Page 1 of Mark my Words

KRISTINE

BOSTON

When I arrived at work this morning, I was looking forward to getting right to work on the manuscript I’d been doing a developmental edit on, but no. Of course not. Today had to be the day that I was voluntold to babysit another copy-editing intern because one of the authors he worked with had gone off the rails. I didn’t have time to babysit anyone, I didn’t want to babysit anyone, and I performed much better alone when I didn’t have to deal with other people’s bullshit.

The phrase team player didn’t apply to me because I didn’t want to be part of the team. Now Sam, on the other hand. He was the epitome of being a team player and worked for the bane of my existence.

“I can’t believe you’re making me work with that egotistical waste of perfectly good brain matter. Sam’s a first-class douche canoe,” I sighed as I looked at my boss, Isobel. I’d worked with her for a while, and she’d asked me to take on some pretty time-intensive projects in the past, but this was too much.

“You’ll be fine,” she said, rolling her eyes. “If I have to put up with Adrian on this one, you can deal with Sam. He’s not as bad as you make him out to be.”

“I’m not sure he can dedicate all his remaining brain cells to focus on this project.”

“Would you quit pretending he’s an idiot? He graduated Summa Cum Laude from Duke.“ Isobel shook her head as she gave me an exasperated look. And he liked to tell everyone about it, or at least his boss did. I graduated from Harvard; you didn’t see me asking people for a cookie.

“I think he’s taken one too many performance enhancements in his time for his brain to work properly. I mean, come on, he played lacrosse.” I raised an eyebrow and crossed my arms over my chest. “I bet he does CrossFit. I bet he actually enjoys it. Who enjoys CrossFit? I know normal people don’t. It’s like some millennial form of a torture ritual.”

“Lots of intelligent people go to school on athletic scholarships. Not everyone can be born with a silver spoon.” She arched an eyebrow back at me, crossing her arms to match my standoffish posture. This was always going to be a point of contention between us. Isobel had worked two jobs and put herself through school, and I...well...

“Hey, I got in all by myself. I graduated with honors, too. You act like I was handed a diploma without working for it.” My last name may have ensured my application was reviewed, but I earned my spot at Harvard. I also busted my ass to prove that I wasn’t my brother. I didn’t need grades handed to me.

“I get it,” Isobel told me in that placating tone of voice she used when she was trying to get me to do something she knew I would object to. “I went Ivy League too, but I also ate Ramen noodles my first three years out of school. Anyway–” she sighed. “It’s not my choice. When our authors collaborate, we all have to play nice.”

“Why is Chase helping that hermit guy anyway?” I knew Evan was a bestselling author, but I thought he might be taking the tortured artist routine a little too far. He rarely came into the office, but when he did, it was all cloak and dagger. Why any of the editors went to all that trouble for one writer was beyond me.

“He’s not a hermit. He simply likes privacy and has a touch of social anxiety,” she said, shrugging. Yeah, sure. Just a touch. Right...

“You told Chase he never left his house. Doesn’t that make him a hermit?”

“I prefer the term recluse. It makes him sound more mysterious,” Adrian called out from Isobel’s open door. Oh, joy. He was my favorite person in the whole company. Which was why I rarely called him by his first name, preferring to stick to his official title, Dickhead.

“Do you lurk in the hallway waiting to interrupt other people’s conversations?” Isobel rolled her eyes, but I saw them lingering on how his shirt clung to his overly large biceps while he leaned against the door frame. I was convinced the big muscles were compensation for something else being not so big. His brain surely wasn’t his only tiny body part.

“Hey! Your intern was trash-talking my writer and my intern. I was only walking by.” He was trying to look innocent, but his stalker tendencies were showing. Over the last few weeks, I’d seen him lurking in the hallway more than average.

“Walking by to where? My office is at the end of the hallway.” At least Isobel didn’t seem to be falling for his bullshit excuses.

I seriously didn’t know how she put up with all these muscle-bound idiots. Adrian clearly had the hots for her and didn’t have a big enough pair to do something about it.

Personally, I didn’t understand the hype. The expensive piece of hardware inside my nightstand did a better job than any man ever had. And I didn’t have to talk to it after. Why waste your energy on morons who only want to get into your pants when you can give yourself a good time? Or at least take the edge off.

“Evan’s sent me some new pages,” he told her, his voice a little guarded, but I could tell he was secretly excited about something from the gleam in his eyes.

“Already?” Isobel’s eyes widened.

“Yeah, your girl has been working her magic,” he said, looking mildly impressed.

Isobel’s mouth dropped open dramatically, and she made a fake little gasping noise. “Was that an actual compliment about Chase?”

“Well, she is pretty flirty, so I can see how it’d be easy for her to write about sex.” And just like that, the sleaze shoved his foot in his mouth three sentences into a conversation. That had to be a new record for him.

“I’m gonna pretend you didn’t talk right now, so my knee doesn’t have to slip into your nuts—accidentally, of course.” His head swiveled comically in my direction, and I narrowed my eyes at him. Chase was a professional, and he was a giant douche who needed to watch himself.

“Are you really going to let your intern talk to me like that?” he asked Isobel, pointing at me.

“Are you still talking?” I scoffed, sitting down and facing away from him.

“I’m sure the two of you can figure out how to get along,” Isobel sighed, exasperated.

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