Page 19 of Breathe for Me

Christ, I… I feel sick. And as the room spins around me, my heartbeat loud in my ears, the office door swings open.

“Got your note,” Georgina calls, her steps bouncy as she heads for me. She’s in that green dress again, the same one from her first day, and her wide smile seems real. Is everything between us a lie?

No.No.

I’m jumping to conclusions. I’m—I’m overtired and paranoid, and there will be an explanation for this. There must be.

She’s my Georgina. She is.

“You look like shit,” my assistant says when she reaches my side, tousling my hair with a frown. Her touch is so soft, her concern so real, and I want nothing more than to bury my face in her stomach. For her to wrap her arms around my neck and never let go. “Maybe you should go home, Levi. Or call a doctor, even. Did you not sleep again last night?”

Actually, I slept like the dead. She sucked all my usual worries out through my cock.

Mutely, I turn the monitor to face her. Georgina will be confused, or she’ll deny this. Everything will make sense. The woman I love is not here to make my life a living hell, and she did not pretend to want me to ruin my life.

“Oh,” Georgina says quietly. “Crap.”

My eyes slam closed. My head feels like it could explode.

“I can explain,” she begs, and I roll my stiff neck, inhaling sharply. Can’t look at her. Can’t open my eyes. Can’t faceanyof this.

“Please do.”

“I was going to tell you Levi, I swear. Today, actually. I’ve been writing you a letter all morning, but it’s not ready yet and—shit. Okay. Okay.”

It’s funny: I canfeelher panicking beside me, the tension shuddering through her limbs, but it doesn’t move me like before. I’m distant. Separate.

I haven’t been numb like this since before she worked here. It’s relaxing. I almost missed it.

“My dad used to work for Ignis,” she says. “Obviously. I mean, you’ve figured that out. But it was—it was hisdream, his whole purpose in life, and he worked for your company for nine years. He loved the work here so much. Then a year ago, he went through a… a rough patch.”

Reason for termination: intoxicated at work.

“Go on.” The words scrape out of me, cold and aloof. Georgina lets out a shaky exhale, then pushes on.

“He was fired.” She sounds so miserable, but there’s anger there too. It’s easier to hear it with my eyes closed. “After all those years, after being so dedicated, you fired him just like that. No one offered help. No one suggested sick leave. You just let him go.”

Idid nothing of the sort, because that is what middle managers are for.

“I cannot babysit each Ignis employee, Georgina. Not even the drunken ones.”

She gasps like she’s been punched.

“So you came here for revenge,” I say quickly, pushing on, because I cannot let guilt seep in. Cannot let her get under my skin. If I do, I’ll fall apart and she’llsee. She’ll know that she’s won.

“Yes,” she whispers. The floor creaks as she inches closer, but I roll my chair away. My eyes are still screwed shut, and it’s so blissfully dark inside my own head. Each damning word she speaks lands with a clang. “I didn’t have exact plans, but I wanted you to suffer for what you did.”

“The canceled meetings? The fire alarm?”

“Yes.”

“The elevator? Pest control?”

“I’m so sorry, Levi—”

“Don’tcall me that.” Finally, I open my eyes, and the whole world seems grayer than before. When I turn to my treacherous assistant, the only spots of color in the world are those blue eyes, brimming with tears.

Fake, obviously. Or frustration at being caught. Thank god I realized before the launch—how much havoc might she have wreaked then?

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