Big Chicas Don't Cry(29)

And the asshole looked even sexier.

That bastard.

“All right,” Charlie began. “Thanks for meeting me this morning, guys. I didn’t want to do this in my office because, with the glass walls and doors, it’s kinda like being inside a fishbowl. Plus, reporters are nosy, so I figured meeting in here would give us some privacy.”

We both nodded.

“I heard from a third party that there was, um, a very loud disagreement between you two Thursday evening. I know there’s been some tension building, and I think we should talk about it and figure out how we can move forward.”

I opened my mouth to defend myself, but Adrian beat me to it. “Yes, it’s true. There was a slight disagreement over the direction of a story, but it was nothing. In fact, I spoke to Erica over the weekend, and I can see now that my, uh, management style could be better in terms of team building. I hope she’ll understand that I’m still learning, too, when it comes to being a city editor.”

Did I walk into the wrong conference room? Was Adrian Mendes actually admitting that he wasn’t perfect at something?

Perhaps I wasn’t the only one who’d done some thinking last night? Either way, I had wanted a chance to fix things, and he was giving it to me.

“And I realize now,” I quickly interrupted before he could go on, “that I don’t need to be so defensive when it comes to Adrian editing my stories. I feel confident that we’ll be able to put our issues behind us and work together as a team from here on out.”

He met my eyes that time. I couldn’t say for sure, but I think he kind of smiled.

Charlie exhaled a huge breath. “Well, that’s good. I guess we didn’t need to meet after all. Now, if you’ll excuse me. I haven’t had my coffee yet.”

We all stood up to leave. I was about to follow Charlie out the door when Adrian called out, “Erica, can I talk to you for a minute?”

I nodded and walked toward him.

“Did you mean what you said?” he asked. “You know, about us working together?”

I let out a long sigh. “I did. Look, I thought about what you said about me being defensive all the time, and it wasn’t all lies. I didn’t see your edits as wanting to help. Instead, I saw it more like you wanting to point out how much I sucked.”

“You did? I apologize then. Like I said, I need to work on how I approach things . . . and people. How about we start over?”

I smiled and nodded. “Sounds good to me.”

“And what about the team? You’re really talented, Erica. I can tell how much you love playing. Please don’t quit on my account.”

“I’ll think about it. And . . . thanks.” Then, before I could stop myself, I blurted, “I’m sorry about what I said about your beard. But you really do look better without it.”

Adrian blushed. He honest to goodness blushed. My heart stopped at the cuteness of it.

No, no, no. You absolutely cannot think about your boss like this.

So I did the only thing I could think of to get my heart beating again.

I ran out of the conference room.





Chapter Fifteen


SELENA


I checked my new Apple Watch for the third time. Even after a few days, the giddiness of seeing how amazing it looked on my wrist still hadn’t waned.

But even if it had been my old Swatch watch from the third grade, I still would’ve known that Kat had taken a two-hour lunch.

Katherine “Kat” Martin was the senior vice president of marketing at Umbridge & Umbridge. She was beautiful, smart, fashionable, and my boss. She was also one mean, cold-ass bitch.

Kat was actually hired only a few months before me, but you would think by her superior attitude and air of self-importance that she was the mother-effin’ CEO. I did my best to stay out of her way and do my work without much direction. For the most part, Kat communicated with me via email, even though my cubicle was directly outside her door. And the door was usually open. She wrote all her emails in CAPITAL LETTERS and never once said the words thank you, please, or good job. Some days, it would seriously cross my mind that she purposefully withheld information from me in order to make me look bad.

It wasn’t my job to keep tabs on her. And I honestly enjoyed the time when she was out of the office. Something she’d been doing more and more of lately. I couldn’t have cared less about where she was or what she was doing.

Unless it was now, when her boss was asking me if I knew.

Alan had walked to my desk at exactly 11:30 a.m. after realizing she wasn’t in her office. I told him what I always told him: “I think I saw her heading toward the copy room.”

I never knew where Kat disappeared to because she never told me. Still, I knew enough to know that I would look bad if I said as much. So I always lied.

Today, though, Alan wasn’t giving up.

When he called to ask me again if I’d seen her, I checked my watch and realized she’d been gone for over thirty minutes by then. I said I thought she’d gone to lunch.

But now it was 1:30 p.m., and he was standing in front of me and asking again. As awesome and high tech as my new watch was, it couldn’t tell me where Katherine had gone.

I was about to fess up and tell him I had absolutely no idea when I saw her quickly walk into her office and shut the door. But not before I noticed that her blouse was untucked from her skirt and her bun from this morning was long gone.