I nodded. “Yes. I’m not letting you get into trouble over something so ridiculous. Do you want to meet Lacey at this place?”
“Yes, please,” he chirped, and I could see him trying to figure out something in his head, but I waited for the smile that bloomed across his face, rather than asking what he was thinking. “How many people from the office have to be there to qualify as a work function?”
“You have to invite everyone. Even dumpster-fire email writers.”
“Done!” He beamed at me, and I patted his cheek, sensing another two or three weeks of hellish preparation in our futures.
Just as he was getting to his feet, Shelby popped open the door to the hallway and slid inside. She looked the same as she did most days, in a professional button-down shirt and khakis, and her long hair was up in a ponytail that had made its way over her shoulder. The second she laid eyes on us her eyebrows climbed her forehead. She smiled until her nose wrinkled, and then she pointed at Wick. “Mr. Guidry, were you—”
“No,” we both said at the same time, but he dusted off his knees, which didn’t help matters.
Shelby giggled till she snorted before she sighed with her whole body, shoulders slumping. “You should know Xadrian has been talking trash about you to customers and telling them you’re trying to drive up costs unnecessarily.”
“We saw the email, but there was nothing like that in there,” I said.
She shook her head. “He has a private email he uses with customers, too, and I was mistakenly added into an interesting conversation on Slack. I took screenshots, but I wanted to give you some context and let you know what was going on before I forwarded everything to you. I figured that would be a hell of a shock without some warning first.”
“Shit, he seems like he’s out to cause trouble.” Wick frowned and crossed his arms. His foot tapped away while he stared at the floor.
“That isn’t what happened in the last round of team meetings. Wick informed him that he couldn’t be lazy with his designs. There wasn’t a word uttered about a desire to increase the final project costs.” I massaged my temples and stared at the painting of a starry night and pond across the room that wassupposedto be soothing but didnothingto bring my blood pressure down out of the sky.
Wick grunted and checked his watch, the gold winking in the afternoon sunlight cutting through the windows. “What time did Miss Lacey want to meet us?”
“I don’t know, in about an hour probably,” I mumbled. “This is going to take all night. Should I tell her we can’t make it?”
He shrugged. “No, we can let the matter rest until Monday.”
“You know, this seems like a conversation that isn’t meant for a peon like me.” Shelby winked and backed out of the door, sending us awkward finger guns on her way out that had me grinning. Wick waved at her, and she spun around to hustle off.
“We can’t let this go because we have plans,” I said with a sigh.
Wick growled and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I have to decide if I really want to fire him or not.”
“What?” I asked, incredulous. “He’s calling into question your integrity with clients! You have no choice.”
He shrugged. “If I’m not firing him, it can wait. If I am firing him, I must take the time to work out his severance, and that will have to wait until I can talk to my lawyer and see if I can knock the payout down due to the crap he’s pulling. Either way, I am done today. Let’s go meet Miss Lacey.”
“You’re serious here?” I stood and shoved my glasses up the bridge of my nose as he shuffled between me and the desk, then powered down my laptop with a sneaky poke of his finger at the keyboard.
“Absolutely.”
I smiled when he straightened my tie, then grabbed my suit jacket from the back of my chair to hold it up for me. It was a little strange to slide my arms into the jacket. I wasn’t sure why, but it always made my face hot when he helped me, and today was no different. I cleared my throat as I smoothed down the lapels, and he ran his hands across my shoulders before I turned to face him again.
“Shall we?” He held out his hand, and I took it. His smile was worth the pain in the ass that would be waiting for us to start the fresh week on Monday.
“Fine. Let’s just leave everything in the office. I can’t imagine letting this go until Monday, though. I want you to decide what we’re doing about Xadrian tonight, and we can come back in tomorrow and—”
“No, I want us to take the weekend off.” His mouth firmed, and I got the feeling this might turn into an actual fight if I tried to push it.
I stared up at him. “Why? You never really take a full weekend off.”
He shrugged. “I never had a reason to make sure I took the appropriate time for myself, and now... I regret that I made you work so much. There were obviously better things we could’ve been doing on the weekends.”
Smiling, I glanced toward the door since we’d already had one surprise visitor, but he snagged my chin with two fingers and turned my mouth toward himself to lay a kiss on me.
“All right, you talked me into it. Let’s go.”
“Excellent choice.” He dragged me by the hand around the desk to the door.
