“Spare me,” Kate said in a bored tone as she stood and headed toward the conference room door. “But I’ve made a mental note. Next time you’re on a phone call with your biggest investor that took three weeks for his assistant and me to coordinate, I’ll let everyone know you’re in your office and that it’s okay to go on in.”
“Oh, I’m sure Kennedy wouldn’t mind if I went in,” Claudia said with a warm smile, pressing her nose to his cheek and giving him some sort of weird Eskimo kiss.
Kate caught Kennedy’s eye as she passed the couple and smiled sweetly. He tried to hide his wince and failed. She knew the only thing Kennedy hated more than interruptions while he was on the phone was public displays of affection.
Just wait till you see the life-size ice sculpture created in your likeness, Kate thought as she left the conference room. It’ll be right next to the oysters you can’t eat.
“Ah, there you are.” A large, masculine arm dropped over her shoulders as Matt Cannon, one of her other bosses, fell into step beside her. “Don’t be mad.”
“What did you do?” she asked, already scrolling through the email on her iPad, trying not to be annoyed that her inbox had overflowed in the brief time she’d been discussing shellfish with Kennedy’s girlfriend.
“You look so pretty today,” Matt said. “And you smell nice. So nice. New perfume?”
Kate didn’t wear perfume.
“Matthew,” she said, stopping at her desk and batting his arm off her shoulders. “Please tell me you didn’t.”
“Didn’t what?” He picked up her stapler and pretended to study it. Matt was gorgeous, with blond hair and playful blue eyes. He was also utterly brilliant, having taken Wall Street by storm as a “boy wonder” back in his early twenties. He was also kind, charming, and she loved the guy, but the man had one serious shortcoming . . .
Kate sighed. A real sigh, not one of the silent ones. “You did.”
“Did what?” This from another male voice. “Managed his own calendar again?”
“Managed is a strong word,” Kate muttered to Ian Bradley, her third boss, as she dropped into her desk chair and pulled up on her computer Matt’s calendar for the following day.
“How bad is it?” Matt asked, craning his neck to see her screen.
“Well, it depends,” she said, her mouse already clicking rapidly to repair the damage. “Just how much do you want to meet with Jarod Lanham, at the same time you have lunch with Sabrina, at the same time the Sams scheduled your Q1 review?”
“Cozy!” Ian chimed in with enthusiasm. “Your bosses, your wife, and your top client, who once dated your wife . . .”
“They didn’t date,” Matt groused at Ian before looking beseechingly at Kate. “Can you fix it?”
“Done,” she said, already locking her computer screen and picking up her cell. “I sent an invite to Jarod asking to reschedule for Friday, confirmed the review with the bosses, and . . .” She held up her screen. “Just texted Sabrina to see if happy hour works instead of lunch.” Her phone buzzed, and Kate looked down at the message from Sabrina Cross, Matt’s wife and one of her best friends. “She says we’re good.”
“I love you,” Matt said. “You are the best. And so, so pretty. Isn’t she pretty, Ian?”
“So pretty.”
Kate shot Ian a suspicious look. “What’d you do?”
He sucked in his cheeks and pretended to think. “Hypothetically, if Lara was feeling a little stressed about the wedding, and I told her to calm down . . .”
She gave him a look. “Please tell me you didn’t actually say the words calm down to the woman planning your wedding.”
“Well . . .”
“Oh my God,” Kate muttered, thumbs already at work as she wrote another text message, this time to Lara McKenzie, to do damage control with Ian’s fiancée. “At least if you two keep it up, I have unshakable job security.”
And she meant it. Of course, on paper, she reported to Kennedy, Matt, and Ian. Technically, they were the bosses, she, the executive assistant. But they all knew who really ran the show.
It wasn’t a typical arrangement, but the four of them went way back—they’d all started at Wolfe Investments the same year, within a month of one another. Back when the guys were junior brokers and Kate’s primary employment goal had been a job that covered vision insurance, contributed to a 401(k), and put her over-the-top organizational skills to use.
Though Wolfe had a high burnout rate, with very few junior brokers “making it” to the next level, her guys had all been promoted to director. And while protocol had dictated they each pick their own dedicated assistant, they’d all picked, well, her.
It had worked out well for all of them. On Wall Street, where douchebags were a dime a dozen, Kate had lucked out not only to have one boss who wasn’t a total dick but three who respected her and had become friends.
The result had been a crazy few years, but Kate wouldn’t have changed a moment of it. Well, that wasn’t true. Kate would happily eliminate Matt’s fondness for screwing up his own calendar. And she hadn’t exactly relished Ian’s pre-Lara days when she’d smoothed out more than one of his awkward Whoops, I slept with her; Whoops, her, too scenarios.
As for Kennedy . . .
“Hey, if it isn’t my two favorite boys!” Claudia said, releasing Kennedy’s arm and coming over to greet them.
Kate knew it was petty, but she couldn’t help but relish Matt’s ever so slight eye roll at Claudia’s over-the-top air-kiss routine.
Claudia slapped Ian’s biceps. “Ian Bradley, I haven’t seen you in forever! You keep dodging my double-date invitations.”
Ian dutifully pecked Claudia’s cheek. “Apologies, doll. The wedding planning’s been keeping us busy.”
“Right! Remind me again when the big day is?”
“It was supposed to be Valentine’s Day, but we made a last-minute venue change and pushed it to June.”
“Oh, so your darling girl will be a June bride!”
Matt caught Kate’s eye and mouthed, Darling girl?
She pressed her lips together to hold in a smile, imagining what Lara, a badass FBI agent, would think of the descriptor.
Kennedy caught their exchange and swatted the back of Matt’s head, which earned him a curious look from Claudia.
Without acknowledging her silent question, Kennedy asked, “You ready for lunch?”
“Lunch? It’s two thirty,” Matt said, glancing at his Rolex.
“Congrats, Kate, you finally taught Matt how to tell time!” Ian exclaimed.
“I wish,” Kate said.
“You know, I mastered that a few years ago,” Matt said. “It’s damn dates that seem to trip me up . . .”
“You sure?” Kennedy said. “Because you didn’t seem to have telling time mastered this morning when you were four minutes late for our six a.m. run.”
Ian turned to Claudia. “It’s not too late, you know. Save yourself.”
“I think he’s adorable,” Claudia said, reaching out and taking Kennedy’s hand. “Shall we?”