Hot Boss

by Anne Marsh

  When we file out, Hazel nudges my arm. “There’s an after-party.”

  “You think that’s where they’ll head?”

  “I’m certain of it.” She smiles at me, her fingers grabbing mine so she can lead me through the crowd. “I overheard Molly talking to another rider’s girlfriend in the bathroom. Plus, he placed third. He’ll have sponsors to talk to, people to schmooze.”

  The crowd’s large and some of the cowboys have drunk their weight in beer. After the third time someone bumps into Hazel, I pull my hand free and wrap my arm around her shoulders instead. People think twice about bodychecking someone my size and it’s a good excuse to touch her.

  Naturally, the after-party isn’t being held in the same place as the rodeo. We walk down the Strip for a quarter mile in companionable silence.

  “Pit stop.” Hazel yanks on my arm.

  Obediently, I slow to a halt. “What’s up?”

  “We totally need to try those.”

  I follow her pointing finger. Those are Day-Glo margaritas in three-foot-high containers that look suspiciously like bongs and that can be obtained from a bar that’s steps from the Strip, apparently serviced by a bevy of bikini-clad, boot-wearing, feathered mermaids. Hazel steers me past the neon statues of deep-sea ladies and five minutes later we’re officially armed and dangerous. I take an exploratory sip of my pink to-go margarita as we walk. It’s more mix than tequila, which bodes well for our ability to make it to the after-party.

  Hazel slurps enthusiastically. Hers is green and she ordered triple shots. “Are you sure Evan’s trouble? He’s obviously good at his job and people seem to like him.”

  Sadly, she’s right. Still, I go with the obvious counterpoint. “She hasn’t known him long.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Hazel sucks an impressive amount of margarita through her straw.

  “Words, Hazel.”

  She swallows a mouthful of lime-green slushy. “Well, assuming that she met Evan after she moved out and filed for divorce—”

  “Of course she did,” I growl. Molly’s neither a cheater nor a liar.

  Hazel pats my arm. “Then she’s had a little over a year and a half to have met him.”

  “She could have met him last week.”

  “Or last year.” Hazel salutes me with her margarita.

  I force myself to nod. I’m aware that coming to Vegas is at best illogical. At worst, it’s probably a misdemeanor. Clearly, Hazel is also aware of this because she goes right there.

  “Why are you here?” She waves a hand around us. She’s a lightweight when it comes to alcohol. Usually she avoids it at business dinners or I drink it for her. “If you want to reconcile with Molly, stalking isn’t going to help your case.”

  Naturally, I double down on my stupidity. “I want to make sure she’s okay.”

  “You’re such a white knight! Always rushing to the rescue. Why can’t she rescue herself? Why do you have to do everything?”

  Hazel sucks fiercely on her margarita.

  I try not to remember the way her mouth feels on my dick.

  “I made promises.” Wow. That sounds lame, even to me. “A judge can’t just wipe those away with a stroke of his pen.”

  I’m not sure if actual pen and ink was involved in our divorce. The whole thing was handled by our lawyers and I never even had to go to court. The last time I saw Molly was at our mediation appointment. Hazel would have been horrified, because I agreed to everything Molly asked for. I try not to think too much about the fact that she asked for almost nothing. She didn’t want money or our house or even most of our things. Just enough for a fresh start and a new life, one without me. It feels distant now and like a whole different life, as if somewhere out there is a happy Jack and Molly, married, making babies, carrying on toward happily-ever-after.

  “Do you believe in parallel universes?”

  “A multiverse?” Hazel pulls thoughtfully on her straw.

  “Maybe there are multiple universes out there.” I rest my palm against the small of her back, nudging her toward the crosswalk. The light’s red, so we come to a halt, surrounded by a crowd of other pedestrians. “And there’s a different version of reality in each one, right? One where Molly and I never met, one where we split up, one where we reconciled. Hundreds and hundreds of different endings.”

  “One where we never met or never had sex,” Hazel says. “One where there’s not this thing between us.”

  As usual, she takes me by surprise. Even after all our years working together, I’m constantly amazed by the directions that her brain goes. It’s part of what makes her such a brilliant venture capitalist, though, because she sees connections and outcomes the rest of us don’t or can’t.

  I try not to think about a universe where I never meet Hazel. Naked, warm, wide-open Hazel—her hands tugging me down until I’m at her favorite angle. God, she has so many preferences. Directions. Pointed suggestions. I never have to wonder if Hazel’s enjoying herself in bed. The words just pour out of her, throaty moans, half-spoken commands, the bite of her nails underscoring the moment when I do something she really, really likes. She talks and talks and talks the whole time we’re having sex, and I fucking love it.

  “I think,” she muses, clearly chasing down a thought, “that you need to decide which universe you’d choose to be in right now. If you had a choice or magic universe-hopping skills. Life’s not a flip book, Jack. Eventually you have to pick one page. One place.”

  She shrugs and returns her attention to her margarita. The light changes and people flood the crosswalk. It’s like a swarm of drunken salmon all battling to swim in opposite directions. I grunt and wrap an arm around Hazel when someone smashes his shoulder into her. I don’t want her to get hurt, not ever.

  “I know.” I squeeze her shoulders gently, and not just because we’ve barely made it to the other side of the street unscathed. “But I just need to make sure that Molly’s okay, that she’s safe with this guy.”

  “White knight,” Hazel says. “You’re the guy who marches into battle glued to the back of his horse.”

  “So?”

  There’s nothing wrong with wanting to look out for the people in your life. It’s good to care, to be loyal.

  “So maybe it’s not an accident Molly picked a guy who gets thrown off horses for a living.”

  “Sticking is better.”

  Hazel makes a noncommittal sound and applies herself to her margarita. It’s pretty clear what her position is on white-knighting. I mean, I know we’re not that kind of thing. We’re friends and partners. We’re fun and we’re each other’s benefit. But we’re not a couple, not for real. We’re not in a relationship and I don’t get to ride through her life, tilting at her monsters.

  “Do you still love her?” Hazel laces her fingers through mine as she talks, tugging me toward the casino’s entrance.

  I don’t know what to say. I don’t love love Molly—not anymore and maybe not for a long time. Feelings aren’t something I’m good at, if we’re being honest. For all the effort I put in with Molly, I still didn’t get it right. Rather than holding on like a cowboy, I went flying off and bit the ground.

  “Jack?”

  “No.” I try it out and realize it’s true. I have affection and regret, fondness and memories, but the bigger feelings are gone. Or more accurately, they’ve been redirected when I wasn’t looking.

  Maybe those parallel universes can overlap this one; maybe one small sidestep and bam, you’re in unfamiliar familiar territory. Because there seems to be some alien place that I’ve just stumbled into, and it’s a place where maybe I have feelings for Hazel. Not love, not that way, not yet, but there’s more than a seed of something sprouting in my chest.

  * * *

  It turns out the rodeo after-party is open to anyone, so we don’t have to sneak, bribe or buy our way in. Hazel’s visi
bly disappointed. I’m not sure what her plan was. In addition to multiple cash bars, there’s a country band performing up onstage.

  And dancing.

  Lots and lots of dancing. Hundreds of would-be cowboys and cowgirls strut their stuff, boots thumping in rhythm, hands clapping. It takes me less than a minute to spot Molly and Evan in the thick of the dancing. He twirls her in a circle, one arm wrapped around her waist, the other holding her hand. He’s a cocky bastard, loose-limbed, confident. The asshole definitely knows what he’s doing out there. You’d never guess he got tossed off a horse an hour ago.

  “That’s not a waltz,” Hazel hisses. Her elbow digs into my side.

  “Agreed.” I’m not entirely sure what that particular dance number is called, although I’m clearly in the minority there. Everyone else on the dance floor is moving more or less together, heels tapping, hands clapping in bizarre synchronicity.

  “I only know how to wedding waltz.”

  “We’ll figure it out. Let’s go.”

  Hazel has multiple sisters, all of whom I’ve watched get married. Honestly, I’m sort of a surrogate big brother for them. Not for Hazel, obviously—that would be gross—but I’ve pinch-hit as an usher, scooped up drunken bridesmaids and given my opinion on cakes, dresses and flowers. And, yes, waltzing was involved.

  “Jack.” She whips out her phone and starts googling. “That’s not a waltz. So I. Don’t. Know. How. To. Do. It.”

  Hazel’s fingers fly across the screen and I tilt my head so I can see her search results. “We’re going to learn to dance by watching YouTube? Before they shut this party down?”

  “Yes! Maybe.”

  Hazel angry-glares at the screen, where a cowboy and cowgirl are dancing up a storm. She slows down the video. Rewinds. I don’t think there’s enough time to execute this particular plan.

  I pluck the phone out of her hand and shove it in my back pocket. “We’ll improvise. Or copy the people next to us. Come on.”

  “I’m going to suck, Jack,” she growls. “You’ll rock this. It’s practically a sport. I, however, am going to look like an uncoordinated idiot and I don’t want to. You always have a plan—make one up now. A good one,” she adds.

  I watch the dancers for a second. It doesn’t look like rocket science. “Come on. Wing it with me.”

  “Jack. No.”

  “Trust me.”

  I grab her hand and tow her out onto the dance floor. Based on where we start and what seem to be the rules of this particular dance, we should intersect with Evan and Molly shortly.

  I come to several conclusions in the next five minutes. First, Hazel is a bad two-stepper. Second, I’m even worse. Third, cowboys are really good sports. We bumble our way through the steps, careening around our line. We’re still laughing when I twirl Hazel around and come face-to-face with Molly. Okay. Face-to-top-of-her-head. She’s laughing, too, pulling Evan closer, and then she looks up and spies me.

  Yeah. The laughter vanishes from her face.

  “Can we talk?”

  She leans up and says something to Evan that I don’t catch. He nods, then he’s holding his hand out to Hazel. Somehow I always thought partner swapping would be sexier. I lead Molly off the dance floor because I’m not having this conversation in front of an audience. The bar seems by far the better choice.

  “Why are you here, Jack?”

  “I love Vegas.”

  “You hate Vegas,” she counters.

  Not true, although it’s not my favorite place.

  “People change.” I shrug. “You did, so why can’t I?”

  Of all the ways I’ve planned this meeting, line dancing wasn’t one of the steps. I’d expected our reunion to be awkward, but surprisingly it isn’t. It’s more like running into someone from college that you used to spend time with. They’re part of your past and you can’t help but pick over the memories, reliving the fun ones, the parts that you enjoyed. But we’ve both moved on. And if I’m being honest, we’d both moved on long before we got around to filing for divorce. We’re not the same people we were when we got married, and I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.

  I study Molly while I flag down a bartender and order drinks. She looks different. Gorgeous. Stunningly beautiful in a quiet Madonna way. But that’s not new. It’s something about the way she holds herself or maybe in how she watched the rest of us. As corny as it is, she knows who she is and what she wants. Which is a cowboy, my brain reminds me. Your replacement.

  Out on the dance floor, Evan is valiantly trying to teach Hazel the two-step. She’s game and laughing, but her results are subpar. It must be driving her crazy.

  “So.” I hand Molly her drink. “A cowboy?”

  “So,” she counters. “You and Hazel?”

  “We’re just friends.”

  She shrugs. “If you say so.”

  That’s not what she means.

  “I never cheated on you. And certainly not with Hazel.”

  “I know that.” Molly takes a sip of her wine. “You were always fair.”

  Divorce has not granted me the super mind-reading powers that I lacked during our marriage. I still have no idea what Molly is thinking. It’s beyond frustrating. I scrub my hand over my head, looking for the words I know I won’t find.

  “Why did we break up?”

  “Because we were happy together until we weren’t. Because we didn’t work anymore. Because people change. Because we each made choices about what we’d do with our lives or who our friends would be or what we’d share.”

  Or not share, I think. But I don’t say anything and Molly finishes her thought.

  “And I couldn’t fix us but I could fix me. I didn’t handle the end well.” She puts her glass down and meets my eyes. “I’m sorry.”

  “Are you happy?”

  I’m talking about feelings. Shoot me.

  “Yes.” A smile curves her mouth.

  “With a cowboy?”

  She nods. Her eyes watch that cowboy. For a moment, I remember when she used to look at me that way, but then I let it go.

  Evan’s given up trying to teach Hazel the moves and is now attempting to limit the swathe of destruction she’s carving through the neat, orderly line of dancers. He’s grinning, though. My Zee has that effect on people.

  I review what I’ve learned tonight, starting with the sad truth that apparently I’m an enormous jackass. Okay. I can live with that. I’m still running a full background check on Evan as if he’s a candidate I’m thinking about bringing in and pitching to the board.

  The management team makes or breaks a company. Sure, you need great people everywhere, and you should never overlook the guy or gal who’s making the widgets or cleaning the kitchen. Those people count and shit doesn’t get done without them. But you also need leaders, and sometimes people get so busy name-calling and screaming about the compensation package that they don’t see what a CEO can bring to the table. Football games don’t get won without a quarterback. You need everyone in that stadium—the people who buy the tickets, the guy hawking hot dogs, the engineer who makes the scoreboard run—but it’s the quarterback who brings everyone together. The focus. The lightning rod. The guy reacting and putting years of training and practice into play. You can’t cut corners on that guy—so I’m going to make sure Evan’s everything he should be.

  “There’s nothing wrong with being friends,” Molly says quietly as Zee and Evan abandon the dance floor and head toward us. “But there’s nothing wrong with taking a chance on being more, Jack.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  HAZEL’S UNCHARACTERISTICALLY QUIET after we leave Evan and Molly. It’s not immediately obvious—even at three in the morning, the Strip is a loud place—but I know better than to expect silence from her. Hazel always has something to say. I take her hand, pulling her into my side. The sidewalks are still cro
wded despite the late hour. Couples stroll past us, arms around each other, but the annoying hawkers have disappeared for the night. No one offers girls or lap dances or a dozen other sexual services. Discarded nudie cards spill over the sidewalks and streets.

  We’re on the wrong side of Las Vegas Boulevard for our hotel, so I steer us toward the nearest crosswalk. The light’s not in our favor, so we wait with dozens of other revelers. It’s a noisy, half-drunk, cheerful crowd that jostles carelessly, everyone either judging their chances if they jaywalk, or jockeying for the best position to surge across the street when we get the green light. There’s an older, blue-jeans-and-matching-shirt-wearing couple, somewhere in their midsixties, in the vanguard. The guy’s rock solid, his feet planted. He throws an arm around his lady, anchoring her.

  “Six o’clock,” I say, nudging Hazel with my shoulder. “Tell me a story.”

  “Jack. Not tonight.”

  “Why not?” I brush a kiss over the top of her head. “Tired?”

  “You’re an idiot.”

  “What’s wrong?” I run through the night searching for issues, but too much has happened. The likeliest candidate for her upset is the way I handled things with Molly and her cowboy, but I need specifics before I can come up with a plan to fix things. Hazel looks up at me, but I can’t interpret the look on her face. Since nothing tonight has gone as planned, this shouldn’t surprise me.

  She pulls away from me, marching in silence by my side until we reach our villa. After I slide our card key over the lock and hold the door open so she can slip inside, she heads straight for the master bathroom, shedding things as she goes. Her jacket. Her purse. A cowboy boot. The housekeeper has been in and the bed is turned down. Chocolate mints decorate the pillows and a gold serving cart in front of the fireplace offers a choice of nightcaps. Cognac, calvados, scotch and soda—eeny, meeny, miny, moe. I wage a brief internal debate about the relative merits of adding more alcohol to the mess I’ve made of tonight and decide against it.