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- Quinn -
When Maddy walked in the door Friday night, she went straight to the fridge for a Smirnoff Ice like she’d been anticipating the moment all day.
“You alright?” I asked as Tanner shuffled a deck of cards across from me and Pete dicked around on his phone.
“Yeah,” she said, taking a second healthy swig from behind the kitchen counter. “Just tired. And thirsty.”
I knew she was lying. She wanted to say her first week on the job had been a dream, that she was getting the hang of things, impressing the right people. But she wasn’t. She was getting treated like dirt, and behind her flimsy joviality, I could tell she was one putdown away from collapsing into a puddle of tears.
To be honest, I admired the fact that she hadn’t bitched and moaned all week. It said a lot about her that she was determined to stick with her decision and make the best of it. At the same time, though, it was hard to see her hurting in private, hoarding her pain, holding in her tears. I knew all too well what a panicked, abused intern looked like, and Maddy definitely had that caffeinated deer-in-the-headlights look people got when they spent all day taking shit and pretending it was everything they’d hoped for.
Not that I’d ever been an intern myself. I couldn’t relate on that level. I had no idea what it took to build a reputation in a new business from scratch, no idea how hard it was to start at the bottom. The second I graduated from college, I became my dad’s right-hand man. So seeing how bedraggled she looked coming in the door made me feel a little guilty at the knowledge that I’d made people look like that, feel like that.
“You joining us for poker night?” Tanner asked, shuffling like he was in a room full of people who were easily impressed.
“It’s strip poker if Maddy’s playing,” Pete said, his thumb flying across his phone screen like a seizuring grub.
“It’s not strip poker,” I said, scowling at Pete as Maddy came around the counter. “And you don’t have to play.”
She winced when she slipped her feet out of her high heels and set her bare feet down on the crème-colored carpet. “Well, I was going to say yes if it was strip poker, but—”
“See!” Pete said, smiling as he lifted his chin in her direction. “I knew you’d be down to up the stakes. Just like your big bro.”
“She doesn’t want to play,” I insisted. “Leave her alone.”
Maddy stepped up to the pop-up card table and shifted her weight so the fabric of her blue skirt stretched across her hips. “What’s the buy in?”
I clenched my jaw. Was she fucking with me right now? Did she know how much I didn’t want her undressing in front of these idiots? Or had her rough week left her totally unhinged? Christ, she was probably walking blind through traffic all the way here like a zombie. I should’ve offered to pick her up on my way home.
“Two hundred bucks,” Pete said.
Concern flashed across her eyes before she regained her composure.
“I’ll give you a hundred if Pete’ll spot the other half,” Tanner said, raising an eyebrow towards Pete. “What do you say? Give a broke intern a chance to win some lunch money?”
Maddy’s shoulders relaxed like not having to hide the fact that she was broke in front of her brother’s friends was some sort of gift.
“Why not?” Pete said, leaning to one side so he could grab his wallet from his back pocket. “I’ll miss James less if you play.”
Tanner threw five crisp twenties down in front of her.
“Put your money away,” I said, not wanting her to feel like a charity case. “She’s too tired to play.”
“Who says I’m too tired?” she asked, leaning away from me. “If everyone wants me to play, I don’t see why I shouldn’t.”
I glared at her. “Everyone doesn’t want you to play.”
Her brows lifted. “You mean you don’t want me to play?”
Blood pulsed in my temples. “I mean James wouldn’t want you to play.”
“He wouldn’t want me to lose,” she said, her bottle of Smirnoff Ice dangling from her folded arms. “But he’d never tell me not to play.”
“Here—” Tanner moved his seat to her side of the table. “I’ll get another chair,” he said, starting across the room.
“That’s Maddy’s room,” I said, my stomach flipping as I pointed him in the opposite direction. “Grab my desk chair from in there.”
