How to Have Your Boss's Secret Baby - London Casey Page 0,15
had been through hell and back in life and was still standing.
“How’s Eddie?” I asked.
“The same as always,” Jen said. “The kid loves trouble.”
“Like his father,” Connie said.
I cringed.
“He better figure that out fast,” Jen said. “Or else he’ll be mooching off ugly women so he could fuck younger women…”
“Still not a good thing?” I asked.
“It never will be,” Jen said. “Big Ed will never change. Last I heard, he was in California. Trying to take up professional surfing.”
“At his age?” Connie asked.
Jen laughed. “Not my problem. I do feel bad for Eddie. All I can do is be there for him.”
“Oh, I forgot to tell you,” Connie said to me. “Brooke won a poetry contest.”
“Really?” I asked.
“Yeah. I forgot to bring the poem with me. It was… something with trees and clouds? No. It was…”
Connie trailed off thinking.
My phone vibrated in my pocket.
I ignored it.
Then it vibrated again. And again.
“So, what have you been writing?” Jen asked. “Are you quitting that terrible job yet?”
“I hope to soon,” I said. “I can’t even tell you how…”
My phone went off again. And again.
I leaned back and dug my phone out of my bag.
It was Cole.
Text after text after text.
Telling me I needed to get to the office.
There was an emergency.
I knew Cole’s emergencies.
Then again… maybe something really was wrong.
“Is that the asshole boss now?” Jen asked.
“Yup,” I said. “He needs me to come to the office.”
“Right now?” Connie asked.
I looked at them and nodded. “Right now.”
“Are you going to go?” Jen asked. “I would tell him to fuck off.”
“If I do that, I’m out of a job,” I said.
“You know, Goofville does have internet…”
Jen blinked fast to drive her point home.
We always called it Goofville instead of Goodville because one night on a dare, Danny Drevlin painted an f over the d on all the signs in town.
He was such an idiot.
He was drunk at sixteen, walking around with a can of red paint and a paintbrush. It took the cops ten minutes to find him.
I knew what Jen meant.
I didn’t need to live in the city to write.
Slowly, I stood up. “I’m sorry…”
“Go do your thing,” Connie said. “We’re fine. We had fun today, right?”
“Yeah,” I said. “It was good to see you two.”
Connie still had that girlish look to herself. Her blue eyes and pudgy cheeks. Even after two kids, she kept a youthful glow. As far as Jen went, her eyes were hazel, her hair dark, and her resting bitch face perfected. She had always been rough and tough.
The three of us grew up as best friends.
Connie wanted to be a painter. I wanted to be a writer. Jen wanted to marry a rock star.
None of that really worked out. For all three of us.
In some sad sense, I was the closest to my dream.
Then again, was I?
I hugged them both as Cole continued to text me.
I ran out of the coffeeshop and growled at my phone when I texted him back that I was on my way.
The only thing that comforted me was dreaming of someday quitting my job.
“Hope I wasn’t interrupting you,” Cole said.
“Actually…”
I shook my head. It wasn’t worth it. At all.
Cole pointed to his office. “Follow me.”
“Your office? Am I getting fired? If so, just do it.”
“You’re not getting fired, Maya,” Cole said. “Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“Will you just get into my office?”
“There’s not a half-naked woman in there, is there?”
“No,” Cole said. “She left ten minutes ago.”
I hate you. I fucking hate you, Cole.
“You really hate me, don’t you?” Cole asked.
“Nope,” I said.
I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of thinking I hated him.
Cole walked toward his massive desk in his massive office.
Behind him, through the windows, the other buildings looked like the perfect backdrop for Cole. The way he stood with his hands touching his hips. Staring at me. Actually… the way he was staring…
“I’ve been thinking about something,” he said. “I was debating asking or telling you.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’re going to get some overtime, Maya. Some really good overtime. How would you like to clock in and stay clocked in?”
“What?”
“I’m thinking… forty-eight hours. We won’t be gone that long, but just to be safe…”
“Gone?”
Cole picked up a folder off his desk. “Mr. Pickle. He wants me to join him at his cabin in the woods.”
“Sounds kinky,” I said.
Cole smiled. “I really pissed you off by bringing you in, didn’t I?”
“You tell me, Cole?”
“You know, I liked it better when you first started, you weren’t so mouthy.”