Cady picked up a beautifully wrapped gift that Juliet had just put the finishing touches to. She couldn’t help feel a tad jealous of Juliet’s planned trip. “When do you leave?”
“The twenty-third. I am so looking forward to it.”
“Did I hear Denver is due more snow on the twenty-fourth? A white Christmas… how perfect. ”
Juliet grinned widely. “Oh, God, the ranch is so beautiful when it snows. Pristine white fields as far as the eye can see, mugs of steaming hot chocolate, twinkling fairy lights, decorating the tree. Seriously, Christmas anywhere else would just be a letdown.”
Cady’s mood plummeted even further as she glanced at the tiny and quite frankly unfestive tree in the corner of their apartment. Damn, it was going to be one lonely, miserable Christmas all on her own. Still, there was the Hallmark channel. She would buy herself a huge box of chocolates and her favorite bottle of wine and binge watch all the perfect Christmases the movie channel had to offer.
Juliet reached out and squeezed her hand. “You know, you could always come with me. “
Cady was tempted. Juliet had been kind enough to invite her last week when she first found out the M.K. Morning project would wrap up early. Boy had she been tempted, but Paul still hadn’t given her a straight answer about whether the cancelled holiday leave was now reinstated.
“Perhaps if my review goes well, I could ask Paul again. For the life of me I can’t see any reason why the ban on leave is still in place. There is literally nothing for us to do between Christmas and New Year’s now that everything has been signed off.”
Juliet beamed at her, then winked. “I can think of a certain brother of mine who would be quite happy to finally meet you.”
Cady blushed. “W-what?”
“Oh, don’t be so coy. I know you guys talk every night. Those walls are paper thin, Cady.”
Her cheeks reddened even more. “H-how do you know who I talk to?”
“Denver’s due more snow on the twenty-fourth,” Juliet mocked. “You honestly think I believe you have taken to watching random weather forecasts? Admit it, Miles told you. Besides, you are always pumping me for details about him.”
“I do not.”
“No? Does Miles still keep in touch with his ex, Jules? How long have they been divorced, Jules? Is he seeing anyone special, Jules?”
“I never asked you that last one!”
“Well, you might as well have! You are desperate to know, aren’t you?”
Cady chewed on her lip. Damn it, she did, but now she couldn’t ask. “No. There is nothing between Miles and me, we just chat occasionally. I like hearing about the animals.”
“Ok, you keep telling yourself that. Jeez, Miles thinks he is being subtle, too. Always turning the conversation around to you, pumping me for information.”
Cady chewed on her lip. “H-he does?” She heard the eagerness in her voice and checked herself. No way was she falling into Juliet's trap, even if she was curious about what Miles wanted to know about her. “We’re just friends… there’s nothing going on between us.” Cady stared defiantly at Juliet, but she knew she’d been caught. Ah, damn it! Jules had her figured out. She lowered her eyes. “Would you be mad if there was?”
“Why would I be? I think it’s kind of sweet. I think you two would be cute together. He isn’t seeing anyone, by the way, least that’s what Caleb told me. You know, Miles isn’t exactly a big talker, but you two are always on the phone for hours, maybe the reason he isn’t dating has something to do with your late night chats.”
“I doubt that. You’re brother doesn’t even know what I look like. Am I even his type? I saw what his ex-wife was like! ”
Juliet pinched her cheek. “Clarissa was a bitch.”
“No, I meant her appearance. She wasn’t a five-foot-three, chubby redhead!”
“Seriously, you are not chubby. Those are curves, honey, very beautiful curves that I have seen a lot of men admiring. But, maybe you’re right, Miles does kind of have a track record with tall blondes.”
“There you go. I am neither tall nor blonde.” Deflated, Cady crossed her arms defensively across her D-cups. “I bet Clarissa was stick thin, too, wasn’t she?”
“Yeah, Clarissa barely ate, and I swear that is what made her such a bitch. You have a lovely figure, Cady. Don’t be so hard on yourself. If a man can’t see how sexy those curves are on you, then he must be blind. And that hair! Oh, my God, you do not know how jealous I am of your locks!”
Cady smiled back at her friend. Ordinarily, she wasn’t fixated on her appearance. She was quite satisfied with her few extra pounds, and the fact that she could never reach things from the top cabinets never bothered her, but… what Miles might think of her did matter.
Last week, a little flirtation had slipped into a conversation, but she couldn’t help thinking that if Miles saw her in person, that would rapidly disappear, as would their end-of-day chats.
“Stop matchmaking, Jules. I like Miles as a friend, but he lives in Colorado, and I work in Virginia, so the whole thing is moot anyway.” She looked at the clock on the microwave. “Huh, talking of jobs, I better get going. Today is going to be a long day.”
“Will you come home before you go to the Christmas party?”
Cady shook her head. “No, I’d only have to go back into town again and I have so much to set up there. God help me! Why did I volunteer to organize this?”
“You did not volunteer. Paul dumped it on you like he always does. Though if I’d have been forced to organize it, I’d have made damn sure it was on this side of the Potomac. Honestly, why DC? The traffic will be a nightmare, and most of your co-workers live out this way.”
Cady winked at her, “Because Paul lives literally around the corner from the venue. You should know by now, everything my boss does, is because it benefits him.”
* * *
Cady looked up at Paul’s office door as it opened and watched him shake hands with the new girl. Actually, she should probably not call her that anymore, as she had been here six months. Cady didn’t know much about her, and couldn’t even remember her name. The woman had originally arrived to do some temping but had quickly found a permanent place, and already received a promotion. The rumor mill was rife, of course, many believing she only got the job because she and Paul were involved.
“Thanks, Libby.” Paul’s hand rested on the woman’s shoulder, his fingers stroking it a little too intimately. Okay, you are as bad as the gossips, quit imagining things.
Paul removed his hand from Libby, and glanced up at Cady. “I’ll see you now.” He pushed his glasses back up his nose and disappeared into the office.
For no rational reason, Cady grew hot and her hands began to sweat. She swiped her palms over her pencil skirt and stood up. Taking a deep breath, she fixed a smile on her face and headed to the door.
She was five feet from Paul’s office when her phone buzzed in her hand and she glanced at the screen. Tears pooled in her eyes as she read the message from her mother.
Sorry, Cady, Pebbles didn’t make it. He died peacefully, hun, he wasn’t in any pain.
Cady’s heart constricted as a wave of uncontrollable sadness flooded over her. She wanted to run to the bathroom and find a stall to cry in.
“Are you coming in or what? If you keep dawdling, we won’t make the Christmas party,” Paul called through the office door.
Cady had spent the entire day dreading her review. As one colleague after another filed into Paul’s office and then out again, her nerves ratcheted up. Damn it, why had she looked at her phone. The review on top of the news about Pebbles was too much to deal with. “Coming.”
Inside the office, her tears threatened to fall any moment and it was all she could do to will them to stay in place. But Paul didn’t even seem to notice her distress as he handed her a piece of paper outlining the information he’d gathered from her co-workers. In a daze, she glanced over it and statements like ‘dependable,’ ‘hard-working,’ �
�knowledgeable,’ and ‘sticks to deadlines’ all wafted across the page. But in her melancholic state, Cady derived little pleasure from her colleagues glowing reports.
Paul mumbled on, listing projects she worked on and saying something about her high standards. Did they really need to do this now? All she wanted to do was curl in a ball and cry for her lost pet.
“…I just want you to know that we at Gainbridge and Sons have valued the work you have put in, and you will be sorely missed.”
Cady’s brain came into sharp focus. “Sorry? Missed?”
“We’d like you to know that it was a hard decision to make because both you and Libby are very well qualified, but…”
Wait? What was Paul talking about?
“…At the end of the day, we have decided to offer Libby the permanent position as my PA.”
“What? But I have been your PA for two years… she hasn’t even worked in this department!”
Paul removed his glasses and leaned back in his chair. He waved a piece of paper at her. “You were taken on as an intern, Cady…”
Yes, that was true, but after six months she had stepped into the shoes of Paul’s PA when his current assistant upped and left the company without a word of explanation. Later, Cady found out the PA and Paul were having an affair that suddenly ended.
He slid the paper across to her and she picked it up, her eyes widening as she read it.
“We never officially gave you the job. You were standing in.”
“For two years?”
“Um, a little unusual, I know, but after careful consideration, I’ve found Libby has… exceptional talents… um, talents that I admire.”
Admire? Oh, yes, Cady could imagine what specific talents the very attractive Libby had. Then it hit her. Why hadn’t she realized this sooner! Libby was the name of the woman Paul took on that safari! Now it all made sense.
“Of course, I can supply you with glowing references, and wish you luck in your new career direction…”
Cady had no idea what he was waffling on about, all she knew was this was bullshit. For twenty-four months, she was at his beck and call. She worked late into the evenings, came in on the weekends, and ran around doing all his damn personal errands on top of what she was being paid for. And that was another thing! She’d been paid an absolute pittance, far lower than other jobs in that position, all with the promise of a raise after her review or after a project came in successfully, to keep her there. Of course, that had never happened, but she always thought it would.
“I’m fired?”
“We prefer the term, ‘Let go’.” Paul didn’t even look up at her when he spoke. “Let’s pencil in the 24th of December as your last day, then that will make everything tidy. Does that sound fair?”
Tidy? Tidy for fucking who? Cady stood up so fast her chair tumbled over behind her. “Fair? You’re kidding, right?”
Paul blinked up at her. “I can understand this might be disappointing, but…”
“You know what Paul, why don’t you just shut the fuck up. No, this doesn’t sound fair. None of this even makes fucking sense.”
“There is no need to cuss Miss…”
She put both hands on the desk in front of him and leaned forward. “You know what? I think I’ll leave now. Fuck waiting until Friday, and fuck your glowing references. I’d like to say that working for you has been a pleasure, Paul, but sadly it hasn’t. You have been the vainest, most self-centered, inept, and fucking neediest boss I have ever had the misfortune to work for. Oh, and you might as well drop the facade because everyone in the office knows you're screwing Libby, and if even one single person didn’t figure it out, then I’ll make it my business to tell them.”
“Don’t do anything you will regret, Cady.”
“Why? It’s not like I will lose my job! Well, Paul, I’d like to thank you for giving me the opportunity to move on because, you know what? I don’t think I could have bear to work for such an asshole any longer. Please forgive me, if I don’t wish you good luck for your future, because quite frankly, I hope you don’t have one. In fact, I rather hope your ass gets royally sued when you and Libby break up and you try forcing her out of my job!” She stomped to the door.
“Cady…”
She flinched at the way he said her name.
“Um, I hope we can be civil at the Christmas party. I wouldn’t want any unpleasantness to spoil things.”
She swung around, but most of her fight had left her, and the tears that had formed for Pebbles were now about to spill down her face. “Christmas party? Oh, don’t worry about that. There’ll be no unpleasantness because I won’t be at the stupid office party.”
As she stormed down the corridor, Paul shouted after her, “But Cady, you’re supposed to be organizing the evening… please, at least have enough pride in your work to finish the job.”
7
Miles
Fountain, Colorado December 22th
Miles woke from a rather erotic dream that had materialized out of nowhere. In it, he’d been talking on the phone to Cady in Virginia when suddenly they were having phone sex. And because it was a dream and a long way from reality, somehow their bodies were exquisitely joined, despite the miles between them. The only issue was that he had yet to see what Cady looked like.
His eyes flicked open as the hot and sweaty writhing in his dream reached climax. “Fuck!” He found his hand and belly were sticky with cum. “Shit, what are you twelve?”
He rolled out of bed, partially ashamed he’d just had a wet dream about a woman that was just a voice on the end of a phone. After turning on the shower, he stepped under the stream. What the hell was it about Cady that he was finding so bewitching? How was it even possible to fall in love with just a voice?
Love? Fuck, no!
Miles turned the hot water to cold and the freezing cascade of water shocked him back to his senses. “This is not love, it’s infatuation mixed with lust because you haven’t been laid in months.”
Hmm, about that. The last time Miles had taken a tumble in the hay—quite literally, as it turned out—was with Mrs. Clayton back at the end of August. Exactly why there had been no one since was not something he could put his finger on. It wasn’t like he hadn’t had any offers—more that he hadn’t felt any inclination to do anything about them.
If Miles was a less jaded man, then he might have concluded his late night chats with Cady might just have had something to do with his lack of interest in one-night stands. But that was impossible. They were friends, and apart from a recent conversation when things got a little flirty, anything more hadn’t entered his head.
Or had it?
His thoughts started racing through his mind. Let’s face it, that dream came from somewhere. Well, last night’s dream was… an exception? Except that wasn’t the half of it, was it? There was also his ratcheting up anxiety, and subsequent bad mood—that he unleashed on just about everyone at the ranch—just because he hadn’t spoke to her in a couple days.
Two days.
Two days and seven hours, to be exact.
“Fuck.” He reached for his phone and opened up his messages. There was still nothing from Cady, despite the dozen or so pictures and texts he’d sent. He wondered if he should try calling her again, but he had already left her two voicemails. He was starting to look desperate.
And perhaps he was beginning to feel a little desperate, too.
Miles’s phone began to vibrate in his hand and for half a second, his heart soared. But when he looked down and saw it was Juliet, the organ in his chest lost its wings and fell into the bottom of his stomach.
“Hey Jules, is everything okay?”
“Yes, why wouldn’t it be?”
“Because, it is seven a.m. and you never call me?”
“Oh, yeah.” She giggled, and in the background he heard her GPS announce a turn. He rolled his eyes. Juliet had no sense of direction and relied on the robotic map reader to even get her to the corner store. �
��Sorry, I just finished my shift and thought it would be nice to talk to my favorite brother.”
“Bullshit. What is it Juliet? Fuck, don’t tell me you are cancelling. Sarah will be devastated if you don’t come for Christmas.”
“Of course I’m not cancelling. I look forward to Christmas at the ranch the whole year.”
Miles chuckled. That was an understatement. Right from when she was tiny, Juliet had always gotten ridiculously excited about Christmas. She had invented dozens of ‘family traditions’ and continued to add something new to the list annually. Last year, she announced that it was now a tradition for them all to watch ‘Love Actually’ on Christmas Eve.
“Um, I was wondering…”
Ah, here it comes. No doubt she had some hair-brained scheme she wanted to enlist Miles help for. The last one of those involved him hiding a puppy in his closet because Juliet wanted to surprise Sarah. The damn thing had chewed through two pairs of his jeans and ate his only dress shoes before Christmas morning arrived. Still, it had been worth it to see the expression on his stepmom’s face.
“Why do I fear those words?”
“Look, I know Christmas is family time, but… um, how would you feel if there was one extra at the table?”
Miles sighed. Another year of making small talk with one of his siblings’ boyfriends or girlfriends wasn’t high on his list of favorite things, but they were getting older, and soon there would be wives and kids appearing around their Christmas table.
Nolan was already starting that ball rolling. “Sure. We can squeeze another in.” Miles didn’t ask what the sleeping arrangement might be. It was hard enough seeing his twenty-four year old sister as an adult, and he certainly wasn’t going to allow thoughts of his sister sleeping with anyone enter his head.
He decided to change the conversation. “How’s Cady? I haven’t heard from her in a few days.”
Miles' Christmas Roundup (Holiday Hunks Book 2) Page 5