Page 2 of Kissing the Boss (Fairy Tale Quartet 2)

Lana Judge was a callous, ungrateful, condescending, selfish, and coldly beautiful woman in her early fifties. She was also the co-CEO of Judge Fashions Industry where I worked and thus, my boss. Oh, and add in the small fact she’d married my dad when I was eight, which I guess technically made her my stepmother, and there you had our relationship in a nutshell. We pretty much loathed each other.

Ignoring her jab at my timeliness, I set the tray on the corner of her desk where I always put it.

“Hello,” I greeted with much more reservation than I’d used with Shyla. After stirring in the dissolved sugar, I set the cup on the desk close to her. “Is there anything else you need?”

She ignored the tea and frowned at a memo she was browsing. “Have you copied the market reports for the meeting yet?”

“Yes,” I was happy—aka, smugly thrilled—to report. “And I’ll have them organized and stapled in just a few minutes.”

Lana made an irritated sound. “Don’t bother. Throw those away, because the idiots in accounting just emailed me last-second numbers, meaning the file I sent you is wrong.” She thrust the memo she’d been scanning my way. “Plug in these new figures and make sure the revised version is ready with copies for everyone by the time the meeting starts.”

“Uh…” What? No. I didn’t have time to start all over again. Was she crazy? The meeting began in fifteen minutes. But when Lana arched a meaningful glance my way, I found myself bobbing my head enthusiastically. “Sure. No problem.”

One thing I could never do was let her think I was incapable of completing any challenge she set before me. She would only ever find me agreeable, prompt, and efficient. So, yeah, suck on that, stepmommy dearest.

Lana and I both would’ve been happy to never cross paths again after my dad died. But dear old Dad, God rest his deceiving soul, broke my heart when he left his company to her, and not me. I mean, I’d been conditioned for the position, raised to believe I’d inherit JFI one day. I’d lost count how many times over the years Dad had brought me to work with him and said, “Someday, sweetheart, all this will be yours.”

Except it hadn’t. Losing JFI, and worse, losing it to Lana, had been a hard, bitter pill for me to swallow. But I’d sucked up my pride, gone to her as soon as I’d graduated from college, and I had humbly asked for an entry-level position, hoping to eventually toil my way to the top.

JFI was my father’s legacy, it was like home and family to me. I’d never pictured myself working anywhere else. So, yes, of course I’d gone begging for a job. It didn’t matter who Dad had left the company to; I decided I’d just earn my way back to where I’d always been destined to be. And I realized I liked the idea of working for it instead of just being given a spot.

Except the wicked witch had turned me down flat. No entry-level position, no family courtesy, no nothing!

Not one to give up easily, I had persisted and negotiated until she’d only agreed to bring me on board when I said in a desperate last-ditch effort that I’d work for free as an unpaid intern until I proved myself worthy.

Of course, six months later, and here I was, still an unpaid intern. Lana claimed I hadn’t proven myself at all. But I wasn’t finished trying. Not even close. Soon, not even a bitter, manipulative, hard woman like my father’s widow could deny I was good enough to deserve full-time employment. And once I got that, watch out, world.

“Well?” She waved the backs of her fingers at me, shooing me along. “Get to it.”

Zapped from my daydream, I cleared my throat. “Yes, ma’am.” And away I went, determined to wow her with my superb stapling capabilities. I mean, who wouldn’t want to advance an intern who stapled like a total badass, am I right?

When Shyla sent me a sympathetic glance, letting me know she’d heard everything, I simply lifted my chin and hurried back down to my workroom, where I had a date with the copy machine.

Since I was the only person in the building who actually worked in the basement aside from the janitor who didn’t come in until after noon, I didn’t expect to find another soul around when I returned, meaning the man tryin

g to set a mousetrap I had on the floor under a wire shelf full of paper reams caused me to shriek.

“Oh my God! What’re you doing?”

He jumped and accidentally tripped the hammer, making it snap down over his finger. “Mother fu—”

Jerking his digit free, he stuck it into his mouth and spun to level me with a scowl.

I winced at my stepbrother. “Sorry! Are you okay? Let me see.”

“Mi’m fime,” Brick muffled out moodily from around his finger before pulling it free to add, “Why did you yell at me?”

“I’m so sorry,” I gushed, grasping his wrist so I could examine the injury. The red mark just below his fingernail made me suck in another wince of sympathy. “It’s just, I… I read somewhere that mice could smell a human on traps, and it scares them away. So I wear gloves when I set it.”

“Really?” he asked, intrigued by the notion.

“Mmm-hmm.” I tugged open the small refrigerator I’d brought in from home and set up by my desk so I could fish out a piece of ice for him.

While I actually had heard that advice about mousetrap setting, the truth of the matter was I just didn’t have the heart to actually set it anymore.

I had once, of course, after my initial glimpse of Jacqueline. Yes, I named her. Don’t judge.

Upon first impression, her little gray mouse-i-ness had scared the holy bejesus out of me. So the next day, I showed up to work, armed with a dozen traps, ready to call all-out war, until she actually appeared again, stealthily sneaking toward one of the traps, her whiskers twitching and tail swishing as she scented the cheese I’d left as bait.

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