Her Secret

by Bloom, Penelope

  “And how do you feel, Peter Barnidge? Because right now, I feel very curious.”

  I smirked. “I’m sure you do. I—” when the escalator reached the second floor, I could see the small mob of forty or so fans harassing my assistant, who looked on the brink of tears.

  I apologized to my assistant and then spent the next two hours in a whirlwind of posing for pictures, signing books, and talking to the most devout fans of mine who had been waiting even when it seemed like I wasn’t going to show. Violet was never too far from my side, but she did a good job of blending into the background and only raised the suspicions of a handful of fans who asked if she was my girlfriend. I’d explained that Violet was an employee the first time, and the answer had stuck. I felt a little guilty about that. I wasn’t sure why I was still trying to deny what I felt, except that I didn’t know if Violet even wanted anything to come of what we’d just done, either.

  Once the initial crowd and the surge of people who heard I’d showed up cleared out, I finally had some breathing room.

  Violet and I sat behind the table where my books were on display and waited during a brief lull in visitors.

  “You know, I saw your sticky note for the thriller you’re writing,” she said.

  “What are you talking about? How would you—”

  She smirked in a self-satisfied way. “I have my ways.”

  “You can be unbelievable.”

  “Thank you.”

  “It wasn’t a compliment.”

  “And that’s not for you to decide. So, is what you’re writing the follow up to What’s Buried There? Or are you writing something new?”

  “It’s still the follow-up. Not that it matters. I think I end up deleting two pages for every page I write.”

  “Hm. Well, I think the answer is obvious. You have to destroy Kristen. Now, keep in mind I’m a neutral party here. Completely unbiased.”

  “Right. And how do you propose I destroy her?”

  "First, you finish the book. Next, you use your brilliant marketer of an employee to put together a social media plan to get the truth out there. Hashtags. Memes. Everything. Then you release your book, and everybody realizes it was written by the same author because it’s awesome, and while this is all going on, you’ve got your lawyer trying to nullify the contract, since it was bullshit anyway.”

  I laughed. “That’s a nice fantasy. But it wouldn’t work.”

  “What’s the harm in trying?”

  “I’d have to finish the book, for starters. I’d also risk making a total ass out of myself, dragging my own name through the dirt, and ruining my career.”

  Violet pursed her lips in consideration. “Okay. Yeah, some of that is possible, but don’t you think it’d be worth it? Just for the chance?”

  I was saved from having to answer because a fresh wave of fans came to the table asking for signatures. I was in the middle of posing for a selfie with two women from Australia when Kristen showed up to my booth. She wore a sequined black dress and heavy eyeliner that made her look every bit like the villainous parasite she was.

  “Look who it is,” she said.

  The fans I’d taken a picture with immediately picked up on the tone and inched away, giving Kristen and I a semi-circle of space like we were high school kids about to have a fight in the hallway. Violet was still sitting at the table, but she looked ready to forget her ankle and charge if Kristen gave her a reason.

  “Yeah, go figure. I’m at the place where I’ve been scheduled to be for months. I’m even at the table with my name and my books on it. What a shock.”

  Kristen rolled her eyes. “I actually came here to compliment you, so you can save the nastiness. I got a little bored after our run-in at breakfast and decided to do a little digging on your girlfriend. I just never took you for the type to go after someone with so much baggage. Seriously, Peter, I’m impressed. Most guys in your position would pass over damaged goods, but look at you. Happy as can be!” She clapped her hands lazily together, gave an equally low-energy eyebrow wiggle.

  “What are you talking about?”

  Kristen bit her lip in delighted shock. “Wait. You don’t know, do you? This is too perfect. As much as I wish I could stay to watch the blow-up, I have a busy schedule. I just wanted to stop on my way through and give you a commendation. Although, now it seems like that was for nothing. You didn’t even know what kind of charity case you were dealing with.”

  I waved Kristen off. Whatever she was talking about wasn’t something I wanted to hear from her. I was almost ready to write off the whole conversation as just another chapter in the psychotic mind of Kristen Woods, but when I looked back to the table, Violet’s face told me something was wrong.

  “I’m sorry everyone,” I said to the fans who were still waiting for me to sign their things. “I’m going to need a few minutes, but if you come back in an hour or so I’ll be ready.” I moved to Violet’s side and sat. I didn’t press her to talk right away, because it looked like she was already trying to find the words to tell me. I also had a sinking, twisting feeling in my stomach that I was about to learn my days of being a blind idiot weren’t over, after all. I thought again about what I’d seen in her purse—the crayon, the kids snack, and the little toy lipstick. Everything happened so fast that I’d nearly forgotten all about it, but now…

  “There’s something I haven’t told you,” she said slowly. “You know that racquet you saw me looking at back on our little snowstorm hike?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I was thinking of buying it. For my daughter…”

  Everything clicked into place, starting with the look that had been on her face during the interview. I’d told her someone with kids wouldn’t survive working for me, and she’d looked like she had seen a ghost. The early morning solo tennis accident. The contents of her purse. I even remembered something I’d totally ignored before. That first day at the convention in New York, there had been a random kid in the room. I never even stopped to wonder why that was, but it was obvious now, just as obvious as it should’ve been then.

  She has a kid. No. She’d had a kid this entire time and she’d lied to my face about it. All those times I’d felt like I was being played again, I’d been right. In an instant, it felt like I was back in that moment when I’d first realized what Kristen did.

  I ran through a few things I wanted to say, struck through them all, and decided to simply walk away. I needed some space to breathe.

  “Peter?” Violet said.

  I ignored her. I just wanted to get somewhere else. I could call in plane tickets and text the information to my assistant. Violet could fly back to New York tonight. Without me. I could go back on my own time. And then what? I’d fire her? Yell at her? Tell her she was a shitty human being for tricking me?

  I found an empty conference room and closed myself inside. I sank down to the ground and thumped my head against the door a few times. Fuck. Some small part of me thought I was making too big a deal of this. But it wasn’t about the lie itself. I didn’t care that she had a kid. It was that she’d just proven she was both capable and willing to withhold something huge from me. I’d found out about her kid, but who knew what else she was hiding? I didn’t even know if she was single.

  I knew I should go back and talk to her. As pissed as I was, I knew it would be worse if I stewed on this until Monday. That would give my imagination plenty of time to wander. But I didn’t move an inch.

  I pulled out my phone and dialed the airport. “Hi, I need to buy a ticket for one to New York. Tomorrow morning. Her name is Violet Browning.”

  17

  Violet

  My flight landed just before noon on Monday. My last contact with Peter had been to watch him walk away after he learned about Zoey. His assistant told me he’d booked me a flight and had instructed her to make sure I got there okay. Even when he was giving my ass a kick out the door, Peter Barnidge still had to make sure I was looked after.

  I w
anted to be indignant and pissed. Maybe I’d let myself, at first. No matter how I looked at the whole situation, I couldn’t excuse myself, though.

  I’d called an emergency meeting with Lilith once I was back in New York. She got Liam to agree to stay home with Zoey for an hour or so until we’d had a chance to talk.

  She met me at a local bakery. Lilith wore an oversized, black torn t-shirt and neon pink leggings. I was always secretly jealous that she could pull off the style that could not be expressed in any other way than as fuck you chic.

  “Wow,” Lilith said, plopping down in the seat across from me at my corner table. “Sleep much?”

  “No. Thank you. I haven’t.”

  “Yeah, no shit. It looks like you tried to go to sleep, and sleep went to your face with a baseball bat instead.”

  I grinned. “I missed you. A little.”

  “You were gone like two days, and since I’m not a clingy psychopath, I’m not going to admit I missed you. So… I got your text. And yes, I agree, you did fuck things up.”

  I sighed. I’d sent Lilith one of those monster texts on the plane ride this morning. It was the kind of text that is so big it has to be sent in several phases and the person on the receiving end has to wait forever between texts while they watch the little “...” keep pulsing. “Okay, but how do I fix it?”

  “That depends. How big was it?”

  “What?”

  “Peter’s little peter. His cock. How big was it?”

  “I don’t see how that matters?”

  She winced. “Damn. So it was that small?”

  “No. It was like,” I held up my hands to indicate the length and then made a “C” shape with my fingers to indicate the thickness. “Like that big. And why am I telling you this?”

  Lilith grinned mischievously and shrugged. “I don’t know. But you said the sex was good, and I was curious if it was because of the tool or because he knew how to use the tool.”

  I glared. “It was both, now focus. Okay? So what do I do?”

  “That depends on him. I mean, did he ask you to come into work today.”

  “No?”

  “Did he tell you not to?”

  “No…”

  “Okay, so the first obstacle could be that you’re already fired and don’t realize it. You can always use the couch at our place, by the way.”

  I put my hands in my hair and bulged my eyes. I hadn’t even thought of that. Peter probably couldn’t technically fire me just because I lied about having a kid, just like he couldn’t technically not hire me for having a kid in the first place. But not calling and not showing up gave him legal justification to fire me, even if I had only stepped off the plane an hour ago.

  “Maybe he won’t fire you?” she said when she saw the look on my face. “Okay, how about we pause this. You put your phone on speaker, give him a call, and just follow my cue. Okay?”

  I pulled out my phone, nearly fumbled it to the ground, and then set it on the table. I really wished I’d been able to sleep last night, but I had only laid in my hotel bed tormented by the idea that I was supposed to make some huge apology gesture like going up to his room on my hands and knees, begging forgiveness. I felt bad about lying to him, but I didn’t feel hands and knees bad, so I’d stayed right where I was, worrying myself into a sleepless night.

  To my surprise, Peter picked up on the second ring.

  “Why aren't you at work? Your plane should’ve landed an hour ago.”

  “Because she’s on speaker phone, dickbreath,” Lilith shouted loud enough to draw plenty of curious glances from nearby tables. So much for following her cue.

  I put my hands up to shield my eyes like I’d just done something stupid in traffic, because despite what people might say, you could absolutely hide from shame.

  “Um,” Peter said. “Do I know you?”

  “You will get to know me if you don’t—”

  "Lilith," I said. "Just... " I picked up the phone and turned it off speakerphone, ignoring the stabbing motions Lilith was making at me. "I can be at the office in, uh," I clicked my phone to see what time it was. I'd already made arrangements to have Lilith and Liam watch Zoey until I was finished with work today before I'd known what time we were due back on Monday, just to be safe. "I can come now."

  “Good. Find a way to get here if you want to keep your job.”

  “Tell him,” Lilith mouthed in an over-exaggerated way.

  “He hung up,” I said, pointing to the phone.

  “What a fucking asshole.”

  I sighed. “Yeah. Do you mind if I just come by and pick up Zoey after work?”

  “That’s fine. We love the little gremlin. She can stay as long as she needs to. But if I find out that he hasn’t already started forgiving you by the next time I see you, I’ll make a personal visit to Peter’s office. Tonight.”

  “Yeah, well, he leaves at like four, so you’d probably just find locked doors.”

  “At four,” Lilith said again in the same, menacing tone.

  I grinned. “I appreciate that you’re always there to be willing to murder someone on my behalf. I wish I’d had a friend like you my whole life. Except then again, you’d probably be in jail already for murdering Dawson.”

  “Jail is for people who get caught.”

  I laughed, but there was a glint of something in Lilith’s eyes that wiped the smile from my face. Not for the first time, I wondered if Lilith was actually a serial killer on the side, but I was secretly glad she was my little serial killer, if that’s what she was.

  “Well, wish me luck.”

  “No. You don’t need luck. You need cleavage.” Lilith reached across the table and started tugging at my shirt.

  I laughed, slapping at her hands. “Get your hands off my boobs!” I whispered.

  “I will, as soon as you release them.” Lilith finally managed to tug my blouse down a little, which satisfied her enough to get her to sit back. “There. That will help.”

  “I don’t think Peter is weak-willed enough to have his mind changed by a few inches of boob.”

  “It’s shock and awe, Violet. You’ve got to go in, boobs blazing, booty shaking. He starts to think he’s still mad? Boom. Your ass is in his face. He wants to fire you? Bam. Boobs. It’s simple, really.”

  I grinned. “You’re lucky I know you’re mostly kidding, or else I’d think you were crazy.”

  “Nobody wants anything to do with crazy until they think it’ll get the job done. I’m just saying…”

  “Yeah, well, I’m not going in there to shake my ass around and shove my boobs in his face. I’m going to talk to him and calmly explain what happened and why I waited so long to tell him the truth. Like an adult. Probably, at least.”

  18

  Peter

  I unpacked the duffel bag I’d lugged around all weekend once I was in my office. I’d dragged around four drafts of my current manuscript, the final draft of my last two books, and various other documents I would’ve needed if my tax or financial people had a question. I hadn’t ended up needing a single document from my bag all weekend, but knowing I had it all within arm’s reach was comforting.

  Part of me knew what I was doing was more about the ritual and the comfort of the action than practicality. I carefully sorted through everything in my bag until I’d put everything back in its rightful place, where it’d likely remain untouched until the next time I took a trip.

  I focused on my task mostly to keep my mind off Violet. Despite a sleepless night and a quick flight back to New York this morning, I still had no idea what I wanted to do about her. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. On an instinctual level, I wanted to bend her over my desk and slap her ass while I lectured her about hiding things from me. I wanted to fuck the truth out of her. I wanted to whisper threats in her ear while I took her from behind until she moaned out every last thing she was still hiding from me.

  But that was fantasy, and it wasn’t helping. The real Violet Browning was going
to show up any minute, and I suspected our first interaction would play a huge part in determining where things went. The issue was that I had no idea where I wanted them to go. Not really, at least.

  Anastasia stuck her head in my office. “Hey,” she said.

  I looked up expectantly. She was my cousin, but we’d never been close before or after I gave her this job. To be completely honest, I wouldn’t have even hired her if I didn’t think she was the most qualified applicant, either. I didn’t believe in playing favorites with family. “What is it?” I asked.

  “She’s here.”

  “Okay?” I couldn’t hide the irritation from my voice. Anastasia knew I didn’t like to be interrupted. Visitors meant paging my phone, not bursting into my office.

  “Sorry. It’s just that I know you’re probably planning on chewing her out, but I like her. I think she has been good for you. Maybe just consider listening before you talk when she comes in, okay?”

  I frowned. Anastasia had never even come close to trying to give me advice on how to handle my business before. She must’ve really felt strongly to put her neck out so far for Violet. I grunted, because that was all I could manage.

  Anastasia flashed a tight smile and slipped back out.

  When the door opened again, Violet stepped in. I wasn’t sure what I expected, but I didn’t expect her to look somewhere between pissed and determined. I also didn’t expect it to look like her blouse was intentionally tugged low to show as much of her breasts as possible.

  My natural reflex was to fight back against the softness I already felt for her by saying something mean. I would’ve probably harassed her about being late, whether that was remotely reasonable or not. Instead, I thought of Anastasia’s advice and I kept my mouth shut.

  “I lied about having a daughter,” Violet said. She was still standing almost a ridiculous distance from me, like she’d been afraid to step any farther into my office than she had to for the door to shut.