain-eating amoeba, maybe?”
“A brain eating amoeba wouldn’t be airborne and your hand isn’t a facemask.”
He backs away even further, but drops his hand. “You left here in April a normal human – well, at least a human who didn’t think he was Doctor Doolittle. And now you’re on a video phone giving counseling to a duck.” He’s backed away until he’s in the doorway.
“Graham? Donovan? What is this about brain-eating amoebas? And you’re speaking to a duck?” Constantine’s voice booms from the computer screen that we have set up facing the conference table.
I start and swivel around in horror. Constantine has showed up to the video call early. His sons stand next to him, looking puzzled. The look that Graham gives me from across the room makes me want to dig a hole in the ground and bury myself in it.
“Nothing, sir! Just a little best-friend humor here.” I bark out a loud, hearty laugh that sounds faker than a 1970s laugh track.
He scowls at me skeptically. “I must not understand the American humor.” He glances at his sons. “Was that funny? Am I missing something?”
They shake their heads in puzzlement and answer him in Greek. I am confident that they’re not taking my side.
Constantine harumphs, clearing his throat loudly. “Maybe the brain amoeba explains why I never got the final figures from your proposal.”
Graham shoots me a look of utter horror. He sent me the proposal to review, and I was supposed to forward it to Constantine. No, I did forward it to Constantine. I know I did.
Right after a huge shouting match with my parents over Jamie and Sienna. My mother tried to give me an ultimatum that I insist that Sienna fire Jamie. She told me I needed to make it clear to Sienna that if she didn’t fire her, I’d break up with her. But, at the same time, of course, Sienna would need to continue to play her part as my wife until the property deal went through. I responded to my mother in an uncharacteristically snappish tone of voice, which made her cry, which made me feel like the biggest asshole in the Solar System, and then my father got on the phone and yelled at me.
So yeah, I was distracted, but I definitely sent that email.
“Constantine, I don’t mean to contradict you, but I swear to you I sent it.”
“Everything that you send me has a read receipt. Go and check it.” His tone is grim. “I’ll wait. If