Page 5 of A Conflict of Interest

I’d gotten out and sworn off people forever. But then, when I’d just been casually hanging out at a networking event I’d seen advertised to someone else and decided to go and see if there was anyone cute there—then I found Kelcey there, looking beautiful in a little black dress with one of those big hair bows she always loved pinned into her cute new long-bob haircut, and I didn’t typically go thinking of people asbeautiful.I’d think of them asa cutie I’d like to see in bed for a night,and I was happy with that. But then there was that dumbass with blue eyes and that thing she did where she bounced on the balls of her feet thinking over what to say, and I was kind of suckered in, and I went and said the most mortifying things I’d ever said in my life, things the CIA couldn’t have tortured out of me.

And Kelcey shot me down.

So the sane, normal thing to do would have been to say something likeyeah we kind of dated and then I broke things off and then we kind of dated again and I broke things off and then we definitely dated and I broke things off and I tried to hook up with her again and she told me to leave her alone, so I’mprobably not the right person to talk to her,but it turned out I needed all the help I could get to keep me from talking to Kelcey, because I said, “Yeah, no, nothing’s wrong. I can totally chat to her and get her on board. I’m just thinking about how much work this is going to be once we do land the gig… work sucks.”

“You know, there’s a lot of other people who would gladly take this job.”

“And none of them have my way with words. C’mon, you could never bear to be without me. So, what? Do I send her an email?”

“I can set up a conference call for us—”

“Ugh, calls suck,” I said, which, theydidbut I was mostly just trying to avoid the scene that would unfold if the call connected and Kelcey saw my face there on the screen and Danielson had to see the fallout. “I’ll just message her on Slack or something. Get me her contact.”

He raised his eyebrows. “You sure? This is a big deal… you know I’m going to kill you if you drop the ball on it.”

“I’m not. Trust me. I’m good at what I do.”

I tried to play it all casual and cool like I wasn’tremotelyanxious—I mean, this was Kelcey Huntington. I knew her inside and out. Emphasis on theinsidepart. I knew what made her tick. And I headed to my desk in the tiny, cluttered corner of the studio, where there were all hands on deck: all four of them squeezed into one claustrophobic room with enough junk for forty people. And as I sat down at my computer and powered it up, I was completely relaxed, and I’d never once been nervous in my life.

I was going to throw up. How didKelceyget under my skin? How didKelcey Huntingtonget me to want her so badly that I was shaky as I pulled up Slack and waited for Danielson to get her contact and pass it to me—how didKelceyof all people make me feel this way? Just because I liked blondes didn’t meanI was ready to fall head over heels forher.I didn’t date in general, and I especially didn’t date women. I couldn’t imagine it. Going around telling people aboutmy girlfriend?Ick.

Well, it always had been ick. Now it made me picture Kelcey, with round blue eyes and long eyelashes fluttering around them as she looked at me in the low glow of the Christmas lights next to where I’d parked the car, late at night, just the two of us, and the soft laugh in the way she said my name andsince when was I like that?Ick. Major ick.

A message popped up from Danielson, and my heart jumped as I looked at it—a Slack contact. Kelcey’s. And then a message,Here’s Huntington’s info,and,should I set up a meeting, tell her all about her boss’s sister?

Absolutely not,I sent.Let me handle the introductions. I know how to drop these things to make them land with maximum impact.

Meaning I wanted to message Kelcey without her realizing it was me, because it was the only way I’d ever get her to acknowledge my existence again. I’d always liked to play dirty.

I anguished for a long time over what to write before I sent a message, safe and polite, making sure my Slack contact was bare and didn’t give me away.

Hi there, Miss Huntington! This is Nic, head of outreach with ERC.

She responded right away. Rare of her. I guess she had other work she was avoiding.Hi, Nic! It’s really nice to meet you. You can just call me Kelcey.And after a second,Or just Kelce. It’s what my friends call me.

That meant we were friends now. This was evil of me. I regretted nothing.Thank god. I don’t do stuffy formalities. I’d been worried when Danielson told me this was a big corporate client that we’d be doing suit-speak.

She sent laughing emojis, and then,My bosses always tell me I need to be better at suit-speak.

She was immediately getting distracted from the work. That was just like her… it was perfect. I guess I liked easily distracted girls. I’d never had a type with women before, and I was just defining it as everything about Kelcey.Well, they put the right person on the job to talk to us. We’re a pretty small team so it’s all cozy.

I love cozy, so it works out well for all of us.

Yeah, of course she loved cozy. I knew full well how much she loved cozy—how she got excited about winter coming around because she got to wear big sweaters and fuzzy socks and cuddle with a hot drink, and once upon a time it had been me there cuddling her over a hot drink. And I was trying not to miss it, but I could hear every message in her soft voice with the little lyrical lilt to it like a silvery bell, and I wanted to print out every message and wallpaper them onto my walls.

Yeesh. Down bad, much? This was probably a bad idea. I kept doing it.

Well, this is supposed to be a formal business correspondence and a professional communication for a job, but I love cozy too, so let’s officially brand this chat a cozy little lodge with a fireplace, hot coffee, big fuzzy blankets, and a whole bunch of Christmas lights and decorations.

omg,she sent, all pretenses of proper business communications out the window. Thank god. It was like I was talking to Kelcey again. I shouldn’t have been, but I was.that’s perfect,she sent, and then,not too many Christmas lights though, last year I mixed up whether I was ordering individual lights or boxes of light strings and ordered 600 light strings for a Christmas party

Oh,thatwas why there had been so many lights at that holiday party. I’d always wondered who had been behind that.Now that I knew it was Kelcey’s doing, I thought it was cute and quaint. I thought suddenly that every Christmas party needed six hundred light strings.I think this collaboration still deserves something special, though,I sent.Maybe a very moderate and reasonable 400.

She replied right away with,450.

Seemed like she didn’t regret the 600 lights too much.perfect number.And,hold on, I’m going to grab some coffee and a muffin before this so it’s just like we’re in that lodge while you tell me what you want for this job.

Under any other circumstances, I’d have weirded out any sensible client with this kind of conversation. But I had Kelcey on a string, and I was making her…

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