Page 4 of False Confidence

Her mom ignored her completely. “I’d appreciate grandchildren before I’m too old to show them off, that’s all I’m saying. And you’re thirty now, Jazz. You don’t have forever.”

“As fun as this was, I have to go if I’m going to make it out in time to meet my friends.” Jazz said goodbye and hung up before her mom dragged the conversation on even longer.

By meeting her friends, she meant flicking through movies, trying to find something new to watch before getting bored and turning on reruns of her favorite TV shows for the five hundredth time just so she wasn’t sitting in silence. She knew if she called Maggie, she’d invite her over in a heartbeat, but Jazz had third-wheeled Maggie and Cal last weekend and the weekend before that.

Jazz had other friends—ex-colleagues, old college friends—but most of them were married with kids and Jazz never had anything to add to the conversation when they went out. Those friendships were fizzling out, which was fine by her. Her life was how she liked it. Sure, she wanted a partner and babies someday, but she was only thirty, for fuck’s sake. She was perfectly happy as she was.

And it didn’t matter what she did, her parents would still ask for more. Her brother and sister excelled in everything they did, constantly trying to outdo themselves. But unlike her siblings, Jazz was no longer competing.

Alexander and Lilia Cannon had exactly zero interest in who their children were as people, just what they achieved. In their eyes, Jazz had achieved nothing in her thirty years. Her college degree didn’t count—that was the bare minimum expected of the Cannon children. Her parents did approve of her job, at least. Michaelson and Hicks was the best business law firm in the region, and that was something they could brag to their friends about. Jazz was sure they never specified her role within the firm, but it was something. And she didn’t care what her parents, or their friends, thought of how she lived her life.

She settled on a crime show she hadn’t re-watched in a few weeks. Now to find something to do while she watched… Jazz was well prepared for weekends in the house: her apartment was her own personal activity center, with piles upon piles of stuff she’d picked up to try and never gotten around to.

Paper bags crinkled as she rummaged through them, picking out the first thing she found: a rock painting kit. Okay, maybe not that. Jazz dug a little further, her fingers closing around another box, and smiled when she withdrew a cat embroidery kit. It was perfect. The cat looked exactly like Maggie and Cal’s cat, Peach, and Cal’s birthday was in a couple of months. She could definitely finish it on time.

She tipped out the box onto the couch and only just managed to stop the tiny packet of needles from slipping between the cushions. There were instructions, but where was the fun in that? And how hard could it be anyway? Jazz clamped the fabric in the hoop, struggling with the bolt to tighten it, before realizing she’d put it in upside down. She righted it and grabbed a needle, threading it with dark brown embroidery floss and kicking her feet up on the couch.

With her tongue between her teeth, she made the first stitch around the cat’s right ear. It was uneven, but it was only the first stitch. She continued, cursing when she pricked her finger on the needle. A tiny bead of blood formed on the end of her finger, staining the cat’s pink nose. “Shit.”

She dropped the hoop and headed to the kitchen, running her finger under the faucet. This wasn’t her first embroidery rodeo, and she’d forgotten how bad she was with needles. She rummaged around below her sink for a band-aid, before suddenly remembering that she’d stashed her first aid kit in her pantry for safekeeping after the last time she’d burned herself on her toaster.

Her kitchen wasn’t tiny, but the sheer amount of clutter she’d brought with her—and everything she’d added since—made it hard to navigate. She found the first aid kit and slapped a band-aid on her finger before knocking a bag of butterscotch candies to the floor. Where had they come from? She scrambled to pick them up, remembering the craving for butterscotch cupcakes she’d had a few weeks ago.

“No time like the present,” Jazz said to herself, grabbing flour and sugar from the shelves. It had been a while since Jazz baked anything, and she liked playing around in the kitchen, so she grabbed one of the recipe books from the pile on the floor by the air fryer she’d bought six months ago and hadn’t taken out of the box yet. She’d get to it. The page with her favorite cupcake recipe was sticky, and a portion of the ingredients list ripped away as she peeled the pages apart. It wasn’t like the measurements had to be exact—she’d figure it out.

Something resembling a batter eventually came together, and she scooped it into a tray filled with mismatched cupcake liners. Batter splattered across the tray, but it was easier just to pick those pieces off when they were baked—and they always tasted the best.

She shoved the baking tray in the oven and turned it on, remembering too late that she was supposed to pre-heat the damn thing. The part of the recipe that told her how long to bake them for was covered in some kind of chocolate, so she set a timer for twenty minutes and hoped for the best. The dining chair wobbled as she dropped into it, the crochet chair cover scratchy on her thighs. Another project she hadn’t finished; she’d made two and a half chair covers, and then accidentally spilled pasta sauce on one.

It was the polar opposite of the home she’d grown up in. Her parents never visited her in Seattle and it was just as well, because her mom would freak out at how messy and chaotic everything was. She’d hated how much stuff Jazz had accrued over the years growing up, hated how cluttered her spaces were. But Jazz had always felt at home in chaos.

“What the hell did you click?” Jazz sighed, dropping into Cal’s desk chair and flinching at the blaring alert sounding from his computer. The screen was covered in flashing windows, promising Cal he’d won a car, a new phone, an all expenses trip to Belize.

“A link in an email from my bank,” Cal replied with a sigh. “Though I realize now it probably wasn’t actually my bank.”

“Probably not.”

“I’m a fucking idiot,” Cal groaned, rubbing his forehead. Stress always seemed to make Cal’s Irish accent a little thicker, and Jazz couldn’t always grasp what he was saying, but even she understood that.

“No comment,” Jazz replied as she tried in vain to close the windows.

Whatever malware had been attached to the link had already sunk its claws into Cal’s computer. She sighed and crawled under the desk, pulling out the plug. “I’ll call tech, but I think we should leave it off until then.”

“Christ. Thanks for checking. Any chance you’re not going to tell Maggie about this?”

“Zero chance.”

“Wonderful.”

Jazz laughed, offering his chair back to him and grabbing her phone from the desk. “You could download a virus on every one of her devices and she’d still think you’re the best person in the whole world. Other than me, obviously,” she amended, and Cal flushed, his eyes lighting up.

“Maybe since I don’t have a computer, I should just call it a day and go see her,” Cal mused and Jazz shook her head. Maggie really had hit the partner jackpot.

“You might not have a computer, but you do still have a day of meetings. Including one in five minutes. Sierra is waiting for you,” Jazz pointed out. Sierra was Jazz’s assistant, and much better at taking meeting notes than Jazz was. She got less distracted by… everything.

Cal’s face fell, and Jazz sighed. “You’re scheduled to read through case notes for next week after lunch. Take them with you and go see Maggie.”

“That works. Thanks.”

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