"You…" He took a step back. Then another. "You are spectacularly drunk."
"And you are spectacularly rude. Even as a hallucination." I dropped my hands and pointed at him. "You know what your problem is? Your ego. It’s the size of your building. No, bigger. It’s like a whole city. A city of ego. But only you are living there because nobody else can stand to live there."
"Are you quite finished?"
"I’m just getting started. You’ve ignored me for an entire week, Mr. Hunter. You communicate through an app. An APP. Who does that? Who hires a human being and then refuses to acknowledge she exists? You know your scheduling app doesn’t even say please, right? Not once. I checked."
"It’s a scheduling application. It doesn’t require social graces."
"Neither do you, apparently."
His eyes narrowed. "Ms. Wilson…"
"I heard there’s been four assistants." I held up four fingers, which took two attempts because my motor skills had gone on holiday. "Four people before me who had to deal with your emails and your red pen and your refusal to exist in the same room as another person. Four. That’s not a staffing problem, Mr. Hunter. That’s ayouproblem."
He opened his mouth to respond, and that’s when my stomach made its final announcement.
It rose. Fast. Unstoppable. And it didn't negotiate—didn't care about timing or dignity or the fact that my boss was standing three feet away.
I tried to step past him. He blocked my path.
"Move…"
"Ms. Wilson, you’ve been?—"
It happened.
Erupting from my mouth, directly onto his chest.
The silence that followed was the loudest thing I’d ever heard.
I stared at his suit. He stared at his suit. The damage was catastrophic. Three cocktails, one spinach puff, and whatever was left of my professional reputation, all over him.
My brain, which had been operating in a cheerful fog for the last hour, snapped into horrifying clarity. Because nothing sobers you up faster than vomiting on your boss in a nightclub corridor.
He was real.
He wasrealand I had just thrown up on him. Every gesture. All real.
"Oh god," I whispered.
His face cycled through horror, rage, and something that looked like a man reconsidering every single choice that led him to this exact moment in this exact corridor on this exact night.
My voice came out small. "I am so…"
"Get out," he growled.
"Mr. Hunter, please, I?—"
"You’re fired. Effective now." His eyes were ice. Every trace of composure stripped away, replaced by something cold and final. "You are the most catastrophically disruptive human being I have ever encountered in my life, and I would sooner run this entire company alone than spend another moment sharing air with you."
My eyes burned. I blinked hard. Bit the inside of my cheek until I tasted copper.
A door burst open behind us.
"What happened?" A woman appeared in the corridor, late twenties, all sharp energy and designer trainers, eyes bouncing between Jace and me. She was stunning, dark-haired, with features that reminded me of the man in front of me. The same gray eyes, but warmer, alive with a curiosity that Jace’s never held. "Jace? What happened to your…"
She saw the suit. Her eyebrows climbed.
