On the other hand, I knew from experience that if I didn’t respond right away, Kelly would only send me more messages, and maybe even attempt to call me a few times. If I continued to ignore her, she might even go so far as to show up at my work, and that was the last thing I needed right now.
I sighed. I should have known better than to marry her. I should have listened to my dad about her. I’d been stubborn, though, and I’d been sure that I was in love with her. Maybe I had been. But she definitely had never been in love with me, and that had become painfully clear over the course of the next two years.
Two years of marriage and nine months of divorce later and I did know better. I hated it, but I did know better. There had definitely been red flags all along, and I had been foolish to ignore them.
I glanced at my phone again and then heaved myself out of bed. I could at least get some coffee made before I tackled my responses, I reasoned. I made the coffee, watching as it slowly brewed into the pot. I poured myself a mug and took a sip, then looked at the messages. I grimaced when I saw what they said.
I guess I had expected Kelly was writing to ask me to get back together with her or something. Had I been hoping for that? I didn’t want to examine that too closely.
In any case, her messages were of another sort entirely. Instead of responding to her, I opened my email and jotted out something for my lawyer. If Kelly was asking for more money, that meant she was flying through the already-arranged alimony. I didn’t know if there was anything she could do to me if she did run out of money, but I didn’t really want to find out.
I’d never wanted to leave the whole divorce in the hands of the lawyers, but it had quickly become clear that Kelly and I weren’t going to get anywhere on our own. Yet another thing that I should have listened to my father about: that prenup agreement would have been a good idea. I had stupidly thought that I could trust the woman I was going to marry, though.
I knew better now. These were all mistakes I would never make again. If only I could have avoided them in the first place.
I poured the rest of my coffee down the sink. Its bitter flavor was doing nothing to help my mood this morning. I glanced at the clock, and even though it was still early, I decided to head for work. There was always more that I could get done, and there was no point in hanging around my lonely apartment moping about my failures and shortcomings.
3
Mindy
I took a deep breath of the evening air and let it out slowly. It had been another long day at work, but it was Friday. I had the whole weekend to rest and recharge before I came back to the office again. I hated to admit how badly I needed that.
It wasn’t that I didn’t like the company. In fact, I was really enjoying working for Designed by You. It was more that I felt like my brain was mush after a week of training. There had been a ton of new information, plus new faces to remember, and different software to get comfortable with. The weekend would give me a much-needed break to digest some of that information.
Vera laughed and nudged me with her shoulder. “You okay there, Mindy?” she asked teasingly.
I gave her a wry smile. “Come on, don’t try and tell me that you don’t feel exactly the same way,” I said.
She shrugged. “I’m not the one who’s been working alongside Danica,” she pointed out. “You’ve had it way harder this week than I have, from what I hear.”
“Yeah,” I sighed. Danica, nicknamed by some of the other staff as “Danica the Demon”—not that I would ever call her that, even inside the safety of my head—had been no picnic to work with. I was jealous of Vera for working so closely with easygoing Jonathan. But I hoped that if I could impress Danica, it would help me turn this internship into a long-term position with the company. After all, she had that kind of sway with the higher-ups.
That was a long way off for now, though. It seemed like at the moment, the best I could get was her grudging approval of my work. Still, I’d take what I could get.
“You see Pierce at all today?” Vera asked as we started walking toward the bar.
I grimaced. “Yeah, I basically saw him as he stormed out of there,” I said. “Not a very pretty scene.”
Vera shook her head. “Artists,” she said dryly then shrugged. “Guess that means we’re more likely to get a real job after the internship is over though, right? Less competition?”
“Yeah, I guess so,” I said, pretending like that hadn’t been my first thought when I saw Pierce storm out of there. I didn’t know all the details of what had happened, but from the sounds of it, his internship was over before it had ever really started. His loss.
In any case, I had barely seen Pierce all week, while Vera and I had already become friends with one another, helping out with remembering all the information that had been shoveled into our brains over the course of the week. It was hard to feel sorry for Pierce. I was sure he would find something that was a better fit for him. And like Vera had said, it just meant less competition for us.
I pulled open the door of the bar and gestured for Vera to go in first. I had been here a few times before; it was the bar that my roommate Risa worked at. I had been surprised to see how close Designed by You’s offices were to the place, and it had been only too easy to make plans to head there on Friday evening after work.
My roommate, Risa, gave me a huge smile as we approached the bar. “Hey, you,” she said. “How was work? What sorts of things did the Demon have you doing today?”
I groaned and leaned my elbows on the bar. “Can we just not talk about work for the rest of the night?” I asked, looking back and forth between her and Vera.
Vera laughed. “Works for me,” she said. She held out a hand to Risa. “I’m assuming you’re the roommate? I’m the coworker. Vera.”
“Nice to meet you,” Risa said, giving Vera one of her trademark smiles. She poured out a set of tequila shots. “On the house,” she said, winking at us. “You look like you could use it.”
I snorted, but I wasn’t about to turn down free shots, especially knowing that I didn’t need to go back to work for the next couple of days. We clinked glasses together and then sucked down the shots. Then, Risa went to work pulling beers for us.
“I’m off duty in fifteen,” Risa said. “Why don’t you guys grab that table over there?”
“Sounds good,” I answered, grabbing my beer and heading over to where she had pointed. Vera trailed after me.
The conversation was surprisingly easy, especially once Risa, with her infectious energy, joined us. I found out that Vera and I had a lot in common, up to and including the fact that we had gone to the same college.
We were on our second round when Vera’s eyes suddenly widened. “I know you said we weren’t going to talk about work things, but you’ll never believe who just walked in the front door,” she said.
I frowned and turned around to look. I blinked, surprised to see none other than Adam Parker crossing from the door to the bar. I hadn’t seen him since Monday, my first day at the office. He looked every bit as good as he had then. He also looked incredibly out of place there in that bar, dressed to the nines in slacks and a tie, albeit with the sleeves of his dress shirt messily rolled up.
Vera giggled. “You’d think a guy with his kind of money would be somewhere a little nicer than this,” she said, echoing my thoughts.
“You guys know him?” Risa asked in surprise.
“Do you know him?” I asked in response.
“I mean, sort of, not really,” Risa said, shrugging one shoulder. “He’s our mysterious regular. Comes in a few nights of the week, orders a beer or two, then heads out. Doesn’t really fit in here, but of course no one’s ever going to say that to him. Anyway, I figure it must be near where he works.”
“It is,” Vera confirmed. “That’s Adam Parker. He’s the president of Designed by You.”
Risa whistled lowly. “So, your boss, then?” she asked me, cocking an eyebrow.
I nodded. Risa’s s
hit-eating grin told me she knew exactly what I was thinking about the man. My boss. I felt myself flush.
“He’s hot,” Risa said, her eyes dancing.
“His assistant is even more attractive,” Vera said. “I wonder if he ever comes in here.”
“I’ve never seen him in here with anyone else,” Risa said apologetically. Vera looked disappointed, but same as before, Adam was all I could really focus on.
So he came in here a few nights a week, did he? I wondered if there was a reason for it. Did he just like beer, or was he trying to destress, or was he avoiding going home for some reason? It was late now, at least in terms of the working day. Did he always work this late? I had done some reading up on him since I had seen him on Monday, and I knew he was considered to be a bit of a workaholic. I also knew he had gone through a divorce earlier this year.
I was struck with the desire to go over there and strike up a conversation, but I knew better than to do that. I took a hasty sip of my beer as he glanced over, and I had to fight not to choke.
“Huh,” Vera said, sounding amused. “If I didn’t know better, I would think that someone was interested in him.” I gave her a look, and she laughed, holding up both hands. “Hey, all I’m saying is, it wouldn’t hurt to talk to him a little. In fact, it might help you get a long-term position at the company.”
“Doubtful,” I said, shaking my head. “Honestly, wouldn’t that do the opposite? I’m not going to ruin my first real job opportunity by hitting on my boss.”
Vera laughed. “I mean, I didn’t say that you had to hit on him,” she said. “You don’t think you could chat with him without coming on too strong?”
Before I could say anything in response to that—not that I really knew what to say—we watched as Adam answered his phone. His face darkened, and he waved off the bartender who had approached him. He headed straight back out the doors, and I felt myself relax a little, although my heart was still pounding in my chest.
What was it about him that got me so worked up? I wasn’t the kind of girl to get this turned on just by a pretty face. But I felt flustered even though I hadn’t even gone over there to talk to him, even though his gaze had barely brushed past me. He hadn’t recognized Vera and me at all. To him, we were nobodies, and I felt bitter disappointment in the back of my throat as I realized that this was probably the way that the whole internship would go.
I shook my head. “Can we go back to not talking about work?” I asked.
“I guess,” Vera said, sharing a grin with Risa. I shook my head and changed the topic of conversation before either of them could say anything else about my obvious attraction to my boss. I didn’t even know the guy, and surely someone as handsome as him must have a whole slew of girls ready to jump into bed with him, especially given how public his divorce had been.
My eyes slid toward the space at the bar that he had vacated. Yet again, I wondered what it was that drew him here to the bar. But that was none of my business and asking him about any of it was a recipe for getting myself fired, which was the last thing I needed right now.
I might be exhausted from a long week, but I wanted this internship more than anything. I wasn’t going to screw it up by doing something inappropriate with my boss. No way in hell.
We called it a night after just a couple of rounds. It was still pretty early, but I wanted to get an email sent to my folks before I headed to bed. They would want to hear all about how the first week at the new job had gone, and I knew that if I waited even another day before telling them about it, I was likely to receive a message from my mom asking me if I was alright. She worried about me living in the big city all by myself. Not only that, but with my younger sister off to college this year, she was definitely empty nesting.
Anyway, it would be good to get to bed a little early. I was pretty tired, and I had a morning shift at the coffee shop so that I could make ends meet. The internship didn’t pay me enough for that to be my sole job at the moment.
I shook my head and spent the rest of the walk home mentally composing the email I would send to my parents, telling them all about the trials and tribulations of the week. I carefully edited out any mention of my new boss, knowing that Mom, at least, would read way too much into even the casual mention of a dude at my work. She wanted me to be happy, and she wanted me to find love. It had been a while since I had dated anyone, and I knew she was ready for me to settle down with someone.
I quickly typed out the email when I got home and then hopped through a shower. I was asleep the moment my head hit the pillow; all thoughts of my sexy boss silenced for now.
4
Adam
I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, glancing around the place as I waited for Kelly to come back from the restroom. It was Sunday morning, a day for relaxation, but instead of lounging on the couch watching whatever was on ESPN, I was sitting here in a hipster cafe having brunch with my ex-wife.
I had always hated going out to brunch. It was one thing to cook a nice Sunday meal at the house, to share it with the one you loved. But that wasn’t what going out to brunch was all about. Going out to brunch, especially here in Chicago, seemed to be all about being seen. It was more about mimosas and cute footwear than it was about sharing a meal. It was pretentious as all hell, and it drew exactly the type of crowd that I couldn’t stand.
In retrospect, it should have been another of those red flags. I should have figured out that it was a sign that Kelly and I weren’t compatible. She had always been so into things like that. As for me, if I never had to sit through another brunch again, it would be too soon.
Kelly came back and sat down across from me, carefully arranging her pristine white skirt across her knees. She simpered at me, but instead of finally telling me why I was here, she started talking about something at her sister’s work. Like we were just here to catch up on one another’s lives or something like we had never really gone through with the divorce at all.
I didn’t know why I had agreed to meet with her. According to my lawyer, there was nothing she could really do to get more out of the divorce, short of suing me for more money. But she wouldn’t get very far with that.
So when she had pressured me into agreeing to get brunch with her, I had stupidly agreed, thinking that there must be some other reason for it.
I still didn’t know what I was doing there. She hadn’t asked me for money yet, so what did she want? Suddenly, I blurted the question out: “Why am I here, Kelly?”
Whatever she’d been complaining about, that shut her up mid-sentence. She looked shocked that I had asked, or shocked that I had interrupted her. Either way, it didn’t bode well for me, I was sure.
“I just thought we could get together, to catch up,” she said slowly. “You know, like friends.”
I frowned at her and then said what I had been telling myself for months now: “We’re divorced,” I reminded her. “That means we don’t have to stay in one another’s lives anymore. We don’t have to be friends, and we don’t have to catch up. In fact, I think that it would be easier if we didn’t.”
It was harder than I would have expected to get those words out. How many nights had I laid awake thinking about how strange it would be for Kelly to not be part of my life from here on out? I could barely wrap my mind around the idea of never sharing anything with her again. But I meant what I had said. I truly thought it would be for the best if we severed all ties. Otherwise, we could never truly move on and start our lives over.
Kelly looked like she didn’t know how to handle my response, though. She gaped at me, looking amazed that I might feel that way. But there was something about her expression that let me know she was faking it. There was no sincerity there. She was only pretending that she wanted to be my friend.
I had grown too good at reading her expressions in the time we had been married, and even better at reading them since we had started the divorce proceedings. Sometimes I wondered if we might have stayed married if I hadn’t learn
ed how to tell when she was lying to me. Maybe I would still be happy. Maybe I would still believe her when she said that she cared about me.
Suddenly, I felt tired with the whole thing. I sighed. “Seriously, what do you want?” We weren’t just here because she wanted to be friends with me. I should have known that from the start. I had been an idiot to let myself believe otherwise, even for a second.
Kelly folded her arms across her chest, looking frustrated at me for refusing to play the game. “I need to go on vacation,” she said primly.
I stared at her for a moment, wondering if those words had really just come out of her mouth. Then, I snorted, making the people at the table next to us glare at me. I fought the urge to roll my eyes at them. I really, really didn’t want to be there.
I should have known that Kelly wanted more money. It was exactly what I’d been worried about when she had first texted me. I should have known that if there was no way for her to get it through the lawyers, then she would simply ask me for a favor. She thought I was too nice to refuse her.
I shook my head slowly and sadly. She would never be the woman I thought I had married. I had been so blinded by love that I had been willing to overlook all of her shortcomings. I had never realized how greedy she was, to the exclusion of all else. She had never loved me, I didn’t think; she had only loved the fact that I had money. But in the end, even that hadn’t been enough to keep us together.
“Your lawyer got you a really good deal,” I reminded her. “You get a good amount of money every month, and you don’t have to do anything for it.” She would never have to work a day in her life if she was careful. Between the cash payments I made and her stock options in the company, she was all set. But she had never been the careful type.
When she said that she needed a vacation, she probably meant that she wanted to spend a whole month living at five-star resorts, eating the best food that money could buy, having fancy spa treatments, and everything else. The alimony wouldn’t cover her for that. But it wasn’t my job to pay the rest of it either.
Boss’s Secret Baby for Christmas Page 2