Resting my head on the desk, I was tempted to let the tears fall, but I couldn’t let my employees see me cry. It would get back to Father, and there would be questions and inferences that I wasn’t the right person to succeed him. I didn’t give a damn about the job. It meant nothing when Merrick was out there somewhere living his life without me.
I’d tortured myself that he’d met and married in the years since we’d seen one another.
My fingers found the handle on the bottom desk drawer. I kept it locked because no one was to discover what I brought from home every morning and took with me when I left in the evening. Using the key I kept around my neck, I unlocked it and brought out Merrick’s shirt. It still had a trace of his scent, and I lifted it to my face and inhaled.
Thinking back to that last night at the bar, I recalled the shots he’d poured me and how we’d kissed on the stairs near my room. How I refused to wash my sheets until my roommate had snatched them when I was at class and taken them to the laundry. He almost got a bloody nose for that.
I fingered the invitation. The cardstock was expensive. Bex had gone all out, and I expected the ballroom to be adorned with feathers and finery and every surface brushed with gold. Masks were optional apparently. I was ready to toss it in the trash, but Father returned, striding through the open door without a greeting.
“The family and the board expect you to attend the ball. Besides, invitations are sought-after, and Bex would be offended if you don’t go.”
He was exhausting, and he wouldn’t give up, until I agreed. I was tired of fighting him. I could do this one thing, but when I didn’t find my mate, Father would arrange a soothsayer, and when they didn’t produce a mate, he’d have me examined in case my scent was at fault. Nothing I did would ever be good enough until I was mated and marked.
Tired of making excuses, I held up the invitation and said I’d go. And what did it matter? It was one ball. I wouldn’t find a mate, and I’d wear a mask and steer clear of Bex and her magic.
Father nodded and left, and I tucked the invitation into my jacket pocket and turned back to my laptop. At least the open bar would make the evening tolerable.
3
MERRICK
I looked at my luggage and had to shake my head at myself. I was going to be gone for a week… a week to the mountains, where I was probably going to spend most of the time in my accommodations and my sweats. But what did I do? I packed a full-size suitcase, a carry-on suitcase, and a large plastic tote with random items from around the house I thought I might need.
It was absolutely ridiculous, but it was the first vacation I could remember in a long time, and it came at the absolute perfect time. I was going to miss all the Christmas parties at work, at least the biggest ones. There was nothing inherently horrible about working events, but they tended to be a ball of confusion, with our current management, and I wasn't in the mood for that. Plus, seeing people all happy-happy about Christmas only reminded me about how little the holiday was going to mean for me this year… most years, probably forever.
After my brother’s kidney transplant, he was a whole new person. He could be a normal college kid after that, hanging withfriends, going to basketball games, playing far too many video games, and meeting his true love.
My father and I never let him know the sacrifices we made to pay for that surgery and all the treatment needed before and after it. He was still a kid when he first got sick and suffered for years. The last thing he needed was to worry about money after dealing with all of that.
Now he was living with his wife and kids and had invited Dad to Christmas there. I was happy for them and glad my father could go, but the plane tickets were outside my budget, and I bowed out, saying I needed to work. Heck, this free vacation was outside my budget. But such is life.
“Stop it.” I patted my cheek. “Pull your head out of your ass. This vacation is going to be fun. Quit having a pity party for one.”
I made one last check of my packing list, decided I was as packed as I was going to be, and took my tote out to the car. My phone started buzzing in my pocket partway there, but I needed both hands and ignored it. There were very few people I didn’t have on mute, which meant it was probably important, but those few minutes were going to have to wait.
I pulled it out when I got back inside and saw it was Sally.
“Fuck.” That meant something went wrong at work, and they needed me to fix it. I wasn’t in the mood, but if she was calling, Manager Steve would be next, and I’d take Sally over them any day. Maybe they were just wishing me a happy trip or asking me to pick them up a souvenir. They were the reason I won, after all. Yeah, I was going with that.
She picked up on the first ring. The sound of Chef explaining something very loudly, but not quite loud enough for me tounderstand, was the first thing I heard. Knowing the time, he was letting everybody know what hors d’oeuvres were being passed. He loved to create unique items for that and insisted we all be well-versed in them, not that anybody cared. When you walked by someone with a platter of food, they would, at the most, say, “Is this gluten-free?” or “Is this vegan?” and then grab something.
“You just caught me, Sally, I’m on my way out.” Please let that be true.
“About that,” she was whisper-shouting. “Hold on a second.” The sound of Chef grew further and further away, and I heard the telltale seal of the walk-in open. “Listen, the manager fucked up. They didn’t just fuck up. They, like, royally fucked up, and you’re on the schedule.”
“But I put in to have it off.” And I had witnesses. Many of them.
“I know, but they called us all in the dining room and shouted that anybody who wasn’t here that was on the schedule was getting fired. No excuses, no exceptions. You need to get your ass in here. You have half an hour. I said that you were running late. Car troubles.”
“Sally, why didn’t you tell them I put in for it?” I wasn’t pissed at Sally, but I came across as harsh. “Sorry. Didn’t mean it that way.”
“You’re fine. I started to, and the first thing they said was, ‘Well, we’ll see if they make it on the schedule ever again.’ And I figured you didn’t want to be fired right before Christmas. The job market’s not good during the happiest time of year.”
Fuck, she was right. “Fine. I’ll be there.”
I couldn’t guarantee watching my words when I saw the manager, but fuck it. This was something I had told them about half a year ago. I’d been working extra shifts to make sure I could afford my bills, missing a week of work. Heck, I’d been rambling on about it this entire time. I was sure every single co-worker was sick of hearing about it. This was intentional. There was no way it wasn’t.
If I did the shift and left a day late for my trip, it was still six days off. My stomach dropped as I realized this might not be the only date she put me down for. It had better be six days off. If I was on the schedule all week, then I was walking out and would figure out the mess later.
