The Guy Next Door (Forbidden Love Book 1)

by Kelly Myers

I shrugged. “So fix it.”

  “I don’t know what it is. Allison can’t identify it but says it’s there. Tony says it’s impeding one of the command sequences.”

  I blinked up at him. This was the kind of thing that, had upper management stood behind us over this whole “Make It Happen” directive, we could have avoided. We would have had the time to locate the error and get the code cleaned up. If they had given me the budget to hire another programmer, we could have had them go over this stuff with a fine-toothed comb.

  We were behind, and I had nowhere to pull the extra hours from. I didn’t have a magic hat or a time machine.

  “What do you want me to do about it?” I leveled a dead stare at him. His whining wasn’t helping anything.

  He rustled the papers at me.

  I refused to reach out for them.

  “You need to proof this. You said you had programming experience. Well, prove it.” He slammed the documents onto my desk.

  I stood and picked up the stack of code. I tried to hand it back to him. “This is still your job.” I shook the pages at him.

  He lifted his hands in a ‘won’t touch that’ gesture and took a step back.

  “It’s out of my hands now,” he sneered at me and walked away. “I have other command structures to clean up.”

  “Greg!” I stormed after him. “How do you know it’s in this block of code and not the OS? How long have you known about this?”

  “Ask Tony, he’s the one who gave it to Allison. I’m done talking to you about this Queen Crystal. Get another one of your flunkies to work on it.”

  I stopped chasing after him. If this came from Tony via Allison, that meant they had known about it for a day or two, a week maybe. “You are so childish. This is not how you ask for help.”

  I stood there seething. This team, which had hit it out of the park on the first phase of the application, was starting to cave under the pressure.

  I caught a glimpse of Zack as he and several important-looking people in suits walked past the cubicles on the other side of the room.

  “Look up,” I willed at him. I could really use a hug and support right now. I’d take a nod, a half-smile.

  I needed something to drink before I dealt with this code issue. Returning to my cube, I attempted to take a drink. My stupid water bottle was empty. I dropped the stack of code onto my desk and headed to the break room for a refill.

  “I totally think your skin looks better,” one of the women seated at the small break room table was saying. “My hormones hated me. I had zits like a teenager.”

  “Oh, I hope not. I’m already showing, that’s bad enough. I don’t want to look like some pregnant teenager,” a different woman said.

  I cast quick glances at the one who said she was already showing. Did she mean she was pregnant?

  “I wore my husband’s shirts over my baby bump. It was months before anyone realized I was expecting,” the first woman chirped.

  “Lucky. I’m already in maternity jeans and I’m not even three months along.”

  I tried to walk calmly out of the break room, and then I dashed to the bathroom. I stood in front of the big mirror. Did I look any different? Has my skin changed? I smoothed my dress over my belly and my hips. I was already round everywhere. At what point would my pudge become a baby bump?

  17

  Zack

  I felt like announcing my entrance into Crystal’s apartment with a cheesy, “Honey, I’m home.” The thought didn’t slam into me like a sledgehammer but brought with it an all-encompassing feeling of rightness. Home and Crystal, yeah, that was good.

  I had bags of aromatic spicy take-out for dinner. I unloaded our dinner onto the kitchen counter. I had to shove aside a bag of the dill pickle-flavored chips she had been constantly munching on recently.

  “Crystal, I got dinner. You like Thai right?”

  She staggered out from the back of her apartment, fingers pressed to her lips.

  “Darling, are you okay? You look gray around the edges.” I was by her side and guiding her to the couch.

  “Sick again? Are you sure it’s not those chips?”

  Her eyes would have blazed at me if she had the energy. Instead, she looked defeated.

  “You need to slow down at work. It’s taking a toll.” I sat next to her.

  She shook her head.

  “No, listen to me,” I started.

  “You have just as much experience with any of this as I do,” she talked over me. “Zack, I don’t know how I’m supposed to handle all of this,” she sounded like she was going to cry.

  “I can help. Let me.”

  “I’m just going to get more tired.” She leaned into my shoulder.

  I stroked her arm. I didn’t know how to soothe her, how to make it better. “I’m here for you.”

  She sighed. “Yeah, but are you going to be here when…” she swallowed.

  I hated that this was hard for her. I hated there was nothing I could do but hold her.

  “Are you going to still be here when I’m not sleeping through the night? You already don’t stay with me. And what happens when everything starts to swell up? Are you going to stay with me when I get fat and bloated?” She sniffed.

  I leaned over and kissed the tears from her cheeks. I wanted to give her so much. “I’m here now, and I plan on sticking around.”

  Her hands flopped up and fell back to her lap. “What am I supposed to do when I have to take time off?”

  “If you could at least tell HR. They could make accommodations for your illness.”

  She held up her hand in a stop gesture. “Can we stop calling it an illness?”

  I sighed, “Your situation. Crystal, if you don’t tell me what’s wrong I won’t know what exactly is going with you, and what I need you to help with. All I know is on the nights I do get to see you, you are so worn out from work you can barely stay awake through dinner. And half the time you don’t finish eating, and the other half you’re running off to puke.”

  “That’s a fun side effect.” The sarcasm was thick in her tone.

  “I got some lemongrass soup and satay sticks. You think you’ll be okay eating those?”

  I returned to the kitchen to finish assembling our dinner, and pour her soup into a bowl.

  “They sold this property,” I mentioned.

  “I know. I have to find a new place to live.” She sounded dejected.

  “I was thinking, we could look for a place together.”

  She snorted. “Like that’s going to fly with company policy.”

  “I’ve been thinking,” I said as I brought over the tableware we would need. “I want to take care of you. No matter what this thing is that you have. We can figure it out together. You don’t have to be alone. We can get a bigger place, two bedrooms. There are some great townhouses out there with two master suites, each with their own bathroom. We could officially be roommates.”

  “Officially roommates, with our own bedrooms if anyone decided they needed to come to check up on us? Will I need a fake boyfriend? How do you want me to act around any of your fake dates?” she asked tersely.

  “No more fake dates for me. But, yeah, we can have our own space if that’s what you want. We could set up a home office.” With a home office, she could work when she felt well enough. She could move in with me, and I would help her find a new position at another company. One that would work better for her new limitations, whatever those might be. Even if I could get the board to back off the whole dating a coworker mandate, Shingle Click wasn’t a work environment conducive to supporting employees with chronic illness. Working from home was an exception, not a rule.

  Crystal needed a situation where she could work from home. I could support us both, but she wasn’t the kind of woman to let me coddle her. She was a tenacious fighter.

  I set dinner down before joining her on the couch. I watched as she nibbled on a skewered chicken piece. I opened my mouth to fill her in on all my thoughts.

/>   “I have to move before you do,” she announced.

  “When is your lease up?” I knew she had been here longer than I had. I expected her to need to be out a month or two before my lease was up.

  She made a ’stay put’ gesture and got up. She moved slowly and my heart lurched. I wanted her to not get hurt. She shuffled through a stack of papers on the bookshelf next to the door. She held out a folded sheet of paper to me as she sat back down.

  In the middle of the page was an angry red X indicating that her lease was being terminated early. She needed to be out so the new owners could begin demolition.

  “They’re going to level this building because of extensive termite damage. I have until the end of next month.”

  “Next month is two days away,” I said like a moron.

  “Exactly.”

  “Fuck me.” I rubbed my thumb into my eyebrow. If I helped her to find a new apartment, then I would see even less of her. If she moved in with me, there was no ploy of fake roommates.

  I didn’t want to be fake roommates with her. I wanted to have her in my arms, in my bed, and to be able to spend the entire night together. She was going to need me.

  I pulled her to me and pressed kisses to the top of her head. I wished she would tell me. But I understood not wanting to announce anything until she was certain.

  “Do you have specialists lined up yet?” I asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “Will you tell me after that? I could take you to those appointments so you don’t have to go alone.”

  She pushed out of my embrace and swiped at a tear on her cheek. “When it gets to that point Zack, I would really like for you to come with me. And I will tell you. Right now I have to focus on finding a new place to live. And moving, and all the crap with work.”

  I lifted my brows at her. She was the one who said no work talk. She usually brought her work concerns directly to me, but I hadn’t been at the office very often lately.

  “Right, I know, no work talk. It’s the stress. And stress isn’t good—”

  “Stress isn’t good for you. I can’t help the way you would like regarding work. I know it’s tough right now. But I can take one worry off your plate. You are going to move in with me. Fuck work. I can ask Mike to help move your furniture across the hall.”

  “Mike! That’s his name,” she practically laughed.

  “What?”

  “Mike, in the front unit. I could not think of his name the other day. Oh, I feel so stupid.” She smiled at me. It was the kind of smile that was more pity than happy.

  “I can’t live with you, Zack. Work. Our jobs will be at risk. I can’t ask you to do that for me.”

  “You aren’t asking. Let me handle work. I’m not worried about my job. If it makes you feel any better, we can tell people it’s a temporary measure while you look for a new place. You are stuck between a rock and a hard place. I’m your friendly neighbor coming to the rescue.”

  “Really?” She blinked back more tears.

  This woman was trying to gut me. I reached out and trailed my thumb under her eye. “Don’t cry, Darling. I will take care of you.”

  Her arms were around me and her sweet lips crushed to mine. Her lips fluttered over my face like butterflies. I eased back. I brushed her hair from her face and held her. Her honey gold eyes searched my face. Tendrils of her brown hair twisted between my fingers. I loved her.

  Our lips found each other. If this was how she needed my support at the moment, who was I to argue?

  18

  Crystal

  In a few weeks, Zack was going to move me into his apartment. I needed to tell him. I couldn’t live with him and not let him know. He would notice when I didn’t have a period. I needed to tell him so he would stop treating me like I was dying. I wasn’t dying. I was pregnant and scared.

  I needed to tell him before he moved my furniture.

  Thoughts ping-ponged through my brain as I made my way into work. I still needed to find that specialist that Zack knew I needed. He just didn’t know what kind of specialist I needed. How the hell did I find a baby doctor?

  My stomach sank when I saw Greg sitting at my desk, waiting for me.

  I girded my mental loins. “Morning Greg, can I come find you after I get a moment to get settled?”

  “Oh no,” he templed his fingers together. “I found out a little secret, Crystal Queen.”

  He had replaced ‘scum’ with ‘queen.’ Of course, how could that word ever be misconstrued as an insult. He was safe from my pond scum tally list.

  I leveled the flattest dead stare at him as I could muster. My insides were dancing around. I had a few too many secrets, was there any way he had found out any of them?

  “What?”

  He leaned forward menacingly. “Wouldn’t you like to know? Have you gained weight? Stress getting to you?”

  “Greg,” I growled.

  “I’m only concerned about your health. Wouldn’t want you to have a stroke or choke on a sandwich because of stress.”

  He thrust to his feet and loomed over me before stepping out of my cube.

  What the hell was wrong with that man? Why was he talking about my weight? I wasn’t showing yet. I know my clothes were feeling snug, but they still looked okay.

  That was it. The last straw, I couldn’t work with him anymore. If I quit working at Shingle Click then I could openly date Zack, and I would remove myself from the temptation of putting superglue all over Greg’s chair.

  “Morning Crystal,” Tony grunted as he passed my cube.

  Damn, I couldn’t leave the team in the lurch just because I didn’t like Greg. Of course, I could map out everything they needed to implement and when. I was a glorified calendar minder. I could simply provide a very detailed calendar, and they could get someone else to read it for them.

  I could. I bit my lip.

  Zack was out on business trips enough that I could take that home as a project and work on it on the nights I knew I would be alone.

  Zack had connections, and with his reference, he could help me find a job even if I was pregnant. I was barely pregnant. There was time I could give to a new job before going on maternity leave.

  This could work. Zack said he wanted to help, well this would help. Now that I didn’t have to focus on finding a new apartment.

  I tucked my bag into its drawer, pulled up the team chat, the corporate messenger, and my master spreadsheet. I could catch up on all the messages once I had coffee in hand. I stopped by Tony’s cubicle on my way to the break room. I needed to cut back on the caffeine.

  “Hi Tony,” I said. “What’s the problem child got up his sleeve?”

  Tony started to choke on his coffee. “Are you okay?”

  “I can’t believe you called Greg that. I mean we all know you must hate him, but you are always so professional.”

  “I see you knew exactly who I meant.”

  “He thinks you used your feminine wiles on Zack to get us some extra time,” he said.

  “But we aren’t getting any extra time. I keep getting turned down. What makes him think that?”

  “Last night, Zack sent out a message after you left. We have an extra week. It’s not much. But it will help.”

  “Damn. I should thank him.” Anything for an excuse to see Zack during the workday.

  I got a cup of decaf. I can’t say I was impressed, but it was hot and it tasted mostly the same. I returned to my desk and began catching up on all the messages.

  My eyes dragged over the words on Zack’s message. I read, and re-read it. Tony was right. We had an extra week for “Make It Happen.”

  I could almost do that. The next several hours were spent reworking the schedule for the next few days. I needed more time to revise the whole thing based on the new deadline. There was the potential that this could happen without working the programmers to death.

  I shot an email to the operating system group. We were in the middle of integration on a new product.
The extra week helped them out as well. New product first, and then the integration through a system upgrade for existing units. Using the excuse of having to rebuild the schedule with the new deadline, I spent extra time and built out a more comprehensive plan.

  An extra week did not solve all of my problems, I was still secretly seeing the CEO of this company and I wanted that to no longer be a secret. I was quitting, but I wasn’t going to leave Tony, Allison, or Armand in the lurch. Greg could slow roast on a spit for all I cared.

  It was dark out when I looked up from my work. I had been so focused, I hadn’t realized how fast the hours flew by.

  On my way out, I decided to check and see if Zack was around. It was a shot in the dark, but he had been working late a lot. There was nothing wrong with us leaving the building at the same time. We could even walk to the same train stop without any judgment. Besides, I wanted to tell him my plan about the job. And then, if I was feeling brave enough, I could let it slip he was going to be a father.

  The second floor was mostly dark. Lights came from the executive offices. Odds were good one of those offices was Zack’s. My heart skipped a beat when I noticed his office door slightly open and the lights on.

  A booming voice I recognized as belonging to George Fredrickson, President of the Board, came from the office. My stomach sank. I did not like that man. I turned to leave. I could tell Zack my brilliant idea later. I did not want to see Mr. Fredrickson and feel forced to smile at any of his platitudes.

  “Uncle George.” Zack’s voice was clear and sharp and calling that man ‘Uncle.’

  I had to hide my affection for Zack because of some stupid rule about fraternization and nepotism, and his uncle was President of the Board? My blood started to simmer with the heat of indignation. I leaned against the wall just past the door to listen. How deep did this hypocrisy go?

  “Who on staff are you fucking? Craig told me something is going on between you and that woman,” Mr. Fredrickson said.

  Craig? I didn’t know any Craigs at work, but I didn’t know everyone who worked here. Could he possibly mean Greg?