Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 145231 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 726(@200wpm)___ 581(@250wpm)___ 484(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145231 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 726(@200wpm)___ 581(@250wpm)___ 484(@300wpm)
“You did, yes.” I’m a little amazed he remembers the disaster when he can be so oblivious. I’m also stumped at kid logic. “But I thought you didn’t like him?”
“I don’t. I mean, only a little.” Arlo looks at me like it’s obvious. “But he owns a whole building, Mom. He’s rich.”
“Maybe so, but—”
“You gotta listen to him. That’s not fair!”
I eye him carefully. Only five years old and he hates office politics. I have trained the boy well.
“That’s how it works sometimes. It doesn’t mean it’s bad. You have to listen to me,” I tell him. “That doesn’t make me so special, does it?”
“No, but you’re a grown-up!” He rolls his eyes so hard I laugh. “I’m just a kid.”
“So?”
“So it’s cool Mr. Grumpybutt gets to tell you what to do. He gets to boss around a lot of people.”
Well, no argument there.
Arlo picks at his garlic bread crust.
“If I get a button shirt, I can be like him!”
Perfect.
Absolutely peachy.
My son, estranged from his unknown father, has decided after a single meeting to fixate on him. To flipping imitate him.
A man who would, undoubtedly, freak like his hair’s on fire if he knew the kid who tore up his precious new property was really his own son.
A man who would absolutely go nuclear if he had to contemplate giving up a shred of his seemingly perfect lifestyle to burn one hour as a dad.
Like I said, call me Miss Unlucky.
The gods of good fortune decided to forsake me forever after one random night on a casino boat, and I’ll never be over it.
6
QUIT WHILE YOU’RE AHEAD (PATTON)
All things considered, the next couple weeks go smoothly.
Aside from the fact that I can’t get Salem’s face out of my head.
The way she looked at me after I reassured her it was a simple mistake, and we don’t have to dwell on it.
Like somehow, I’m the bad guy.
Like by saying that, I torched her feelings in a way I still don’t understand.
Like I switched off some light inside her by calling it a mistake.
Why?
Clearly, that’s all it was.
It’s not like she has any lingering attraction to me. That’s a one-way street, and I’m the clown who’s been stripping her naked with every glance, even if I’d die before I act on it a second time.
Company ink and all.
Also, I’ve been with enough women to know when they’re turned on and when they want to throw me out the window.
I just hate that she’s avoiding me.
Not totally, of course.
She’s my employee and a manager here, which makes it impossible to ghost me completely, but she does her damnedest.
Conveniently, she misses my calls, sending back the world’s shortest replies to my emails and texts. She tries like hell to pretend I don’t exist during meetings.
“Do you have any suggestions?” I ask during the review of employee logistics—the first time we’ve seen each other face-to-face for more than an hour since the car incident.
She doesn’t look me in the eye.
“I have a few,” she says. Quietly, damn her.
“You mentioned the cleaning routine was disruptive to some of our guests.”
“That’s right.” She launches into how we could handle the schedule better, given all amenities are open twenty-four seven.
I do my best to focus on what she’s saying, and not the fiery-red lipstick she’s wearing today.
Or the way the sadness seeped into her eyes when I asked if she was on that riverboat with me.
Or the brutal fact that I know what’s under her neat blue blouse.
Or hell, the fact that long after that one-night stand, I could still smell her perfume on me and dreamed about the way she purred.
The way she laughed at the table games, before I found myself inside her, haunted me for months after that night.
She’s not laughing now.
She looks like a woman who’s forgotten how.
“Another thing, I think we should consider increasing security. Maybe add one more person for the overnights,” she says as I make myself pay attention to her again.
The ice in her eyes feels so frosty it makes the forty-degree day outside feel balmy.
“We already have two security guards patrolling overnight.”
“I think we should make it three, enough to handle the rooftop bar and cover the floors every half hour.” She pauses. “You wanted input. There it is.”
She might be right. Bumping up our personnel also means better coverage for the cameras, without anyone skipping out on checking footage to finish long patrols.
“Why else?” I push back. “You must have another reason.”
I’m leaning into this mentorship thing, wanting her to make her case as tight as she can.
For a second, I think she’ll tear my throat out for hounding her, but she swallows hard.
Her throat tightens and I think she clasps hands under the table.
“This is a large building with balconies and several entrances. There are a lot of potential security risks here. Surely, our guests would feel safer with a little more security presence, and the guards wouldn’t be stretched so thin. It will also save you from any bad PR out of the gates if it stops any incidents.”