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Lucas rubbed his eyes with this thumb and forefinger, inhaled and then checked the time on his phone that sat next to the stack of unaddressed résumés on his desk.
It was almost five o’clock, but he had fifteen more applications to review before heading home.
Sitting back in his chair, he figured it was either going to be a late night at the office, or he could take the stack of files home and finish going over them while sitting on his couch and drinking a cold beer.
A knock on the door caught his attention, just as Cindy Wahim stuck her head in. “You got a minute, Lucas?”
“Sure, just looking over the last set of applications you gave me.”
Closing the door behind her, maneuvering her enlarged belly in the process, she fell into the chair facing his desk as if a monumental feat.
“Wish there was something I could do or say to convince you that being a stay-at-home mom isn’t what it was cracked up to be.”
“Please, I’d rather look after my own infant than deal with some of the infantile minds of the masses.”
“Now, they’re the exception and not the rule.”
She pointed over her shoulder toward the door. “Speaking of which, you have got to get rid of Lilith. I caught her doodling “Mrs. Lilith Santos” on someone’s tax bill with hearts and arrows.”
Lucas leaned back, eyeing her enlarged belly and praying her water didn’t break on his newly refurbished antique chair.
Cindy pointed at him. “I see what you’re doing and I know what you’re thinking. And no, I’m not going to soak your stupidly expensive chair with my baby-maker juices.”
He waved her off, ignoring the comment, and said, “As for Lilith, it seems wrong to fire someone for having a crush on you.”
“Lucas, Lilith refuses to book meetings requested by city employees between the ages of twenty and forty, who are attractive and single.”
“And female…I know,” he added.
“Negative. Maynard Timmons has been trying to get in to see you for weeks.” She smiled devilishly. “Who happens to have a thing for you.”
Well crap. Maynard was a city council member and gay.
He looked off to the side, thinking back on a few meetings where Maynard became tongue-tied and frazzled around him.
Lucas sat back in his chair. This explained a lot.
“How do you even know this?” he asked, slipping the stack of papers into the folder to his right.
She shrugged, rubbing her belly. “He let it slip after too many Drag Queens at last year’s Christmas party.”
Lucas raised an eyebrow.
“Tequila shots in beer you drink through a straw,” she clarified.
“Ah,” Lucas replied, rubbing his hand over his face.
“Face it, Mr. Mayor, you’re Wayward’s golden boy, who every single person within a fifty-mile radius wants to bang.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” he said, trying to muffle a yawn.
“Please. You’re a ridiculously fit financial whiz with an unhealthy compulsion to take care of people. Who wouldn’t be attracted to you? It’s like you possess some unearthly gravitational pull where everyone wants to be a part of your orbital sphere.” She waved her hands randomly in his direction then rested them on her protruding stomach as if overtaxed. She blew a strand of hair out of her face. “As a statistical outlier, it’s revolting to watch.”
“Okay, first, not sure ‘orbital sphere’ is a thing. And second, if I’m so irresistible, then how are you immune to my charms?”
She wiggled her ring finger in the air. “Wallis is my orbital sphere, galaxy, and solar system. I’m afraid you were relegated to the lower realm of ‘best boss ever’ the first day I met you.”
