Page 1 of My Forbidden Boss

Chapter 1

Adeline

The alarm blares, shattering me from a miserable dream and shooting me into the same reality. Weak light diffuses through the crusted filth on the only window of my bite-sized apartment; dirty not through intention, but apathy.

I throw off the blankets and wince as the frigid air strikes my flesh. The crack in the window bleeds in snow-laced air and steals any body heat that might have warmed my meager room during the night. I ignore the shiver and force myself to stand, swiping my cell phone from the edge of the sink next to my bed and shutting the noise off as the person living next door thumps on the wall.

The walls are made from tissue paper and despair.

The room my father rented for me in Hell’s Kitchen is smaller than the room in the apartment in Moss Creek, where I live in with my mother. You’d think they’d be perks with blackmail.

You’d think my father wouldn’t be an asshole either.

But life gave me an asshole blackmailer who just happens to be my father. Biologically speaking. He may have played a tiny part in creating my life, but the eighty-year-old corner store alcoholic back in Moss Creek gives me more dad vibes than my own dubious flesh and blood.

I take two steps across the floor space, open the shower stall door next to the kitchen bench and turn on the water, hopping from foot to foot to avoid ice building on the bottom of my feet while I wait for the hot water to kick in. It runs like it doesn’t want to be here, and like me, has no choice.

There is no bathroom in this apartment. Or kitchen. Or bedroom. Bed, closet, sink, toilet, shower and my doom are conveniently stuffed into one small room. I measured ten paces from wall to wall yesterday when I first arrived. I’d give anything to be back with Mom, but she’s the reason I’m freezing my butt off in New York in a dingy apartment more suited to be a storage room than living area. Who knew? Maybe in a past life it was, and some greedy asshole resurrected the space to rent to the poor and abused.

Score none for me.

Steam fills the air. I test the water. Tepid, but warmer than the air. I throw off my pajamas, the ones with the unicorns that Mom gave to me for my sixteenth birthday, and dash under the water. Goosebumps break out over my skin in the small moment it takes me to go from freezing to maybe warm.

Five years later, I still wear the same pajamas, but everything else in my life has changed.

At least the unicorns still smile.

The water pressure wilts from the shower head and I do my best to scrub the suds from my hair. The floor, and everything around me, vibrates when a train trundles past. It rattles my empty mug on the sink drainer, along with the foundations of the building.

If I could see out of the window, I’d be able to catch sight of the people on that train. I could reach out and touch the tracks should I need to. I could get on the train and let it take me to the end of the line and the end of my predicament. But the grime on the window keeps me in.

My Mom’s future keeps me in.

I finish with the last of the conditioner. It’s cheap and makes my hair wiry, but it’s all I can afford. Dad might pay the rent, but he didn’t help me get here. I dug into the meager money I’d managed to save from waitressing at Bob’s Burgers, shelled out for the bus ticket to bring me here and for a new wardrobe from the local charity store. All on false pretenses.

All because I want to do the right thing by my mother.

All because there’s no one to help her but me.

All because life chews up the vulnerable and those who can’t afford better.

I’ve spent a lifetime with an invisible sign tacked to my back that says kick the poor puppy. She has no one to stand up for her and no way to pay for respect. Someone like me does something to people who get a twisted kick out of beating the downtrodden. Makes them feel bigger and better about themselves.

If I could have afforded it, I would have paid for a psychologist to work that out for them.

Low self-esteem hurt. Me. Not them. Not when they worked out their aggression in the school hallways and later when they ordered their shakes and fries from Bob’s Burgers.

I should thank them. Nothing anyone said or did surprised me anymore.

Not even when I reached out for the first time to speak to the man whose genes my body is built from.

The water runs cold and I wipe the last of the soap from my body as it turns frigid. I turn off the faucet and grab for my towel, make quick work of drying myself., Then I reach for my skirt and blouse instead of my waitress uniform. Thank you, thrift store.

I feel strange; like another person as I zip up my pencil skirt and tuck in my blouse. This isn’t me. I’m used to wearing the pink striped uniform of Bob’s Burgers, slinging my hair into a quick ponytail and slipping on my sneakers. I got the routine of getting ready down to five minutes. Enough time for me to check Mom had all she needed for the day before I headed out.

I pause to look at myself in the mirror. I have a lot more to do today, and I can only hope Mom can care for herself for a few days. I’ve set her up with enough food and supplies she should be okay until I return from my ‘break’.

Hopefully, what my father wants me to do won’t take long. I’ve never left her before. Not even for a night. Maddy, my best and only friend, normally stays with us so we can have a sleepover every so often. Never the other way round. Those are the nights I feel halfway like a normal person. I can do things people my age do as well as the things the people my age would never have to do.

---