There’s another moment of silence, but this one’s different. It’s long and cavernous, as if she’s stunned.
“Understand her better?”
“Don’t bust my balls, please. Just answer the question.”
“I will, but you’ll have to give me a sec to recover.”
Scowling, I demand, “Am I really so bad?”
“You’re not bad at all.”
“And you’re a terrible liar.”
“It’s just that you give the general impression you’d rather go live on Mars than deal with humans, so I’m surprised to hear that you want to understand one of us better.” After a beat, she adds quietly, “Oh.”
“What?”
“You like her, don’t you? You’re attracted to her.”
It’s too bad my brother married someone this smart. I would’ve really enjoyed having a sister-in-law who couldn’t see right through me. “I’m only trying to avoid having to hire my sixth assistant this year.”
“Now who’s the bad liar?”
“Can we please just have this conversation without you reading anything into it?”
She laughs. “Cole, I’m a woman.”
“I don’t even want to know what that means.”
“It means estrogen gives us psychic powers.”
“Then why don’t you go pick the winning lottery numbers?”
“There’s no need to be sarcastic.”
“It’s the only reasonable response when a smart person is being silly. Can we please get back to Shay? You’re making my brain hurt.”
I must sound desperate, because she takes pity on me.
“Okay. You want my opinion about her? Here it is. I think she’s great. And before you get all huffy and puffy and impatient, let me continue. She’s one of those people you feel comfortable with right away because she’s real. There’s no bullshit with her. She’s not trying to impress you. She’s confident, but not obnoxiously so. And she’s obviously bright. But she also seems really kind, which is more important.”
“Kind? She told me I remind her of an owl.”
Emery snickers. “She’s funny too. I forgot to mention that.”
“Pretty sure she wasn’t joking. What else? Does she have family? Siblings? Where’s she from? What does she do on the weekends? What hobbies does she have? Does she have a pet? What about pet peeves? What makes her angry? What makes her happy? What makes her tick?”
After a beat, Emery says, “Cole?”
“What?”
“Take a deep breath.”
I realize I’ve circled my desk half a dozen times, I’ve got the phone in a death grip, and my voice is too loud. So I take her advice and inhale deeply, closing my eyes.
“Now sit down.”
“How do you know I’m standing?”
“Because you’re a McCord. You men shout best on your feet.”
That makes me smile, mainly because she’s right. I sink into my chair and sit back, attempting to relax. “Okay. I’m sitting.”
“Good. Now, all those questions you asked me? You need to ask her.”
“I can’t ask her. They’re too personal.”
“Which is exactly why she’s the one who should answer them. It’s called having a conversation. And don’t tell me you’re not good at that, because you’re doing it right now.”
When I only sit there brooding in silence, she takes pity on me again.
“Here’s something I can tell you, though. And it will give you more insight into her personality than you think.”
Her voice has turned intriguingly sly. I sit up in my chair, my pulse jumping. “What?”
“The name of her favorite book.”
After a moment of consideration, I say, “You’re a genius. What is it?”
“Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez.”
“I’ll buy a copy. Why do you think she likes it so much?”
“I’ll leave that to you to interpret. But I remember something she said about it that struck me as very insightful.”
“What is it?”
“She said people think it’s some sweeping, epic romance, but really it’s about unrealistic expectations. It doesn’t ask if the hero will get the girl—it asks if he should.”
I say flatly, “I hate it already.”
Her laugh is soft. “Well, well. I never thought I’d see the day.”
“If you’re about to say something about me being human, don’t. Goodbye, Emery.”
“Have a wonderful day, Cole.”
She’s still laughing when I hang up.
I decide I can’t be useful any longer today because Shay has invaded my brain like swarming bacteria. Then I feel bad for making such an unflattering comparison. Then I feel ridiculous for feeling bad, which is when I shut down the computer and leave the office.
My receptionist’s desk is empty. She either left for the day or quit. I check my watch. Six o’clock. So she probably didn’t quit, although I wouldn’t be surprised if that happened soon.
When I hired her, I confused her fear with respect. I thought she was just being deferential. Turns out, I scare the shit out of her.
Like most everyone else, except my new assistant, who has no problem telling me off right to my face. Or threatening to sue me if I continue to disrespect her.
I think about Shay the entire ride down the elevator to the parking garage.
I think about her on the drive home.
I think about her as I stand at my kitchen counter wolfing down beef stew right from the can.
I’m still thinking about her when I change into a fresh suit, grab the briefcase that contains my weapons, and head out into the night, on my way to make another person disappear.
Shay
I survive my first week.
The job itself is demanding, partly because there’s so much responsibility, and I have to juggle several high-level projects with hard deadlines, but also because my new boss is ready with sharp questions and an unquenchable drive for perfection.
No mistake is too small for his notice. I become obsessed with tiny details, checking numbers multiple times, double and triple verifying statements of accounts, reformatting spreadsheets until they’re so streamlined and functional, they could’ve been designed by a team of Scandinavian architects.
If my work is without flaw, my reward is silence.
If he finds a mistake, even if it’s something so small as an extra space between words in a report, he flags it and requests an immediate revision.
It’s exhausting. It’s also exhilarating. It becomes like a game, one I’m obsessed with winning.
We communicate only via email. His arrive at all hours of the day and night, as if he never takes breaks, even to sleep. We’re both short and to the point, with zero hint of impropriety. Or humor, for that matter. The emails are as dry as bone.
If anyone else were to read them, they’d think we’d never met in person and had no desire to. They’d never imagine how loudly I moaned when he was deep inside me. How I called out his name and scratched my nails down his back.
How hard he made me come.
He doesn’t visit my office again. He doesn’t pick up the telephone to discuss issues. He simply shoots off curt emails, which I respond to immediately, always wondering what, if anything, he thinks of me.
I think of him constantly.
I relive our night at the hotel a thousand times in my head. I calculate the odds of meeting again the way we did, as boss and employee. I wonder what strange forces were at work to bring us together, going all the way back to the first time I set foot into Lit Happens, years ago.
At the end of the week, I realize I’m being silly.
If there’s one thing my disastrous relationship with Chet taught me, it’s that obsessing over a man is a waste of time. Especially a man who made his intentions clear by spelling out the company policy against superior-subordinate relationships right into my face.
As I’m getting ready to leave the office late Friday afternoon, I decide to put the obsessing behind me and move on with my life.
That lasts about five minutes, until someone knocks on my closed office door.
“Come in.”
The door opens to reveal a smiling young guy dressed casually in khakis and a navy-blue polo with the company logo on the shoulder. He’s holding a brown kraft envelope in his hands.
“Hi. Shay Sanders?”
“That’s me.”