Page 17 of Hard Boss

“Understand this right now, Tina. I ever catch your hands in my boyfriend again, I’m fucking break them. I am trying to be nice, but I will not tolerate Wilder being abused by you or anyone else. This is your only warning. Next time, I’ll go to jail with a smile on my face and you’ll be eating through a goddamn straw. Understand?”

“Fuck you,” she hisses.

I go over to Wilder and lean down to kiss him. He promptly grabs my hips and pulls me into his lap to straddle him. “We will be landing soon,” the flight attendant warns.

“Later,” I say, kissing Wilder again.

I move over to my seat and hold Wilder’s hand as Tina settles into a seat, glaring at me. If looks could kill, I’d be dead right now. I smile sweetly and lay my head on Wilder’s shoulder. I can feel it in the pit of my stomach that things are going to get a lot worse with her and I am who she is going to target. I will happily take it in, because Wilder is mine. I have waited my entire life for this, and I won’t let some bimbo gold digging skank try to ruin that.

Chapter Four

We arrive at thehotel and Wilder grabs his bags, as well as mine, while I tip the driver. Tina grabs hers and we walk into the lobby. What Tina doesn’t know is I called yesterday and fixed the reservation. Not only is it in my name now, but there are two rooms and she is at the opposite end of the floor from us. I spoke personally to the manager and was assured that no one would be allowed keys unless I was there.

“Welcome,” the woman behind the counter says cheerfully.

“Hi!”

“I have a reservation under…” Tina starts to say.

“Actually… The reservation is under Macie Douglas,” I say. “There should be two rooms.”

“Yes ma’am,” she says. I hand her my ID and she looks over it before starting the check-in process. “I see there are notes indicating that no additional keys are to be made?”

“Yes ma’am,” I say. “If anyone needs an extra key, only I am authorized to get those.”

“What?” Tina asks.

“Also, only the room rates will be going on the card on file. Everything else will be billed per room to be paid at checkout,” I say.

“Perfect,” she smiles. I turn to Tina and she looks angry.

“All charges to your room are your responsibility. The company is only required to pay for the nightly rate,” I say simply. She says nothing and I turn back to get the room key from her. Tina snatches the key and walks ahead of us to find her room. I shake my head and look back to the woman. “She is not to be allowed access to our room. I don’t care what her reasoning is, she is not authorized. If anyone goes against this, I will contact a lawyer.”

“Yes ma’am,” she says.

“Ready?” I ask Wilder. He nods and we walk to the elevator.

“She’s going to turn it on me,” he says quietly. “She’ll ruin me.”

“Don’t worry about that,” I say. “Arden is speaking with a lawyer today.”

“You told her?” he asks as the doors shut.

“Not everything. I told her that Tina might try to claim rape to ruin your reputation. She said she suspected you were hiding a lot of details and is afraid that she will try and sue you for workplace sexual misconduct, so she’s compiling all of the times that you have offered severance pay to end her contract early. You’ve offered it almost weekly for a year and a half. When you were showering this morning, I sent her an email to request again. I basically stated that due to her repeated offenses of sexual misconduct and harassment, she is being offered her severance pay, yet again, and included that if she violates company policy that her contract states that she forfeits that pay should her contract be ended early. I sent her a copy of her contract as well.”

“I feel like a fucking idiot for not being able to run my company,” Wilder sighs.

“You are not an idiot, Wilder. You are trying to survive. Dumont Incorporated is doing well, but the projections aren’t exactly ideal. Getting rid of her and all of that stress will allow you to focus on growing. You are in no danger, but things need to change.”

“You are amazing, you know that?” he asks.

“I’m not doing anything you wouldn’t do. If that means I get to be controlling and take over for a while to get rid of her, I will. I know you are fully capable of running this company alone, because you have been, but you also need to focus on peace. If you didn’t trust me, you wouldn’t have given me the freedom youhave in the last three days. Really, I think you knew what I would do, but you were afraid to admit that you need help.”

The elevator door opens and we go left down to our room. I glance back and see Tina at her door on the opposite end of the floor. Before she can react, Wilder unlocks the door and we lock ourselves in our room. I take a second to text the group chat I made, but I have Wilder’s number as his company phone, not his personal cell phone.

Me: We have a meeting in an hour. Meet us in the lobby and we can go to the conference room together.

Tina

---