LUNA
By daythree at my new job, I was starting to wonder if I was the type of person who could get away with murdering my new boss and disposing of his body. I’d watched enough true crime that I thought I had a pretty good handle on what not to do, but I wasn’t sure yet if I had the disposition for homicide. However, the more he pushed, the more likely I was to get there, that was for damn sure. The man had gone out of his way to make my life a complete misery between the hours of eight and five.
Keeping my composure while secretly wanting to jab a pencil into the man’s eye was getting harder and harder. He fought me every step of the way on everything I did, from converting his joke of a filing system to digital in an effort to free up space and boost him into the twenty-first century, to the type of Post-It notes I’d stocked—he hated the pop-up style ones and thought the bright colors were childish and ridiculous.
I worked tirelessly to prove I could do a good job, reminding myself over and over that my first paycheck was still a week and a half away, but sometimes even that didn’t feel like enough to keep me from losing my cool.
If he wasn’t riding me about the million and one things he thought I was doing wrong, he was complaining. Complaining about the kind of work he was getting now that we were officially open for business and taking on clients, complaining about the lack of delivery options in such a small town, complaining about the fact that most everyone who walked into the office already knew the gist of our first meeting. It was one thing after another until I was convinced the man just didn’t know how to be happy.
Ignoring his tantrums seemed to be the only thing that worked, so on day four, I rerouted all the calls that would come in at my desk to the phone in the conference room up in the loft area on the second floor, and buried myself in work, digging through the boxes of files—Nate’s current and inefficient system—and scanning each and every page into the digital folder I’d created.
I’d been so lost in my work that I’d lost track of time as the hours rushed by. With the very last document scanned and digitally put in place, I closed the lid of the very last file box with smile, a firm sense of accomplishment making my chest feel light and loose. Pumped on adrenaline from finishing the most boring, menial task in the world, I hefted the closest box up and started down the stairs with it. One down, only fifteen more to go, I thought as I hit the landing.
“Jesus Christ, what are you doing? You’re going to fall and break your neck.”
“Ha! I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction,” I replied right before Nate rushed over and yanked the box out of my hands. I let out a breath, shaking out my straining arms. I wasn’t really hip on cardio, but if doing this meant I didn’t have to hit the gym or go for a run, I’d take it. “Thanks. If you’ll just put that by the door, I’ll go up and grab another.” I turned on my heel—open-toed in a soft bone color this time—and reached for the stair railing.
“Nuh-uh, no way.” He braced the cardboard box on his hip and under one arm, like it weighed next to nothing, and grabbed my wrist before I could take a step, preventing me from moving. I flinched at the electric shock his touch sent across my skin, and my gaze shot down to where his long fingers wrapped around my wrist, making it look positively dainty. I was suddenly very aware of his hands in a way I’d never been aware of that appendage on another person before. He had nice, well-shaped nail beds and short, blunt, clean fingernails. There was still the faintest pale band on his finger from the wedding ring he’d worn for years before his divorce, and when the hell did I start finding a man’s hands attractive?
I managed to shake my head clear of the unexpected daze as he continued in that brusque tone he always used with me. “You aren’t carrying boxes down these stairs.” He jerked his chin at my feet. “Especially in those shoes. That’s a worker’s comp claim just waiting to happen.”
I forced an eyeroll, hoping the strange reaction I’d just had to his touch didn’t show on my face as I pulled my arm from his grip. “Oh, give me a break. I’ll be fine, thank you very much. I used to live in heels. I assure you, I can navigate a flight of stairs no problem.”
He gave his head an abrupt shake. “Not with a box. No way. You need something moved, I’ll do it.” He registered the box in his arms then. “Speaking of, what the hell are you doing with my files anyway?”
“I found a company that does offsite archiving and shredding. I’ve scheduled them to pick the boxes up and store them at their facility until you go through the digital files I created and decide what you need to keep hard copies of and what you don’t. If something comes up and you need an old file in hand, all I have to do is fill something out on their website and they’ll deliver what we need back to us. Simple, efficient, and a huge space-saver given we don’t have much square footage here.”
“That’s... actually pretty smart.” I nearly laughed at the sour, sickly look on his face, as if admitting I’d done something right made him physically ill.
“I know. I’m full of brilliant ideas. Do you need to sit down after saying that? You look like you’re about to throw up.”
He let out a humph, muttering under his breath as he turned and carried the box toward the front of the office. “Don’t you touch those boxes,” he called back at me. “I’ll handle them myself.”
If he wanted to handle the manual labor, he wasn’t going to get any complaints from me.
* * *
I leftwork right at five and drove straight to Warren’s General Store. It had been a difficult day in a week of difficult days, thanks to my new boss, and I planned to treat myself to a night of relaxation with a bottle of wine, a steamy bubble bath, and my latest romance audio book.
“Hey, honey,” Georgia greeted over the soft tinkling of the bell over the door. “How’re you doing?”
I changed direction, heading toward the register where she sat instead of the wine aisle. “Fine. Exhausted. In desperate need of wine after the day I’ve had.”
Her face pulled into a look of concern. “Everything okay? That boy of mine isn’t making things hard for you, is he?”
“No,” I assured her with a smile, even though he absolutely was. But she didn’t need to know that. “Trust me, I can handle him.” At least that was true. I’d learned over the past few days to just suck it up at work, then go home and scream into a pillow until spots danced in front of my vision from lack of oxygen. It was cathartic. But tonight, wine.
“Oh, honey, I know you can. If there’s a woman on this continent who can handle that man, it’s you. I love him, and I’m glad he’s home, more than you could possibly know, but I’m not blind to the fact my son can be a pain in the rear end when he wants to be.”
I lifted my brows and laughed. “Ah, so you do know him. And that particular want seems to be constant.”
She reached across the counter and patted the back of my hand. “I have all the faith in the world you’ll put him in his place.” She tightened her grip as she leaned forward and lowered her voice, her eyes doing that glinting thing again. “And then, just maybe the two of you will find that spark that drew you together the first night you met.”
I groaned. “Georgia, come on. Don’t start with that. You know my rule. No—”
“Relationships,” she finished for me, holding up her hands before clasping them together at her chest. “I know, I know. But you’d be so cute together,” she cooed. “And you’d be so good for him. I just know it.”
“That’s not going to happen,” I insisted, then grabbed hold of the first thing I could think of to shift the topic. “How are things working out with your granddaughter as free labor?”