Saved By the Boss by Olivia Hayle
Anthony
“Looks good,” I say.
Tristan gives an approving hum, glancing down at his phone. “Imagine it filled to the brim with people, too. We’ll be packed in here.”
The giant ballroom is a bit gaudy, perhaps, but it’s just what the clientele will expect. People who attend charity auctions in mid-Manhattan on a Friday evening aren’t going because they expect Louvre-level class. “It’ll do.”
Tristan snorts. “So enthusiastic.”
I glance down at my watch. It’s nearly ten in the morning, the day of the function, and Miss Davis hasn’t gotten back to me with my date for the evening.
I don’t know what I’m hoping for most—that she does, or that she doesn’t.
The idea of walking around here in the dim lighting, with all these people, having to make idle chitchat… I’d rather suffer through one of my migraines.
“I’m not sure why Victor needs us here at all,” I say.
Tristan slides his phone into his suit pocket. “Of course you are,” he says dryly. “He wants the pizzazz we add.”
I raise an eyebrow at him. “The pizzazz?”
“Yes. We’ll bid highly and it’ll give us a chance to mingle. Carter has some executive at a multi-media company he wants us to meet.” Tristan waves a hand. “We’re here to see and be seen.”
“And you’ll stay for exactly fifteen minutes,” I accuse, “before escaping back to your beautiful girlfriend and your son.”
Tristan’s smile is shameless. “Yes, but I’ll bring as much pizzazz as I can for those fifteen minutes.”
“I can’t believe I was happy for you in the beginning. I wish I could take it all back,” I say, shaking my head. “You smug bastard.”
Tristan’s smile just widens further, and despite my words, we both know I’m still thrilled for him. He’d found happiness in a way that had been denied him for years. Doesn’t mean it isn’t still insufferable to watch, sometimes.
He doesn’t ask me why I hadn’t responded to his text about coming around for dinner yesterday, and I’m grateful for that. He doesn’t push.
Victor strolls toward us, weaving around tables covered in white linen. His hands are in the pockets of his slacks.
“Think it’ll do?” he asks.
“It will.”
His face is a cool mask. “Remind me why we do these things again.”
“Network. Prestige. Goodwill,” Tristan says. “The company looks good. Acture Capital looks good.”
Victor shakes his head. “I had to tell them to relegate all emails about this to the my assistant. Do you think the question of what the catering company should serve really deserves the CEO’s attention?”
I look past him to the preparations for the evening. Two technicians are on the stage, unrolling foot after foot of cords.
“Cecilia is good at handling that,” Tristan says. “It’s the one thing I miss about Exciteur.”
Victor’s quiet for a beat. “You mean Miss Myers?”
“Yes, Miss Myers,” Tristan says dryly. “Your assistant, previously mine.”
“She does good work, I suppose.”
I roll my neck, catching a crick. Last night had been another one with barely any sleep.
Tristan bumps my elbow with his. “Tell us how the matchmaking company is doing. Have you found your ideal woman yet?”
I shake my head. “I still can’t believe I’m the one who got this assignment. Should have never lost that poker game.”
“Well, it’s not like you’re too busy with anything else, are you?” Victor asks, answering emails on his phone. His words are spoken matter-of-factly.
Because it is a fact. I don’t do much else these days, not when I can handle my business from my home office.
“We’re turning it into an app,” I say. “Should have the company turn green in a matter of months.”
“Gutting staff?”
Summer’s face flits through my mind. “No. They have expertise, and they’re a small operation already.”
Tristan nods, a thoughtful look in his eyes. “We’re going global with it, right?”
“Yes.”
“There could be something there. Hosting elite singles parties worldwide.”
“Like the Gilded Room?” I ask.
Tristan frowns at me. He doesn’t like it when I mention his past habits, despite the fact that I’d once accompanied him to one of those parties. Especially not in public. I know he doesn’t like it, yet here I am, needling him.
When did I start wanting to watch the world burn?
“In a way,” Tristan says, lowering his voice. “But more… respectable. An app launch with a purpose.”
“Could work.”
Victor clears his throat. “Are you bringing any family members tonight, Anthony? Your brother?”
I stare at him long enough that he looks up from his phone. Ice-blue eyes are cold as they stare into mine. “That’s a no,” he assumes.
“That’s a no,” I repeat.
He shrugs, returning to his phone. “A shame. Your connections could help us.”
Tristan and I watch in silence as he strides off to the event coordinators. They stand straight as pins when he instructs them on what is doubtless minutiae.
“Remind me,” I say, “why we tolerate him again?”
Tristan sighs. “He brings in a shit-ton of money.”
“It’s almost not worth it.”
“Almost not,” he agrees, and turns so he’s standing by my side. We look out over the ballroom. “I’m glad you’re coming tonight.”
I make a noncommittal sound. Hate that he, too, has started to walk on eggshells around me. It’s bad enough whenever I speak to my parents. Bad because I know it’s not my impending blindness they’re careful not to bruise themselves against, not when they have no idea the thorn is there. It’s my temper they’re wary of.
“Glad you don’t have to spend those fifteen minutes alone, you mean.”
He snorts, more to humor me than in any real amusement. The silence between us shifts, deepens, and his voice drops. “You know I care about you, man.”
I close my eyes. “Don’t.”
“I have to,” he says, and his eyes are on mine. “Is everything all right? Truly?”
It’s the first time he’s outright asked. Not just commented on my singleness, or my lack of social life, or my temper. But actually asked me for a response.
The truth rises further up my throat than I’d anticipated. Further than it ever has with my family.
But the thought of what comes after stops me. The questions. The well-meaning advice. The suggestions for a second opinion, for technology, for fucking Braille and guide dogs and how are you feeling’s? The altered behavior. How I’d turn from a friend and business partner to someone you pity.
He’d inevitably ask the question that burned like acid in my stomach whenever I thought about the future. How long do you have left until you can’t work anymore? Until my time as an equal partner at Acture Capital is over, until I become a burden, obsolete to everyone I know.
“I’m great,” I say.
My answer might be dishonest, but the silence between us isn’t. Tristan hears the lie and I know he does.
But he just nods. “All right.”
My nerves are so frazzled that I curse out loud when my phone rings twenty minutes later. The cleaning lady before me in the hotel corridor jumps and I mutter a muffled “sorry” as I pass by. Pick up my phone to turn it off.
And see the name on the screen.
“Yes?”
“Oh, hi? Mr. Winter? I hope I’m not calling at a bad time,” Summer says.
I force myself to take the edge off my voice. It’s not her fault that I’m about to put myself through a charity event in a ballroom filled with strangers.
Despite what I’d said to Victor, it’s not impossible that one of my family members will be here. Isaac Winter is the king of schmoozing when he thinks it will benefit my family’s hotel empire.
“It’s not a bad time. Do you have a date set up for me tonight?” I hope she doesn’t. My energy feels strained enough as it is.
“Unfortunately, I don’t. I’m so sorry, but I haven’t been able to find someone I believe would be a good match. I know I waited too long to let you know, but I had hopes for one last client… but no. I apologize, Mr. Winter.”
“Well, stop,” I say. It comes out rougher than I’d meant it. “It’s all right.”
She breathes a sigh of relief and I feel like an asshole. An asshole for going through this charade when she won’t win the bet.
But then her voice slips into a teasing note, soft through the phone. “Trying to strike the right balance between serious and silly with you is difficult.”
“I imagine I’m not the easiest client you’ve ever had.”
Summer laughs on the other line. “No, I can’t say you are. But you’re not the most difficult either.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Well,” she admits, “you’re among them, but not the worst, no.”
“Yet.”
“Yet,” she agrees. “Are you really sure you’ll be all right without a date to your event tonight?”
A wicked idea takes form. One I shouldn’t speak out loud. But the interaction with Tristan has put me on edge, on a day where I’m already dancing with my demons. Why not add one more? “I’m not sure, Miss Davis. You did promise me a date, and so I haven’t set up one on my own. But there is a way you could make it up to me.”
“Oh?”
“You could take her place tonight.”
Complete silence on the other line.
“Mr. Winter, I’m not sure if that would… I mean. Huh.” A cleared throat. “What is this event?”
“It’s a charity auction, hosted by Exciteur Consulting at the Halycon Hotel. There will be canapés. An open bar.”
Her chuckle sounds nervous. “An open bar?”
“Is that a key selling point?”
“No. If I go, Mr. Winter…”
“Anthony.”
“Anthony,” she repeats, her voice soft. “It wouldn’t absolve either of us from the bet. I’d still be looking for a third perfect date for you.”
“I wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”
Her voice strengthens. “Okay, then. I’ll go. It’ll be professional, right?”
Her fears make sense, and I curse myself for being another form of asshole, too. Three for three. It really isn’t my day, and it’s not even noon yet.
“Yes. You work at Opate Match, Summer. I’m not asking anything more than some company at a function.”
“I’ll be there,” she says. “Will you text me the address?”
“I’ll pick you up,” I say, my strides lengthening as I head through the lobby. Back out to the beckoning New York streets, the place I’d grown up, and the city that would one day become a deadly obstacle course for me.
“You don’t have to—”
“I’m the one asking you for a favor,” I say. The words flow easily, following a script I’d once known intimately. “Let me send a couple of dresses over to your apartment.”
“Mr. Winter, I can’t possibly accept that.”
“I’m the one who asked you,” I say. For someone who worked at a matchmaking company priding itself on catering to the elite, she seems unaware of its trappings. “I’d do the same for any woman I’d personally invited to a function.”
“Okay then,” she murmurs. “I’ll text you my address.”
“And your dress size.”
“Um, yes. Okay.”
We click off the call and I find my feet steering me in the opposite direction of my apartment, toward Bergdorf Goodman. I’d meant to make a phone call. Tell them to pick out three dresses.
The way I’d often done for Shelby, once. She’d always liked it when I did that.
But I’d never set foot in the store myself. Savoring the light of the New York summer sun on my face, illuminating the world to a brilliance that makes my eyesight feel normal again, I wonder why I hadn’t.
Picking out the colors and shapes that would look good on Summer doesn’t seem like a nuisance at all.