Andrew frowned. “It was a business decision. But now I can see why she might have been so upset.”
“No fucking kidding. Didn’t she tell you? She has a solution to the problem.”
Andrew squinted at him. “She does?”
“I can’t believe she didn’t tell you.” Jake shook his head. “It was brilliant.”
“How the hell do you know?”
“We talked about it.” Now it was Jake’s turn to dismiss Andrew’s question. “Oh man. This is so bad.”
“Well, personally, I think she’s more upset about you. You hurt her.”
“I know.” His lips twisted glumly. “I fucking know that. And I never meant to.”
“She talked about you all the time. She worships you, man.”
Jake let the words sink in. Then he shook his head. “No, she doesn’t. We had a deal. She needed a boyfriend. I wanted you to think I had a girlfriend. We got along okay and neither of us wanted to get involved.”
“You’re an idiot. It might have been a deal to start with, but she clearly has feelings for you now. How could you do that to her?”
“I’m an asshole, all right?” Jake almost shouted the words.
After a moment of dense silence, Andrew said, “No, you’re not.”
Jake stared at him.
“She told me all the stuff you did to help when her friend died. You didn’t have to do that. If you were just using her, you’d have run the opposite direction.”
Jake blinked. Gripped the armrests of his chair.
“Look. Whatever twisted reason you had for hooking up with her, you need to fix this.” Andrew rubbed his forehead. “She’s a mess, I tell you.”
Jake’s throat tightened. “She’s better off without me.”
Andrew rolled his eyes. “Oh, get over yourself.” Then he sighed. “Hell. I’ve got woman problems of my own. I believe you when you say you’re over Gianna, but hell, Jake.” He paused, swallowed hard, looked away. “I’m not sure if she’s over you. She’s been acting weird lately.”
Jake gaped at his old friend.
He could tell Andrew about Gianna’s phone call, her begging him to see her, her hanging around his office building last night waiting for him.
At that moment, he felt like someone had just handed him a weapon and with it, with a few words, he could make Andrew suffer for everything he’d done to him. Everything he’d taken away from him.
Revenge. Is that what this had really all been about? Had Andrew been right? Had he been using Shelby to get back at Andrew for what he’d done to him?
What had happened to her life?
Shelby sat cross-legged on the couch in her living room, wrapped in a blanket, with a thermometer in her mouth.
She’d had such high hopes for this job, relieved at having found such a good job in her field, working for a good company and for what she’d thought was a decent boss. Then things had gone kind of sour, even though she was getting good assignments and lots of perks, when she started to worry about what Andrew really wanted from her. Then Adam had been diagnosed with cancer. Her parents were too busy fighting with each other and making up to care about her career problems or friend problems.
Then she’d met a guy, a hot guy, but a nice guy, the first guy in a long time—or maybe ever—she’d believed wasn’t using her for his own reasons. Well, other than the reasons they’d agreed on. But then she’d stupidly fallen in love with him, and it turned out he was using her. And now her boss had screwed her over, yet again.
Did she have “kick me” written all over her, or something?
The thermometer beeped. She slid it out and peered at the digital readout. Normal. Huh. She turned it off and tossed it to the table.
She didn’t have the flu. She was just heartbroken.
Her bottom lip pushed out and she let it, indulging in one more moment of self-pity. Then she sighed.
It was her own fault for letting her feelings get involved with Jake. She should have known she wasn’t going to be able to not do that. She’d started off great, making that deal with him, confident she could do it, but then she’d gotten all soft and hopeful, dammit, with her usual sickening optimism, and actually started having crazy thoughts about love and a future when she should know what men were like.
And that included her boss. A guy who’d steal his best friend’s girlfriend. What the hell? That was low. For a moment she almost felt sympathy for Jake after having that done to him.
And now Andrew had killed her project.
Restlessly she threw off the blanket, suddenly feeling hot.
There was no reason they couldn’t do the two projects that needed to be done simultaneously, if they hired an external consultant. She knew they didn’t have internal resources to run two big projects simultaneously, but her cost-benefit analysis showed the savings they could make if they did it with an external consultant, even taking that additional expense into consideration.
She had to tell Andrew that. Why hadn’t he listened to her earlier?
Well, for one thing he’d had another meeting to go to. And for another thing, she hadn’t even really tried to tell him. She’d been so shell-shocked she’d barely been able to speak.
But what could she do? He’d already assigned the new project to someone else. Which made her burn with anger. That was not fair! Then she had to heave a huge sigh, because when Andrew had given her this project, she’d totally thought Brad should’ve been the one to run it.
But she’d been doing it. It wasn’t her fault their internal processes were such a huge barrier. Now people were going to think she couldn’t handle this project, just like Bram and Davis had been afraid of. Nobody would ever take her seriously on any other projects she was given.
If she had to leave this job too, her professional reputation would be trashed for sure. She’d never get another job, other than maybe waiting tables. Impotent fury rose up in her, fast and hot, and she clenched her hands into fists.
She fought her way out of the blanket still tangled around her hips and stood. She wasn’t going down without a fight this time. She was not going to let this happen to her again. If Andrew didn’t want to hear this, she’d go to his boss. She was not going to let her career be trashed yet again.
She’d changed out of her suit when she got home, into her favorite yoga pants and T-shirt. Damn. She looked down at herself. Much as she didn’t give a shit right then how she looked, the VP of Benefits was not going to take her seriously if she stormed into his office looking like this.
Trembling with determination, her stomach tight and her jaw clenched, she hurried into her bedroom and whipped her clothes off. The suit she’d worn earlier lay on the bed and she grabbed it and put it back on. She washed her face, briefly thought about the contact lenses, but her eyes still stung, so she gave up on that idea. Ah well, Jake had said she looked intelligent in her glasses. She hated wearing them, they interfered with her vision and hurt her nose and ears after a few hours, but right now she didn’t care.
She fixed her makeup, not wanting to look like her world had just fallen apart.
No. She straightened her shoulders and studied her reflection in the mirror. She was in charge of her world. Two guys who had some kind of bad history and wanted to stab each other in the back over a woman weren’t going to destroy her world. Let them battle it out over her. Gianna. Her mouth twisted, a sharp pain slicing through her at the memory that Jake had been in love with her.
And likely still was. Why else would he have tried to get back at Andrew like that? Well, if he was still carrying a torch for Gianna, he was an idiot. She was married.