by Emma Hart
A hint of amusement gazed back at me. “It’s fine. It was an accident. Stop panicking.”
“I know, but all your work, and—”
“There’s nothing there that can’t be printed out again. It just means you have extra work this afternoon.” He gave me a lopsided grin. “Honestly, it’s fine.”
Groaning, I dropped my head. “I’m such a klutz.”
“Yeah, but I knew that when I saw you on the side of the road on your ass.”
I groaned again. “I was hoping you didn’t recognize me.”
He laughed, letting go of my wrist. “Not a chance in that. Come on. We can get this cleaned up in no time if we work together.”
I followed him out of the office. “You don’t have to help me.”
“No, I do. There’s still a cup of coffee in that office. I don’t want you turning mine into a casualty too.”
Ugh. This was terrible. “I wouldn’t blame you if you fired me. I’m a bit of a liability.”
Cameron laughed and tossed me a towel from the bathroom. “Mallory, I’m not going to fire you for spilling coffee. It missed the computer, didn’t it? It didn’t go on me. Nobody got hurt, and nothing blew up. Don’t be so dramatic.”
“I can’t help it,” I muttered, following him back to the office. “It goes hand in hand with being a walking disaster. Eventually, you do something worth being dramatic about.”
“Have you done that?”
“Done what?”
“Done something worth being dramatic about.”
Yeah. I was inadvertently responsible for an apartment fire.
Instead of saying that out loud, I swept my arm out in front of me, indicating the coffee. “Is this not worth being dramatic about?”
“Not at all.” He picked the leather diary up. “I liked this, but I can buy a new one.” He put it in a trash bag I didn’t know he’d grabbed. “The paper? It can all be printed out again. You just need to write down what it is so you know what to print.”
“Right. Um.” I looked around and saw a notebook—under the coffee. “There’s a problem.”
“There’s a pad in the drawer. It’s college-ruled. Are you likely to make a disaster of staying between the lines?”
I jerked my head up, ready to be offended, but a smile was tugging at his lips and his eyes were bright with laughter.
He was teasing me.
“Ugh.” I opened the drawer and found the notebook he was referring to on the top. I pulled it out and paused because the movement had revealed another notebook beneath it.
It was bound with gold rings and covered in high heel shoes.
“Um,” I said, fighting laughter as I removed that one, too. “Is this yours?”
Cameron paused his cleaning and eyed it. “Uh, no. That’s my ex-girlfriend’s.”
“How much of an ex is she?”
“Enough of one that it shouldn’t be there. You can throw it in the trash.”
I looked at the drawer. “Did you also know there’s a half-empty packet of gum in there? Plus, a pink highlighter, a sock, and a razor.”
“What sock?”
“I don’t know. I’m not touching your sock.” I handed him the girly notebook, and he tossed it into the trash bag. “What do I need to print?”
Together, methodically, we worked to clean the desk. Well, mostly Cameron worked. I wrote down everything he told me I needed to print out again while he cleaned everything up and threw out the stuff I’d ruined.
I had a list as long as my arm to print back out, and I was pretty sure I’d need to go and get some more ink when I grabbed lunch with Jade, but after almost an hour of organizing and wiping everything down, we were done.
“Hey. Are you ready for lunch?”
I jolted at the sound of Jade’s voice. She was hovering at the top of the stairs and could see me since I was level with the doorway of Cameron’s office.
“Hey,” I said, smiling. “Give me a minute. I need to finish up here then get my phone sorted.”
“You’re good,” Cameron said, tossing the towel into the trash bag. “We’re done. It’s all cleaned up, and I can always answer the phone.”
“Are you sure?”
“Clean up? What did you do?” Jade was already hiding a laugh, and she tucked a wisp of her violet hair behind her ear as she walked toward me.
“I…spilled some coffee,” I said slowly.
“Some?” Cameron chuckled, shaking his head. “Try a whole mug.”
“A whole mug? Holy shit, Mal—what did you do? Miss the coaster?” Jade asked, coming to the doorway.
“I—yeah.” I sighed.
Cameron laughed again and held a hand out toward Jade. “You must be the best friend. Are you as much of a klutz as she is?”
My cheeks flooded with embarrassment as Jade all but froze on the spot. She looked Cameron up and down, very obviously, and grinned.
“Nobody is as much of a klutz as Mallory, and I’ve seen her great-aunt drunk. Jade.” She smiled as she shook his hand.
“Cameron.” He took his hand from hers and turned back to me. “Go take your lunch. It’s all good.”
I hesitated.
He gently pushed me in the shoulder. “Go. Oh, can you get some printer ink when you’re out? I don’t know what it is, but…”
I half-smiled. “I’ll call Casey and find out what it is. She gave me her number for this reason.”
“Yeah, and so she can gloat at me for weeks.” He sighed. “Go on, go, before I change my mind about you calling her.”
“Are you sure? I can do the phone, or help you finish up here, or—”
“What’s that?” He pointed to the glass of water on the desk.
“It’s a glass of water.”
He stared at me.
“Right. Got it.” I grimaced and waved the notebook. “I’ll just put this on my desk. Don’t touch it.”
“You’ll probably lose it on the way.”
I gasped. “I’m a klutz, not a forgetful toddler.”
Jade grinned. “Well…”
“You shut up.” I pointed at her and stalked toward my desk. I set the notebook down next to the keyboard and checked the screen. There was some weird program full of colors and graphs and stuff that I didn’t understand. After a brief frown, I grabbed my phone and my purse and turned to Jade. “Let’s go.”
“All right.” She tugged her purse strap onto her shoulder and bounced toward the door. “Let’s go!”
I pulled my purse straps up to my elbow and poked my head in the door to Cameron’s office. “Do you want me to get you anything when I’m gone?”
“Nope, I’m good.” He smiled, his bright eyes shining. “Have fun.”
I smiled back and turned, walking to Jade and urging her down the stairs. We’d barely taken a step when she leaned into me, grabbing my shirt, and said in a low voice, “Damn girl, he is fine with a capital ‘F.’”
A huge laugh came from inside Cameron’s office, and my jaw dropped at the knowledge he’d heard what she’d said.
Even Jade’s eyes went wide. “Let’s get lunch.”
“Mhmm.”
***
“Holy shit, he’s hot.”
I rolled my eyes. It was the third time she’d said that since we’d sat down in the diner and ordered.
She’d said it twice before we’d ordered, and three more times on the way.
“I know,” I said simply, reaching for my milkshake. “I have to look at him on a regular basis.”
She slumped forward and rested her chin in her hands. “He’s so beautiful. Like a sculpture in an art museum. Totally beautiful. Like someone picked all the best parts of a man and put them all together.”
She finished it off with a sigh.
A long, dreamy sigh that wouldn’t be out of place in a Disney princess movie.
“He’s also my boss,” I said slowly. “Doesn’t matter how hot he is. You can’t drool over him like he’s a pizza on cheat day.”
“Can I use him for masturbation material?”
“No!” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Jade…”
She pursed her lips. “All right, all right. But I do not promise anything.”
I rolled my eyes and sipped my milkshake. “I told you he was hot. But he’s still my boss, so that’s the end of that.”
“Not for me.”
“Yes, for you. No great love stories start with screwing your best friend’s boss.”
Jade paused. “There are plenty that start with screwing your boss, though.”
“I am not going to sleep with my boss. Cut that out. And I wouldn’t say there are any great love stories that begin with anyone having sex with their boss.”
“That’s how my mom met my dad.”
“All right, so your parents are an exception to the rule.” I sighed as our food was brought over and deposited in front of us, the waitress pausing to see if we needed anything else. When we said we didn’t, she left us with a smile.
“My parents have been happily married for years. It’s totally possible to have a happy ending with your boss.”
“Are you trying to marry me off to Cameron?”
“There’s nobody else knocking at your door.”
I dipped a fry in ketchup and pointed it at her. “You don’t exactly have a long list of gentlemen knocking at yours, do you?”
“No, but this is why I keep Logan around. I’m not ready to commit.” She shrugged a shoulder and picked up her burger. “I don’t need a long list. Plus, I’m not a romantic pansy like you.”
I laughed. “What, because I like romance movies and books, I’m a romantic pansy?”
“No, the endless doodles over your notebooks in school proclaiming you Mrs. Nick Jonas are.”
“Hey.” I pointed another fry her way. “I would husband him so hard if I could. Some things don’t change, and my love for Nick Jonas is one of them.”
“Well, I admit, I didn’t see it then, but I do now.” She shrugged. “Puberty did that man good.”
I slowly nodded after biting into my burger. It most certainly had. Then again, it’d done me more than a few favors, too. Puberty and braces, that was.
We finished our lunch in relative silence after that, only casually throwing out little bits of conversation until we were done, and we’d paid.
I held the door open for her to walk through. “Are you going back to the salon?”
Jade nodded. “Need an appointment?”
“Yeah. Can you text me? I have to get some printer ink so I can print out all the stuff I ruined.”
She smirked. “At least now, he really knows you’re a catastrophe.”
I shot her a dark look as we parted. “Not funny!”
CHAPTER TEN – MALLORY
Cameron: Sorry I missed you this afternoon. Did you get all the stuff printed out?
I stabbed some pasta with my fork and hit ‘reply’ on the screen.
Me: Most of it, but I think a couple of the properties have sold since they were printed.
“Are you texting at the dinner table?” Grandpa peered over the table at me as he picked up his whiskey. “You kids these days. You have no respect.”
Mom side-eyed me, begging me not to say anything.
“It’s my boss. Would you prefer if I left the table to have my conversation?” I asked in the sweetest voice I could muster.
Grandpa frowned at me. “Are you sassin’ me, girl?”
“No, she’s not sassing you, you old coot,” Aunt Grace snapped. “She can’t ignore her boss, and it’s rude to leave the table before you’ve finished eating.”
“It’s rude to text at the table,” Grandpa shot back at her. “Especially with your elders.”
Mom grabbed her glass and downed it.
My phone beeped, and my fingers twitched with the urge to pick it up and read the message. I resisted it, instead turning it down so the screen was flat against the table and I wasn’t being tempted by it.
Instead, I tapped my fingers against the table and turned my attention to eating.
“The phone shouldn’t even be there,” Grandpa continued. “I told you that kids have no respect. In my day we sat and ate and talked about our day.”
Oh, Jesus. This was going south fast.
“Well,” Dad said, politely wiping his mouth, “It’s a little different now, Eddie. Phones at the dinner table are normal.”
“It’s rude.”
“So are you,” Aunt Grace griped. “You’re not letting anyone eat. You’re not talking about your day. You’re just bitchin’.”
“Enough.” Mom held up her hands and stopped the conversation before it got any worse. “Yes, texting at the table is bad manners, and Mallory has now stopped. If anyone would like to begin a civil conversation about their day, do it now.”
Nobody said a word.
“That’s what I thought.” She double-checked her glass to make sure it was definitely empty then sighed. “Everyone just eat.”
We did as we were told. There was silence for the rest of the meal—if you ignored Grandpa’s quiet muttering under his breath to himself, that was.
It was awkward and uncomfortable, but so were all family gatherings. I much preferred the ones where I could simply show up for a couple hours and then disappear.
The ones where the family stayed here? Not my favorite.
Dad finished first and got up, taking his plate with him. It was the cue we all needed to move, and although Mom and I moved to clean up, Grandpa and Aunt Grace didn’t.
Grandpa disappeared into the living room, and Aunt Grace took to the hallway where her purse was.
There was the sound of a door closing and shutting, and Mom looked toward the front door with a glare. She wouldn’t go far—she was too old for that—but there was no doubt she was going for a little walk to cool off.
Dad wrapped his arm around Mom and whispered something in her ear. She deflated but gave him a weak smile and nodded. He squeezed her lightly before letting her go, and Mom crossed the kitchen, pausing to kiss the side of my head.
I waited until she went, then said, “Is she okay?”
Dad shook his head as he opened the dishwasher. “She’s stressed. Having your aunt and grandpa in the house twenty-four-seven is getting to her. They’re picking at just about everything. Your grandpa complained there was one half-dead leaf on the plant earlier.”
I picked up a plate to scrape the leftovers in the trash. “She knows what they’re like. She didn’t have to have them stay for a week if she didn’t want them to.”
“I know that, but you know how she can’t say no to them.”
“I’ll arrange it next time. Everyone will be on vacation.” I scraped the last plate off and carried them over to Dad.
His lips twitched and took the plates from me. “Good thinking, sweetie. Until then, can you leave your phone in your room at mealtimes?”
“I have a better idea,” I said brightly. “How about I just don’t eat here until they’ve gone? Everyone wins.”
“Can I join you for that dinner?”
“How about me, you, and Mom go out, and we leave the skeletons to fend for themselves?”
He choked back a laugh and almost dropped a glass. “Okay, I don’t need to tell you that you shouldn’t call your relatives skeletons.”
“But I’m going to anyway.”
“And after the past few days, I’m not going to confront you about it.” Dad chuckled, putting the last of the dishes in the dishwasher. “We can’t leave them alone. They’ll burn down the kitchen, and we’ve had enough fires in this family for a while, thank you.”
I rolled my eyes and grabbed a wet cloth to wipe the table. “That was a total accident, and you know it.”
“I do.” He grabbed me and kissed my hair. “I can take care of this. Go get your phone and talk to your boss. You’ve kept him waiting long enough.”
“It’s nothing important. I just had a little accident at work, and he w
as gone when I got back from lunch. He’s just checking in.”
“Oh no. What did you do?”
“Spilled coffee. Hot coffee.” I paused. “Thankfully, on the desk, not him, and a miracle made me miss the electronics.”
He chuckled quietly, pushing the dishwasher closed. “Now there is a miracle if I’ve ever seen one. I can finish the kitchen. I get a break from the skeletons—your mom doesn’t. Go do your thing.”
“Hey. Why can you call them skeletons but I can’t?”
He shrugged. “I pay the bills. Now, before you go—I told your mom to take a hot bath. Take her this.” He grabbed the bottle of Jack and filled a glass almost to the brim. “Tell her to not put a ton of water in.”
I laughed and picked it up, then grabbed my phone. “Gotcha. Thanks, Dad.” I darted away before I was caught up in anything else.
It took me only a few seconds to get up the stairs and knock on the bathroom where Mom was running a bath. “Mom? Are you good?”
The lock clicked, and she opened it to reveal her wrapped in her fleece robe. “What’s up, honey?”
“Dad sent this.” I handed her the full glass of Jack.
She smiled, taking it from me. “Thanks, Mal. Sorry I haven’t been nice.”
I waved a hand. “Nah, it’s okay. I mean, Grandpa’s here with his ornery self, and Aunt Grace is a pain in the ass, and if you discount those entirely, I totally disrupted your sex life, so…”
“That’s enough!” She laughed, moving to shut the door.
I stepped back, laughing, and let her do just that. She clearly needed her own time, so I crossed the hall and went into my room with my phone. I was finally able to bring up my last message from Cameron, and I unlocked my phone as I jumped onto my bed.
Cameron: They probably were. It’s been a while since I organized that desk.
Cameron: Hello?
I snorted.
Me: Sorry. Grandpa took offense at ‘kids these days’ using their phones at the dinner table. And by a while, do you mean a year?
His response came a lot faster than I thought I would.
Cameron: Sounds like my family dinners. And yeah, a year is about right…
