“Now it’s your turn on the hot seat,” I say once we’re alone again. “Tell me about you. We’ve been working together for a few weeks now, but I feel like I know hardly anything about you, other than that you’re crazy about sticky notes and highlighters.”
I try to ignore the way pink blooms on her cheeks and how her eyes light up at the mention of her organizing habits. “There’s not much to tell. I live a pretty boring life.”
“Somehow, I doubt that,” I say.
Whitney rolls her eyes. “Really. I come to work in the morning. Then I leave at the end of the day. I go home, scavenge something for dinner, and then go to bed, only to do it all over again.” She glanced up to the ceiling, then back down to me. “Oh, and sometimes I hang out with my friend, Leila, on the weekends. She’s a science teacher.”
I nod my head but lean back in my chair. “There’s got to be more. Come on, tell me. What’s one of your deepest secrets?”
She gives me a look like she doesn’t know if I’m joking or not. I’m not. I want to know her. When I don’t budge from my expectant position, her shoulders depress with an exhale.
“My deepest secrets?” she questions. “Like, work wise or?—”
I nod my head. “Anything. Your dreams, or ambitions, or whatever. Lay it on me. I want to know.”
She’s hesitant as she nibbles on her bottom lip. “Okay, fine. I guess I always dreamed that by this age, I’d be married and have a family. It’s all I’ve ever really wanted. I never imagined I’d be stuck in the corporate world as an assistant still.”
Something indescribable settles in my chest that she’d feelcomfortable admitting that out loud to herboss. And yet, I did ask for a secret. I feel honored that she felt safe enough to share that major aspect of herself with me.
“You want a family?” I ask her softly, even though she just said it out loud. She nods, and the way her face takes on a resigned expression eats at my heart. “Then why don’t you have one?”
She plays with a strand of her sandy blonde hair and looks down, as if she’s now embarrassed by this line of conversation. “I don’t know. I guess I just never met the right person, and I got comfortable in my position with Nexus. And Mr. Peterson was a lot of wonderful things, but I doubt he would have been flexible enough to allow me to be a part-time mom and a part-time assistant at the same time. He’d love my children as if they were his own, but he’d need someone who could be there full-time for him.”
“That’s a shame,” I say.
“I guess. I’m happy where I am, though.”
I can’t help the frown that forms on my face as I lean forward again. “Comfortable isn’t always good, you know? Sometimes you have to get uncomfortable to grow into the best version of yourself. Sometimes you have to take risks to get what you want.”
Whitney falls silent, and her eyes study my face intently like she’s trying to find something that’s not there. She blinks a few times, but then her lips twist into a smile. “You’re right. Maybe someday.”
“How’d you end up working for Peterson anyway?” I inquire.
A fond smile spreads across her face, though it’s tinged with a hint of sadness and mourning. “It’s kind of a long story.” When I don’t move, waiting expectantly, she inhales and then drops her shoulders. I suddenly have a spark of regret, knowingthis is probably still a sore subject for her. But she surprises me when she jumps right into her story. “Okay, well. I grew up in a single-parent home. My father was never around, and then died when I was ten, anyway. So, it was just me and my mom. She died too, from an aggressive form of breast cancer, when I was eighteen. Mr. Peterson was a member at the church we went to, and he had always been a family friend. We spent a lot of holidays at their home. For pretty much my whole life, he was the only father figure I’ve ever had.
“When my mother died, he swooped in, kind of like a hero, and helped me get everything settled, and figure out what my next steps were. After everything, he offered me a position at his company to be his assistant, and I couldn’t say no. At that time, I really had no home, and no money, so it was the obvious choice to say yes.” She shrugs her shoulders like it makes perfect sense in her head. “And I’ve been here ever since.”
My stomach twists with a sick realization that my predecessor was extremely important in Whitney’s life. She can’t possibly know that he was dealing in shady business, otherwise she wouldn’t have such a fond expression on her face when she spoke of him.
It’s hard to unite these two versions of Vance Peterson, knowing that he was such a good person in her eyes, yet possibly stealing large amounts of money from his company on the side. My mind and my heart are conflicted with the realization that at some point, she’s going to have to accept that he wasn’t the person she thought he was. And with that realization comes a sense of guilt, knowing that at some point, I’ll have to ruin that perfect image she has of him.
“Why do you call himMr.Peterson?” I ask, curious. “I’d think that if you were that close to him and his wife, you’d be more on a first name basis.”
She shrugs her shoulder. “I don’t know. I alwayscalled him that as a child and for whatever reason, it carried into my adulthood. The idea of calling him anything but that makes me feel weird.” She tilts her head as she thinks it over. “I guess it’s like if you ever had a favorite teacher in elementary school. I’m sure if you ran into them, even as an adult, you’d still refer to them as Mister or Missus whatever.”
I chuckle and nod, catching on to what she’s saying. Before I have the chance to ask her any further questions about her story, our food arrives, and we get distracted. Each of us digs into the plates in front of us. I try to ignore the way Whitney makes a satisfied noise when she takes the first bite of her chicken sandwich, but the sound cuts me straight to the core.
God, this woman.
She’ll be the death of me, I swear it.
We make small talk while we eat our lunches, though we never get back to the subject of Peterson, which is probably by her design. I’ve just barely started telling her a story about when I was volunteering at a house build when she cuts me off with a raised hand.
“Wait. Youvolunteer?”
There’s something about the way she asks the question that has me laughing. Like it’s a fact that surprises her. “Yes. I work a lot with Habitat for Humanity. I donate to them annually, and I help out on their projects when I can.”
She gives me that weird look again; her eyebrows knit together thoughtfully in the middle and her lips pull off to the side, and I’m not sure if I like it. It’s almost as if she’s gauging me against every other guy she’s ever known. Yet, at the same time, there’s a fire behind her gaze that tells me she likes what she’s looking at. She likes what I’m telling her about myself.
