Page 479 of Manhattan Bossholes

My fingers caressed my stomach as I tried to put myself back in the dreamy headspace, but my alarm went off again, effectively killing the mood for good.

Time to get up and get to work, I guess.

Lavonte texted me on the way to the office with a skull emoji, saying the “vibes were off.” He didn’t respond when I asked for details, so I prepared myself for whatever was going down. As always, I stopped in the kitchen first thing for a cup of coffee and ran into Rhea.

“Did you hear?” she whispered in a conspiratorial voice, glancing around the room even though it was obvious that we were alone.

“Lavonte texted and said something is up, but he wouldn’t tell me what’s going on. Fill me in. The stress is killing me.”

She looked around again. “Have you seen Lorraine lately?”

It took me a second to connect the name with James’s assistant. I shook my head. “I don’t really know her, except passing by her desk a few times.”

“Well, she’s been up to something. Or should I say someone. Turns out she’s pregnant!”

I frowned in confusion. “Isn’t she, like, in her mid-forties?”

“Oh yes, she is.” Rhea nodded, clearly enjoying being the office newsie. “And it gets better; she had an affair with Tony in vendor relations!”

“No way!” I gasped. “They’re both married!”

“Indeed they are. Quel scandale!” Rhea pursed her lips in a prim expression. “Since she’s a geriatric pregnancy, she needs to go on bed rest for the final four months, so James is down an assistant. Worst time for it too since he’s doing two jobs and trying to hire a replacement for Clint. He is not going to be fun to have around.”

She was right. James had been doing his best to keep all the balls in the air, but it was clear the strain of trying to be all things to all people was wearing on him. Not that he’d admit it. We all noticed the emails time stamped as being sent at two in the morning, which meant that the guy was basically working nonstop.

I pondered how the news was going to impact our day-to-day lives. It wasn’t like James hung around the creative floor, but he did pop in throughout the week, and we had a group check-in meeting every Friday morning. Was his typical grumbly mood going to turn darker due to the stress?

Rhea and I gossiped our way back to our floor and as I settled into my workspace, an absolutely insane idea started flitting around my brain. There was no way I could commit to it, and I tried to bat the concept away, but the more I attempted to talk myself out of it the stronger the pull to go for it became.

It all came down to the fact that I loved everything about my job now that Clint was gone. The creativity, the freedom, my colleagues, the paycheck… I was right where I needed to be. But fashion was a fickle business, and talent was easy to cycle through since there were so many other hungry designers out there dying for a position like mine. And it wasn’t like James owed me anything. He could throw me out on my ass if he wanted to. If he wound up constantly in a bad mood because of all the extra work on his shoulders, the odds of him being in a firing state of mind seemed high. And who would he target? Gee, maybe the girl who’s been arguing with him since the day they met?

But what if I made myself indispensable to Branson, and more importantly, to James? Then there’d be no way to get tossed aside like I didn’t matter. I had too much experience with the feeling, and I never wanted to be in that position again, especially now that it felt like I’d found a home on the Branson team. Besides, I’d seen what his go-to response was to an unexpected gap in the workforce—he stepped up to fill it himself. Surely, that was an approach he’d respect in others, too.

“What are you up to, woman?” Lavonte asked as he walked by my desk. “You’ve been staring into space since you got here. You’re planning something.”

I grinned at him. “I’ve got a crazy idea.”

He chuckled. “I like that about you. You’ve got balls, girl.”

It was exactly the reminder I needed. “Why thank you, Lavonte! You’re right, I do have balls. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be back in a bit with some hot goss.”

He did a little shimmy. “Oh yes, mama, bring me all the gossip!”

Five minutes later I was once again standing at my boss’s doorway feeling a little shaky. Was it because I’d had a sex dream about him? Possibly. More likely it was the risk I was about to take.

A chance to make myself the most important member of his team, despite what it would do to my workload. But honestly, before I’d gotten the promotion, I was working three jobs on top of school. It wouldn’t be that hard to have school on top of just two jobs. I glanced over at Lorraine’s empty desk and knocked on the door.

“Come in.”

I strode into his office with my head high and my shoulders back. “Good morning.”

James scowled at me from behind his laptop. Whatever he was doing certainly had him in a bad mood, but I was about to change everything for him.

“What is it? I’m in the middle of something,” he barked, gesturing to his screen.

I ignored his tone. “I think you’re going to want to hear this. I have good news for you. I found a replacement for Lorraine.”

He frowned. “Already? Who is it?”