Page 47 of Plunge

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Thistle

I EMAILED SEBASTIAN from the accounting office this morning and he called my cell within a few minutes of getting the note. “So what’s up?”

“What we are doing, Thistle. It’s magnificent.” He tells me about the new engine and the way it uses a revolutionary new fuel injector. They’ve got all sorts of investors throughout Europe and are starting to make inroads with American markets.

“Oh really? Just racing engines or consumer vehicles?”

Sebastian and I talk for a long time until Archer finally strolls into the office with a huge grin on his face. He plunks noisily into his chair just as Sebastian gets to the point: “I want to hire you as a consultant for this project,” he says. “Name your price. I know you know the international tax implications inside and out!”

“Woah. Sebastian, I don’t know what to say.” Archer looks at me and gives me a thumbs up, scowls, flips the thumb down, and shrugs. I roll my eyes at him. “Can I think about this for a bit and call you back?”

My heart warms at the offer from Sebastian. I love the way he hasn’t taken the corporate takeover of his former business to heart. Or, at least, he doesn’t seem to hold any ill feelings toward me about it all. I tell him to email me a proposal for the scope of work and promise to get back to him by the end of the week.

Depending how long he needs help, this could be the perfect thing for me now that Mom is doing better. It’d be like an internship, doing something exciting somewhere and then going back to the grind.

Then I catch myself thinking of Smith and Townson as a grind, and frown again, wondering once more about my life choices.

When Archer sees me hang up, he waggles his eyebrows at me until I tell him about the offer. He claps his hands and jumps out of his seat. “That’s awesome, Thistle. You know what this calls for, right?”

“No, Archer. We talked about this during business hours.”

He starts to peel off his button down until he’s standing there in his undershirt. “We need party music,” he says, cranking up the dial on his speaker. Loud Shania Twain music pulses through the office. “You feel like a woman, right, McMurray,” he shouts over the loud instrumental intro.

I shake my head but agree to take his hands. “One song, Archer.” He nods as he belts out the words, and I can’t help but feel at home here. He’s genuinely happy for me about this opportunity. But then, Archer was always pretty easygoing and quick to please.

“You’re not leaving me for tax season, though, are you?” He sobers as the song fades out and I reach over him to snap off the speaker before a client walks in and hears the cacophony.

“Well…probably?” It seemed pretty clear Sebastian would want me to start with him right away, but I wasn’t sure if it would be a full time commitment. “Why don’t we hold off on the panic until I get the proposal from Sebastian.”

Archer gets himself into a work groove and I try to get caught up on the work I missed galavanting with Fletcher. Archer starts muttering to himself about people’s personal filings, and it occurs to me that we’re going to have to tell him about our secret eventually.

I make a note to look up the implications for filing as single people if we’re legally married for just a few months. It’s possible we can get away with keeping this under wraps.

My mom texts me a few times throughout the day to brag about her parking job when she drove herself to and from therapy, then to tell me she’s going out for dinner and not to wait up. I smile, imagining her and the ladies hitting up the Nobler Experiment for tacos.

After work, I heat up some leftovers and am about to sink into the couch in my sweatpants when my phone rings. Fletcher.

“Hey,” I say, surprised and sort of happy to hear from him. “What’s up?”

“I missed seeing you today at physical therapy,” he says, his voice a little unsteady. “Is that weird to say?”

I smile and feel a warmth spread through my chest at his words. “Not weird,” I say.

He clears his throat. “Well, uh, Louie is doing pretty well and Abigail says she wants to try a night with him on her own.”

“That’s good to hear,” I say. I fidget with the remote, wondering where Fletcher is going with this information, feeling an anticipation for…something.

“So would you want to come over and hang out?” He asks. “I promise I have more food than this morning.”

I ponder the bowl of soggy vegetables and rice that’s perched on my knee, and then I ponder my legs in these old ratty sweatpants. “Give me twenty minutes to change from work,” I tell him. And I dump the leftovers en route to my room, where I pull out half my closet trying to decide what to wear for an evening hanging out with my ex-boyfriend slash husband.

Indigo would tell me to aim sexy,I think, fingering the dress I had worn on my date in Philadelphia before Christmas. I still don’t know what I’m doing with Fletcher, other than going on walks and massaging old wounds.

I decide on some skinny jeans and one of my mom’s old t-shirt from my track team, that hangs off one of my shoulders. I knot the fabric at my waist and squint at the mirror. I decide to throw my hair up in a messy bun, but I dot on some mascara and lip gloss.

Hopefully I look put together, but not like I was trying too hard. I don’t want to make any assumptions about Fletcher’s intentions on inviting me over. For all I know he’s going to tell me to go kick rocks.

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