Huge Deal - Lauren Layne Page 0,55
you back,” Kennedy replied.
Kate risked another glance his way. She’d been expecting sarcasm—or more likely irritation—at the fact that she hadn’t returned a single one of his texts. Instead, his tone was casual but genuine. Not quite indifferent, but he also hardly looked like a man who’d been losing sleep over her radio silence.
Had he even noticed?
“So what’s up?” Matt said, gesturing for Kate to sit in one of his two guest chairs. She did, mostly because Ian and Kennedy towered above her whether she was sitting or standing. Might as well be comfortable.
“So, Christian,” she said. “You guys said he’s been great.”
“Sure,” Matt said with a quick glance over at Ian, then Kennedy.
“Good. Facilities is coming up this afternoon to install a new desk for him.”
“Uh. What?”
“There’s plenty of room,” she said. “The space is meant to fit desks for three people.”
“I don’t think the space is the question,” Ian said slowly. “And I’ll preface this by saying we’ll support whatever you want, whatever you need, but do you plan on Christian sticking around for longer than a day or two of transition?”
Kate had expected this to be harder, but with the moment upon her, she felt more confident than ever that she was making the right decision. Still, she chose her words carefully. “You know I love working here. For all of you. It’s been the biggest part of my life for so long, and I wouldn’t change a single thing about the past few years.”
“But?” Matt asked.
“But,” she continued, increasingly aware that Kennedy hadn’t said a word since she started talking but not brave enough to glance his way. “It’s a lot. Working for all three of you. Three schedules, three sets of clients, three inboxes, three sets of demands. Plus being the point person for many of the other admins.”
“It’s too much,” Ian said quietly. Not a question. “It would be for anyone.”
Kate glanced at him in relief. “It’s more than I want right now. I can’t stress how much I’ve loved it, but losing Dad . . .” She looked down at her hands and swallowed the lump in her throat. “Life is so short. You think you have time to do all of the things, and then—”
“What sorts of things?” Kennedy asked, speaking up for the first time.
“What?” She glanced at him and found him watching her with an unreadable mask.
“You want to work less so you have more time to do other things. I was just curious what sorts of things.”
“Oh. Right. I don’t really know,” she said, tearing her gaze away. “I’ve just realized that for the past six years, I’ve had sort of a single-minded focus on work.”
And you, she thought, deliberately not glancing at Kennedy.
But how did you tell someone—even friends—that you’d realized it was time to stop caring so much about a few things and instead wanted to care a little about a lot of things? That way, if fate rolled the dice to take one of those things away from you, it wouldn’t hurt so damn badly.
“I think maybe it’s time to develop some hobbies,” she added. “Or, I don’t know, work out. Yoga? Barre?”
“What the hell is barre?” Matt asked.
“A ballet-based workout,” Ian explained. “They have classes, lots of stretching and balance. You get toned as shit.”
All three of them stared at him.
Ian shrugged. “Lara does it. It’s made her ass absolutely—” He cleared his throat. “Anyway.”
“Gross,” Kate said. “But yeah, I’d forgotten Lara did barre. Maybe I’ll tag along to her next class.”
“Okay, I’m loving this plan,” Matt said, sitting forward and folding his hands on his desk. “Just tell us what you need from us. You want to cut back? Part-time? Hire Christian as your assistant and have you delegate?”
“I thought about both of those, and they could work, but everything around here happens so fast. By the time I figured out what to delegate to Christian and got an extra few minutes to fill him in on the details, it’d probably already be too late. What makes me so good at my job—and yes, I know I am, thank you very much—is that I know everything that’s going on in every area of your lives. I’m good at managing your calendars, because I know when your individual clients are going through a divorce or when one of you is hungover. I’m good with reservations, because I know that if I booked you at Keens on Tuesday, I shouldn’t send you to Wolfgang’s on Wednesday.