Page 5 of Hate Notes

The phone on Cole's desk rang. He tapped the button, opening up the speaker line.

"Mr. Northman, Kylie is here to see you. She brought flowers."

Barf. He hates flowers.

Cole smiled. "Uh, just tell her to wait there for a minute."

He lifted his eyes to me like I was a shitstain on his brand-new carpet. "You need to go."

I gave Cole a sarcastic salute, stood, and happily left his office.

I smiled at his secretary on the way out and purposefully detoured in the direction that would bring me right past Kylie.

Yes, there was a time when I would have made sure to slip out without her seeing. I would have happily avoided causing a potential fight in their perfect little relationship. But today, I learned I was probably going to lose my job, even though I was damn good at it. If strolling past Kylie on my way out of Cole’s office made his day just a little worse, I could live with that.

"Hi, Kylie," I said, smiling and reaching for a handshake.

She was the type of woman who smiled to your face and poisoned your drinking water, so she flashed pearly whites andextended a limp hand toward me. I took her stupidly well-moisturized skin in mine, shook it around a little, and nodded toward the flowers she carried.

"Flowers, huh?" I asked.

Kylie was twenty-two, gorgeous, blonde, and she did things like "hot yoga."

I was thirty-three, pretty in the right lighting (so long as you squinted a little), brown-haired, and sometimes walked by "hot yoga" studios. I liked animals that were so ugly they were cute, rainy days, finding out exactly how casually I could manage to dress without getting in trouble, and peanut butter jelly sandwiches.

Kylie probably didn't even eat bread.

As far as I was concerned, that fact alone solidified her as an alien presence I could never relate to.

Bread was life. If I had to choose between men and bread, I would take bread. Every time.

"Everything okay?" Kylie asked. She was wearing a fake smile as she tilted her head. "You looked like you went to outer space for a second. And you shouldn't frown like that, Sweetie! You'll make that wrinkle worse." She gave the spot between my eyebrows a little boop.

I flinched.

I took a therapeutic moment to plot Kylie’s hypothetical murder, including how I would dispose of the body and get away with it. If my time watching crime drama and movies taught me anything, it was that body disposal was probably the most important step to successfully getting away with murder.

"There's a smile!" Kylie said, voice just oozing patronizing tones. She leaned closer. "If I age even half as gracefully as you, I'll be happy. And if not, that's why they invented plastic surgery! Right?”

"I need to go," I said. Before I start stabbing you with pens, I didn't say. "Oh, by the way. Good call on the flowers. I told you he loves those."

"Thanks for the tip, girl!" Kylie said, her fake smile fading just a little too fast as she turned and walked toward Cole's office.

"Guh," I breathed. Don't ask me what "guh" means, either. It was just the sound that came out of me as I walked back to my desk.

My office bestie, Kora, saw me coming and rushed over.

Kora was one of those aggressively pretty people who somehow made business casual look like runway fashion. Today she wore a cream-colored sweater dress that probably cost more than my rent, her dark curls artfully messy in that way that definitely took an hour to perfect. Most people assumed we were an odd match as friends—her being all polished elegance and me being... well, me. But beneath her intimidating exterior was the kind of woman who would help you bury a body while cracking jokes about proper excavation techniques. Which, given my recent murderous thoughts about Kylie, might actually come in handy.

"So?" she whispered. "How did it go?" She paused, eyes flicking up and down my body, taking in my disheveled state and defeated posture.

"I... see," she said. "So we're doing ice cream tonight?"

"Ice cream," I agreed. "And lots of plotting. We're gonna plot so hard."

"Ooh," Kora said, rubbing her hands together. "I love plotting. Revenge? Glow-up? Or... wait. Did you say plot or pot? Because I’ve never tried it, but I guess there’s a first time for everything.Wait…do you mean pot, like planting flowers? Because I’m down for that, too.”

“Plotting,” I said, smiling my best evil smile. “But wearegoing to get our hands dirty. That’s for sure.”

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