Page 96 of A Ticking Time Boss

Carter sighs. He’s quiet for a long time. Even as Michael changes lanes and starts heading toward Queens. “It’s not the outcome I want,” he says.

“But it’s not an impossible outcome.”

“No,” he says, “even if I wanted it to be.”

“Wanting something doesn’t make it happen.”

He runs a hand through his hair, the trademark smile nowhere to be seen. “Thought I’d already learned that lesson,” he mutters. “Look, kid, it’s a business. You know it is. At the end of the day, the four of us answer to the shareholders in Acture Capital as much as to our own wallets.”

“Right.”

“If the Globe isn’t doing what we want it to do…”

“If you’re not willing to give it enough time, you mean. Or investment.”

“Print media is dying.”

I turn to him, hands balling into fists. “Yes, and you told me you wanted to fix it! To modernize! Not butcher it.”

“We wouldn’t do that,” he says.

“No, but you’d sell it to someone who would. How is that different?”

He closes his eyes. “I’m twenty-five percent of Acture. I have one vote.”

He could have been honest about that too, I think. Or maybe I shouldn’t have been so naive. “Right. Well, tonight was very enlightening."

“Audrey…”

“They’re lovely people. Well, some of them, when they’re not discussing stripping an entire workplace of its resources and personnel.”

His voice rises. “That’s my job. Part of it, at least. You know that.”

“I never knew you intended that for the Globe. You were the one who convinced me it wasn’t! You took me to that dive bar, and you told me… you told me you were different.” I bury my head in my hands. He charmed me, I think. Got what he wanted, and I bought all of it, hook line and sinker.

“Come back to mine,” he says. “We can talk about it. I’ll tell you anything you want to know, and tomorrow—”

I shake my head. “No.”

His hand tightens on the door handle. “Fine.”

We don’t speak for the rest of the trip. I’m acutely aware of Michael in the front seat, overhearing our entire argument, and my own stupid tears hiding in my throat. The wine is not helping the roil of emotions inside.

Carter speaks again when we drive onto my street. “I never wanted you to hear the Globe spoken about that way.”

“We should have stayed in the kitchen five minutes longer, you mean?”

“No. Fuck, that’s not what I meant.” His hand catches my arm, and he stares out at the brownstone. “Please don’t make me drop you here.”

“It’s a perfectly good apartment.”

“It’s an unsafe, vermin-infested shithole,” he says darkly. “Come home with me.”

I jerk my arm free, and he releases me immediately. “It’s all I can afford on my salary, boss,” I say acidly. “And this is my home.”

“Kid, I—”

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” I say, and close the car door behind me. I make it halfway up the stoop before the tears start falling.

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