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Before I can come up with a response, another text comes in. “There is currently a disaster in my entryway. I need you to clean it up.”
Anger heats my cheeks.
He needs me to clean his entryway… at eight-thirty at night?
No way.
No freaking way.
Clay gets up. “You done with this?” he asks, his hand on my soup bowl.
“Yeah. Thanks.” I tuck my knee up and gaze down at the phone, a frown tugging at my lips.
I want to text a refusal…
But for some reason, I can’t make myself do it.
After all, he is my boss. I did accept the executive assistant responsibilities until the replacement is hired. I mean, this must be what he expects of his assistant.
“Is he giving you a hard time?” Clay asks as he runs a soapy sponge over a soup bowl at the sink
“Er… sort of?”
“That jerk,” Clay says.
Just then, another message comes in.
Brock: “This is urgent, Gwen. If I don’t answer the door, let yourself in. Please walk both dogs. Clean. And then line up dog care for seven days, starting tonight.”
So, there are actual dogs at his house. That must have something to do with the mess in his entryway.
But that’s ridiculous to think I could set up care for them at this late notice. Who is he kidding? I won’t be able to line up dog care for the next seven days tonight. It might not be possible to do at all, given how packed those places get. Why does he even think that’s possible?
Oh.
Right.
He’s Brock Benson.
‘Impossible’ is not in his vocabulary.
Clay places a bowl onto the dish towel serving as a temporary drying rack. He glances over his shoulder at me. “It’s way past work hours. Can’t you just ignore him?”
“I… I don’t know.”
A heavy weight settles on my shoulders.
My boss is giving me an order… to leave my home. To leave my brother, who was so sweet, and stopped over with a half-gallon of homemade ice cream.
I don’t want to go to Brock’s house. Why are there dogs there, anyway? When I was there today, I saw no evidence of pets.
“What do you mean you don’t know?” Clay asks. “It’s not like he can make you do anything this late. You can say no once in a while, Gwen.”
How ironic, to hear my brother tell me to draw the line.
I’m terrible at setting boundaries with him. I should have said ‘no’ when he asked me if I was cool spending money on the construction supplies we needed back in July. That was the month when I took out the personal loan and maxed out my credit lines.
He asked me a few times if the budget was okay with me. Things like, ‘You sure you’re good with this?’
