Page 3 of Some Like It Hott

But I do.

Which means I have nowhere to live.

Unless…

Hmm.

Idohave a job.

And—as far as I’ve been able to tell—averynice new boss. Her name is Hanna, and she’s a business-owning, name-taking badass. We hit it off from our first conversation.

Out of the wreckage of my plans comes a new idea, rising like a phoenix. Because, let’s face it, I’m not one to sit around crying into my coffee. Also, I didn’t have time to order coffee before my life went to shit.

I want to pick myself up, dust myself off, and move on, and I really, really don’t want to give Lloyd the satisfaction of knowing about the ache in my chest. The one that says, sounding like my parents,When are you going to get your life together, Natalie Archer?

“Look,” I say, pleased to discover my voice is nice and steady, despite the low-grade full-body tremor I’m fighting. “I came here to tell you I got the Hott Springs Eternal job. The resort-activities-coordinator job.”

“That’s amazing, Natalie! I know you were really excited about that one?—”

I came here for Lloyd’s praise, but now it’s hollow, like all the times he told me how sexy andfunI was.

There’s relief on his face; I can tell he thinks he’s defused thissituation.Defused me.

That would be a big, fat nope.

I spin through messages, looking for the contact I need. “I know it’s in here somewhere,” I mutter.

“What’s in there?”

“My new boss’s number. I need to call her.”

“Why?”

I stare at him and say, “I want to ask her if I can get on-site housing.”

“But you live with me,” he says, giving me a doe-eyed look of hurt and confusion.

For a second I remember the day Lloyd asked me to move in with him. How good it felt to be asked, to be chosen. To be put first like that.

I wasn’t first, though. I was, quite possibly, never first.

“No,” I say, lifting the phone to my ear and listening to it ring through to Hanna’s desk. Breathing through the hurt. Savoring the words even before I say them, as calmly as I can:

“Ilivedwith you. Before I dumped your emotionally cheating ass.”

2

Preston

“I’ll be in touch in a day or so with next steps,” I tell the CEO of MegaStar as I shake hands with him and his flunkies and escort them out of the Grantham-Hoyer conference room.

I exhale relief and inhale the big-money smell of imminent success as I head back to my office, where my assistant, Franklin, is waiting for me with his tablet in hand.

This office? Is my kingdom. Thick carpet, big mahogany desk, top-of-the-line office chair. Bookshelves full of finance books. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Manhattan and Brooklyn skylines, New York Harbor, and the East River. I am king of all I survey.

“Cut to the chase,” I say. “Anything from Rhys?”

He shakes his head. “Nothing. I called him and left him the message about needing an answer ASAP.”

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