Coldhearted Boss

by Grey, R. S.

  According to his license, he’ll turn thirty-one this year, but that’s as much information as I can gather before I hear muffled voices out in the bar.

  Is it him? Back already?

  My heart leaps into overdrive.

  It’s now or never.

  I have to get out of here.

  I flip back to the cash and rub the bills between my fingers.

  Take it. Take it and get out.

  This money would solve your problems!

  I want it. I want that money so badly my mouth nearly salivates, but instead of taking it out and slipping it into my back pocket, I sigh and slam the wallet closed.

  In the end, I can’t do it.

  Instead of feeling proud that I’m doing the right thing, I chide myself as I walk out into the hallway. All that…for nothing. Now what am I going to do? How’s my mom going to get to her classes? How am I supposed to get to work?

  The voices I first heard in the bathroom grow louder and I relax, recognizing one of them as my cousin. I spot him leaning against the bar talking to the new bartender, asking where I am. When he sees me emerge from the hallway, he looks relieved—relieved and tired as hell. His beat-up baseball hat is tugged low on his head, nearly covering all of his ashy blond hair. His neon yellow t-shirt—his uniform at the lumber mill—is stained with sweat around the neck and arms. If this was a bad day for me, Jeremy’s probably wasn’t far behind.

  “Hey, I’ve been calling you,” he says, pushing away from the bar and straightening to stand.

  I blanche. “Sorry. I wasn’t feeling well.”

  He frowns and assesses me quickly from head to toe. Jeremy’s always been a worrier. When our lives were at the most chaotic in my high school years, he was truly the only person I had in my corner. I was there for him too, someone he could trust, someone he could talk to. We formed a tight bond.

  “Ready to go?” he asks, angling his head toward the door.

  I nod then turn to the bartender, holding up the sleek leather wallet. “That suit must have dropped this. I’m sure he’ll be back for it any second.”

  After I hand it off, I follow Jeremy out to his beat-up truck, decline the half-finished cheeseburger he tries to force on me, and don’t look back in the rearview mirror even once as we pull out onto the old country highway.

  Chapter 3

  Ethan

  Truth be told, when I make it back to my motel room and find my back pocket empty, my first reaction isn’t even anger; it’s shocked admiration. How the hell did she steal my wallet without me even noticing? That feeling doesn’t last long, though. My anger settles rightly into place by the time I make it back to the elevator. The facts are impossible to ignore: I know I had my wallet when I got up to follow her into the bathroom because I remember reaching for it before Steven insisted on closing the tab. Sure, it could have fallen out at some point between then and now (something that has never once happened before), but the other piece of evidence glaring me in the face is the fact that the brunette bombshell isn’t here right now, meeting me back at my room like she promised, ready to finish what we started in that bathroom.

  No. Of course she’s not. She never planned on meeting me here.

  She took my wallet and ran like the little thief she is.

  Rage curls my hands into fists. I can’t believe I got played like that. I can’t believe she pressed her supple body against mine and kissed me back, moaning like she was as shocked by the chemistry as I was and all the while, she was planning to rob me blind.

  I want to find her and teach her a lesson for taking advantage of me.

  I ignore the part of my conscience that tries to lay the blame at my feet. I knew something was off when I first laid eyes on her in the bar. My instincts shouted at me to leave after I’d spent half the night watching her. I’d written off the feeling, though, mistaking it as some kind of gentlemanly urge. I felt like I was taking advantage of her. She looked so fragile and helpless up there at the bar all alone, her shoulders slumped with defeat, head tilted down.

  Now, I realize it was all an act, no doubt one she’s performed a million times before considering how successfully she pulled it off. I could have sworn she was near tears at one point in the bathroom, right after I confessed that I wanted to make sure she was okay.

  Jesus Christ. I’m an idiot. I can’t believe I fell for that!

  I yank my hands through my hair. My god, she seemed so into me, into the way I was touching her, kissing her.

  This never should have happened. My partners and I are only in town for the weekend and we have a million things on our agenda. I had no business noticing the brunette when she first walked into the bar, but now I see the trap plain as day. The whole setup was arranged to tug at my heartstrings. It’s so easy to pick it apart now that I have some distance. Casting aside her femme fatale beauty, I recall her faded jeans and thin t-shirt—clothes that looked like they’d been worn and washed a hundred times before.

  She ignored all of us as she walked straight to the bar, threw herself up on a barstool, and heaved a heavy sigh. The bartender asked if she wanted anything to drink. She asked for some water but didn’t order anything after that.

  Instead, she sat, twirling her phone in her hands with her shoulders slumped over and her head bowed forward. She looked like she needed a savior, and some caveman instinct kicked on inside me, making me yearn to be that for her, even if just for one night.

  My partners had all noticed her walk in too. In fact, one of them, Grant, tried to get me to change seats with him so he’d have a better vantage point from which to watch her at the bar. I didn’t budge.

  Then, later—still not quite ready to give up—he volunteered to go up to the bar to order our next round. Not happening. I clapped my hand on his shoulder and forced him to stay in his seat, much to the amusement of our two other partners. It’s not often I make a fool of myself for a woman, if ever, but not a single one of them was surprised when they stood to leave and I opted to stay behind. They all wished me luck except for Grant, who shot me the finger and told me to go to hell.

  At the time, it made sense. No man in his right mind would want to walk out of that bar and leave that angel behind.

  No, I remind myself swiftly. She’s a lot of things—con artist, thief, liar—but she’s no angel.

  I’m seeing red as I pull open the door to the bar and stalk toward the bartender, who’s cleaning glasses.

  “Is she still here?” I ask, my voice cutting through the air with the subtlety of a sledgehammer.

  “The brunette you trailed into the bathroom?” he asks with a barely interested tone. “Nah. She left right after you did.”

  My ego takes another sucker punch at having my speculation confirmed. She never did plan on meeting me in my room.

  “Great. Well, did you happen to see my wallet clutched in her hand as she ran out of here?”

  Without a reply, he heads over to the cash register, grabs something, and then holds it up like a magician completing a trick.

  I freeze, completely baffled.

  So she didn’t steal it? It really just slipped out of my back pocket—

  No.

  Fuck.

  I haven’t even finished the thought before I tear it out of his hand, look inside, and find every bit of my cash gone. I just pulled it out of the bank this morning, and I know I had over $800 because I didn’t want to have to get cash out here in the middle of nowhere.

  I curse under my breath and the bartender shrugs, totally unperturbed by my anger.

  “Who is she?” I ask, biting out each word while my fingers curl into fists. Surely every man within a fifty-mile radius knows her name.

  “Listen, I just started here. I’ve never met her before tonight and she didn’t tell me her name. All I know is she walked out of the bathroom a few minutes after you and told me you’d dropped your wallet in the hallway.”

  “Yeah, well, she’s a fucking liar. She stole it.”

  He
shrugs as if to say, Well, what can ya do?

  Then he resumes his duties.

  “All I can say is, I hope she was worth it.”

  * * *

  I shouldn’t have told my partners what happened, Grant most of all. He won’t drop it at breakfast the next morning.

  We’re all sitting around a table in an old diner named Lonny’s. It’s the only restaurant we could find that was open early. The food is only one minuscule step up from the crap I could have gotten in the vending machine back at the motel, but their coffee is strong and, after the night I’ve had, I need it. I ask the waitress for a refill just as Grant launches back into it.

  He couldn’t look more pleased with himself if he tried. I think he’s soiled his pants.

  “You thought she was into you and then she—” He breaks off into a fit of laughter so hearty and all-consuming that his next words are complete and utter gibberish. I don’t pick up any sounds that resemble the English language until, “And then in the bathroom—” More laughter. He’s wiping his eyes now. “Took your wallet!”

  Grant is our youngest partner and the one I’m most likely to punch on a daily basis. It’s that damn baby face. If it weren’t for the fact that he keeps his blond hair buzzed short and stands close to my same height, I’d mistake him for a teenager. Our other two partners, Steven and Brad, sit quietly, sipping their coffee and keeping their attention down on the blueprints we’re supposed to be discussing. I credit their resolve to their age. Both of them are well into their 40s and married, each with a couple of kids under their belt. Then I notice the smile Brad is trying desperately to hide and that idea flies out the window. They’re all assholes. Every one of them.

  Steven nudges my shoulder. “So you got scammed—who cares? Jesus, with that face, any one of us would have fallen for it.”

  Brad agrees, and even Grant stops laughing long enough to nod along.

  He reaches across the table as if wanting to shake my hand, cocky smile in place. “Hey man, I actually owe you one. It could have been me in that bar getting duped—”

  Steven motions across his neck for him to cut it out. “He’s been sufficiently shamed,” he says, nodding back down to the blueprints. “Let’s move on and focus so we can get the hell out of here.”

  “How far is the site from where we are now?” I ask, itching to leave.

  Steven narrows one eye, thinking it over. “As the crow flies, not too far. Unfortunately, it’s all backcountry roads. It’ll take us over an hour.”

  “We’ll need to leave soon. The reps are meeting us there at 9 AM and I don’t want to be late,” Brad adds. “That should give us plenty of time to walk the property and go over final details before we head back to Austin.”

  “And if they approve?” I ask, knowing they will. Permits have been stamped. Steven personally oversaw the design, and in our final proposal—the one we presented two months ago—the hotel chain’s entire wish list was fulfilled and then some. “When do we break ground?”

  “A month from now if all goes as planned.”

  “Still up for the challenge?” Steven asks, eyeing me with skepticism.

  I don’t really have a choice. Lockwood Construction is a well-oiled machine because we each play our part: Steven is the principal architect and creative director; Brad heads up acquisitions, sales, and financial modeling; Grant oversees the engineering department; and I’m the one on the ground acting as principal contractor and senior-most project manager on our large-scale commercial builds. It’s an unusual setup. We’ve taken the industry standard and turned it on its head. Usually a client has to outsource every piece of a project from architectural plans to soil reports to construction. We wanted everything done in house by a staff capable of streamlining projects and cutting down on lead time.

  In Austin and the surrounding areas, we usually have two or three projects going at once: shopping malls, university expansions, hospital complexes. We’re an emerging force in the world of design-build firms, and as of this month, our office in downtown Austin employs over a hundred people.

  That’s part of the reason why this project excites me.

  We’ve been working our asses off the last few years. I’ve been forced into the office, stuffed inside boardrooms, and crowded around conference tables entirely too much for my liking. When our client on this new project strongly requested that one of the four partners not only manage but be present through the fruition of the build out here in East Texas, I didn’t hesitate before jumping on board.

  So what if that means I have to live out here in the middle of nowhere? So what if there aren’t real accommodations on site? I like roughing it.

  So what if that brunette vixen is still on my goddamn mind even after I swore I’d forget about her?

  In a month, by the time we’re breaking ground, she’ll be long forgotten.

  Chapter 4

  Taylor

  I had no plans to stay in this town after I graduated from high school. I wanted to go to college, but that path wasn’t in the cards for me. For one, my mom was still dating Lonny my senior year of high school, and I couldn’t leave McKenna on her own with them. The other reason—the one so many of us battle around here—is that I just didn’t have the grades to get into any schools, let alone qualify for scholarships or financial aid.

  I can remember going to talk with our school’s counselor my senior year. At the time, I was still carrying around a bud of hope for what my future could entail. Maybe I could still get into college, and maybe I could take McKenna with me. I could find us a small apartment and get a part-time job. I was sure I’d be able to juggle it all if only I could get us out of Oak Dale. My naivety at the time still makes me laugh.

  Our high school’s counselor was a heavyset woman with an affinity for floral patterns. Her gray hair was always swept up into a severe bun and her thin lips rarely curved into a smile, at least around me. It’s why the whimsical dresses always threw me off.

  “Put the idea of college out of your mind,” she said almost as soon as I walked in that day. Well, hello to you too, lady. “Your grades aren’t where they need to be. You have far too many absences and no extracurricular activities of any kind.”

  “I was on the soccer team for a few weeks my freshman year,” I said with a self-deprecating smile. Truly, I just wanted her to throw me a bone. Unfortunately, this lady had none of those to spare.

  She straightened her glasses on the bridge of her nose and flipped through my file. “I talked to some of your teachers. You do well on exams, but you don’t seem to care about the other part of your grades: homework assignments, projects, papers. Anything you do manage to turn in is only halfway done at best. You should be glad you’re even graduating.”

  It wasn’t that I didn’t care. I wasn’t a slacker. My senior year, my mom was drinking heavily and more in love with Lonny than ever. I spent most of my time outside of school trying to avoid our trailer and making sure McKenna stayed away from it as well. Sometimes we stayed with Jeremy. Sometimes we slept out in our car. If we did stay at home, I had to be watchful and alert, scared something bad would happen if I ever let my guard down.

  That year, McKenna was getting sick a lot too. She was wheezing and coughing in her sleep, and we thought she had a lingering cold. My mom didn’t have the money to take her to the doctor. She hoped McKenna would get over it on her own, but she didn’t, and I had to skip school a few times to help out on the hard days.

  Things only started to turn around when we were able to get McKenna in to see a doctor. Her diagnosis of asthma came with an expensive price tag, but at least it was treatable.

  The next major breakthrough came when my mom finally ended things with Lonny.

  Unfortunately, it was too little too late for me.

  McKenna has it different, though. She’s just now a freshman in high school, and I’m working hard to make sure she doesn’t have to bear the same weight on her shoulders that I did. With the approval of her doctor, sh
e even tried out for the freshman soccer team, and she has a small group of friends, girls who care more about grades than boys. She brought home straight As on her report card last week, and my mom put it up on the fridge.

  She’s doing better than ever—thriving, really—and I’m going to ensure it stays that way. It’s why I’m back at Oak Dale High School today, back in the familiar hallway that leads to the counselor’s office. I have a meeting scheduled with the same oh-so-lovely woman from four years ago. I find that she’s just the same as I remember after I knock on the door and enter her office: red-cheeked and tired. How many students has she watched pass through this school? How many dreams has she dashed? I used to resent her, but now I actually kind of pity her. She has a hard job.

  “Ms. Larson,” she says, eyeing me over the rims of her glasses. “I’m surprised to see you here.”

  I smile and pass her the tin of cookies McKenna and I made especially for her last night. There aren’t many and they’re just shortbread—the cheapest cookie you can bake—but they still serve the purpose. They’re a bribe of sorts.

  “I’m here to talk about McKenna’s future.”

  Her brow quirks with intrigue as she opens the tin and inhales. Ah yes, that buttery smell would bring anyone to their knees. When she pushes them aside and turns her attention back to me, I swear her gaze is slightly less severe.

  “Your sister is only a freshman, if I recall. It’s a little early to be talking about—”