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He shuts the dishwasher door, happy for me, hopeful. Except hopefulness here is ill-advised.
“I’m not going to get it, though,” I add.
He scoops ice into a glass and sprays it full of soda. “You might. If you actually try.”
“I alwaystry.”
He raises a brow. “Do you? Or do you hold back just a little each time so it doesn’t hurt as much when you lose?”
I hate when he’s right. I haven’t prepped for a single interview since I got back, and it wouldn’t have mattered in either case if I had, but I didn’t know that going in. I expected to fail, and I wanted to be able to tell myself afterward that I hadn’t tried my hardest.
I can’t keep expecting to fail. It’s going to matter eventually.
“You really do know me better than I know myself sometimes,” I admit.
He shrugs. “We’re a lot alike.”
“So what are you not putting yourself into a hundred percent?”
His eyes flicker over me and away. “Plenty.”
He doesn’t want to fully invest himself in something he might not get to keep.
I wish I could tell him he was wrong.
* * *
For the weekbefore my interview, I study Holzig as if my life depends on it—their strengths, their weaknesses, the competition.
Just sitting down at my laptop to research has me breathing a little fast. I’mmadefor this job, and if I don’t get it, my heart will break.
Which scares me. Because it’s been broken once too often already.
I’m awake at dawn on the morning of the interview, too excited and nervous to sleep. I have abundant time to get ready, but suddenly it’s ten and there’s no time at all.
“Where the hell are my heels?” I shout, more to myself than Beck. “How could I have lost them when I only own six fucking things?”
“They’re right behind you, babe,” he says, watching my meltdown with quiet amusement.
He crosses the room, towering over me as he places my phone in my hands. “Kate,breathe. You’re going to be great.”
And before I can process it, his palms cradle my face and his mouth fuses with mine, stealing my breath and running all that chaos off to far corners of my mind. When he pulls back, my brain is stunned into silence. We don’t do this. We don’t kiss if we aren’t in the process of inserting body parts into other body parts, but he just kissed me like he actually cared.
And I liked that he did it.
It’s dangerous.
“Okay, thanks,” I whisper, before I turn and half stumble toward the door.
* * *
Downtown San Franciscois nearly ninety minutes from Elliott Springs. I give myself an extra hour to allow for traffic and parking and I need every minute of it.
By the time I walk into a conference room flanked by floor-to-ceiling glass windows, I could swear this day has already been a hundred hours long.
Adam Weintraub enters right after me, alone. I sort of knew what to expect since he’s been getting a lot of publicity and his brother is a pretty well-known snowboarder—dark hair and stylish glasses, trim, mid-forties—but he’s much more buoyant and friendly than I’d have anticipated. He’s also gay, so at least I don’t have to worry that he’s brought me in here to offer me aspecial friendship.
We shake hands and take our seats, and then he grins at me. “Kate, welcome! What’s up with the long absence from the workforce?”
