Page 40 of Never Say Yes To Your Boss

“It was dark. Late. But still. He’d taken that route so many times. It was Christmas, and we’d been at a company thing. Bradford didn’t bother going, and my other siblings went in separate vehicles. My younger sisters went with my mom, and they left before we did. They were tired, so they went home early while my dad and I had to stick it out to the end. It was cold. Like bitter winter Chicago cold. We, uh…after the car went off the road and hit the ditch, it turned over and crashed into some trees. Not old ones, thankfully. Younger ones. They stopped it from rolling, but the car crumpled around them, and it crumpled around me. It was so cold. My dad…he was…he was out cold for a little bit, and that was better. But then he came to, and when he saw me stuck like that, up in the air, he was so panicked. He had a cut on his forehead, and it was bleeding. He kept saying I was covered in blood. That he’d killed me. Until now, I still hear him saying that. ‘Oh Jesus, I’ve killed you. My son.’”

“Oh my god. Oh my god, Darius.” Tears are threatening in her voice, and I can hear them, but she doesn’t let go for a second. Her arms tighten, and she presses herself into me. It forces me deeper into the seat, but that actually quells the panic. She’s more than just my shield. She’s holding me down and keeping me from shattering and changing shape, becoming air instead of a solid, and floating right the heck out of here.

“After the accident, no one could ignore what was going on anymore. My brothers were the ones who said something to thedoctors, but I feel like my mom blames me. I was out of it. I was on painkillers and having surgeries and whatnot, and when I got out, that’s when they told me. That dad had dementia. They took his driver’s license away. The board was questioning his ability to run the company, so as soon as I was ready, and by ready, I mean still so fucked up that it was a miracle I was functioning, he turned it over to me. Bradford helped a little bit, I have to say. At least he was nice to me and less of an asshole when I was recovering from those first few surgeries. He never told me it was my fault. He did tell me the things my mom said, though. But to be fair, my dad was her whole world. She loved him so damn much.”

“It wasn’t your fault. You can’t…that’s not how those things work.” She swallows thickly. “My mom…she freaked when Heather was diagnosed and kept saying she shouldn’t have done this or that or that maybe when she was a baby, she’d done something, maybe exposed herself to something when she was pregnant by accident. She was irrational, but Heather put those ideas out of her mind quickly enough. Because that’s not how the world works. The accident didn’t kill either of you. Your dad…well, he could have hurt himself so much worse. He could have been driving later and gotten in a collision with someone else, and they could have been hurt. Anything could have happened. That’s like saying it could have been worse, which doesn’t help at all, and that sounds so callous. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

“It’s alright. I get it. I’ve thought that, too, so many times. No one blames me. Maybe my mom doesn’t, really, but things changed after. I’m not around, and I made the company my life, even if I was doing it from the house I bought, this one, while I recovered. I drowned myself in work. It was Bradford who moved to Philly when we expanded things later. I worked like a dog to make that happen. He’s a good face ofthe company. Blonde, handsome, young. People can think he’s running everything. I don’t mind it at all. The less publicity I get, the better anyway. I just wish—the people I stopped seeing, my friends and all—I wish I had done that differently. That it wasn’t so much work, work, work, hiding away, and licking my wounds. I should have made time. I blamed them for a while, but it was all me. My family…we don’t do things anymore. Not together like we used to. Not even during the holidays. We’re scattered all over the place. My mom and I made our peace a few years ago at my dad’s funeral, but it’s still not the same.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Ev mumbles.

“My dad, he had a good few years, but he deteriorated so quickly. He had home nurses and people my mom hired, the best of the best, yet he still got out one night and made a break for it. He was confused. He wasn’t found for hours, and by then, he’d been outside for so long. Soon after, he contracted pneumonia, and he ended up passing from that.”

There’s the smallest of shifts, and then Everleigh crawls into my lap. It’s a challenge back here because there’s almost no room. She swivels and tucks her legs up and twists so that she’s sideways. She still keeps her arms around my neck, but she looks up at me, and it’s enough to slay me. “I’m so, so sorry all this happened. That all of it happened. It’s mean, and it’s unfair. Life can be so brutal sometimes.”

“You’ve had a few knocks in that department too. I came to see if you were okay, and somehow, we ended up here, and I’m the one who did all the talking.” I blink against the burn in my sinuses that warns me I’m going to lose it soon in a much different way than I usually lose it in a car.

“That’s okay.” She nods like she wants to believe that. Like maybe she does believe it. “Should we get out?”

I can’t believe I told her all that. What’s more? I can’t believe I told her all that in the backseat of a car. I’m shocked to find thatthe panic has passed, and I’m now just uncomfortable. And not in a good way. Not in a way that I feel like I can handle just yet, but I don’t feel like I’m going to leap out of my skin or leap out of the car or throw up because I can’t breathe, especially since air is vital in keeping one’s cookies from being tossed.

“Has Hans ever threatened to call you Big Daddy D? And is that why you let him get away with just calling you D?”

“What?” I gasp.

She grins and scrambles off my lap, leaping out of the car the same way she got in. She walks around to the other side and opens the door, shifting the seat forward so I don’t have to risk another faceplant trying to get out.

Her nostrils flare slightly, and she can’t keep her smile from nearly cracking her face in half, but it falters at my confusion.

“That bastard,” she hisses. “I knew he was kidding. I asked him about it a few days ago. About how he started calling you D, and that’s what he said.”

“Oh my god. I have never asked him to call me Daddy anything.”

“That’s a relief. I mean, I’m not judging or anything. If you want to go by Daddy, then by all means…”

“You’d call me Daddy?” I realize I’m outside of the car and that the panic never truly set in. The door is closed, and I’m on the other side of it, and I did it. For the first time since the accident, I fucking did it. No sedation whatsoever. Yes, Everleigh was basically holding me down, but in a good way. Then she distracted me when I was getting out, and now I’m here on solid ground again, my feet back on concrete.

She shakes her head. “Nah, never.”

“Did Hans really say that, or were you just trying to distract me?”

“You’ll never know,” she says and shrugs, but then she loses it and tosses her head back and laughs. I wanted to make hersmile, and now, look at this. I got laughter instead, even if it wasn’t really me but Hans. I guess it was Hans. “Alright, so he did. There’s no way I’m inventive enough to make that up.”

Oy.“You know what this calls for?”

“Please tell me it’s a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”

That wasn’t at all what I was going for, but I don’t mind changing my plans. “It’s exactly that.”

Chapter fifteen

Everleigh

Iknow it’s four in the morning, and I’m knocking on Darius’ door, but I had to. Sleep was an elusive bastard because I currently have too much on my mind. Too much I need to tell someone. That I need to tellhim. He was so honest with me in the car today, so I need to be honest in return. I could wait until morning, except I can’t. I could maybe wait for a good time, except there will never be a good time. So I’m here.

I’m also about to chicken out and go racing back down the ridiculously long hall runner back to my room on tiptoes, but then the door opens, and Darius is there. He’s half asleep, looking rumpled, with his hair a mess on one side. It’s adorable. He’s adorable and beautiful. Always.

He’s got one hand thrown onto the doorframe, and he takes up the whole doorway. He’s wearing those sweatpants again and nothing else. He looks like the god of sleep and the god of beds, and it makes my throat close up so fast and hard that it’s impossible to swallow down the lump that rises there.

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