The Boss(hole) by Bloom Penelope

Author:Bloom, Penelope
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-07-04T16:00:00+00:00

20

Jules

I hummed to myself while I set up Adrian’s calendar for the day. “Adrian Terranova,” I muttered under my breath. I had to admit it was a much more fitting name for him than Adrian White.

I popped up from my chair and went to the breakroom. I’d been so focused on surviving that I had been taking my lunch at my desk. The breakroom was a hub of activity during the lunch hour, and I’d seen enough dirty looks from my colleagues to guess I wouldn’t be entirely welcome there. I felt socially stunted when it came to this sort of thing.

When I was Juliette Coleton, I never met somebody who didn’t want to butter me up and become best friends. I’d needed an entirely different skill set to survive. I had to figure out who was genuinely interested in being my friend and who was looking to use me. The fact that none of my “friends” had made a serious effort to reach out and connect told me all I needed to know. Yes, I’d dropped off the grid, but I was still screening calls and texts on my old phone. I’d told them I was on a little vacation, and they’d all been happy to accept that and forget I ever existed, apparently.

Now I had Anastasia and that was essentially it. I made a mental note to find time to hang out with her soon because ever since we’d had lunch together, I’d let work and Adrian consume everything. Other than a few texts, I’d barely talked to her since before New Orleans.

It was time to give the breakroom a try, I decided. I took my lunch into the breakroom to microwave it. Today’s lunch was Salisbury Steak in a cheap little black plastic bowl with mashed potatoes and gravy. It looked deliciously disgusting and I couldn’t wait. One of my favorite parts of my new life was getting to eat all the processed garbage my parents would’ve never let me touch before.

I stepped into the breakroom and heard conversation immediately die off. There were four people waiting around a large table in the center of the modest sized room. I recognized everyone’s faces by now, but didn’t have all the names pegged down.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” I said.

Everybody except a woman who was waiting on the microwave ducked their heads, gave that distinctly awkward pressing the lips together that sort of functions as a smile look, and shuffled out of the room.

“Don’t worry about them,” the girl said. She was maybe in her early twenties and wearing a cute black dress with tennis shoes. She had on thick glasses and her blonde hair was long and wild. “I’m Lythe, by the way.”

“Jules,” I said, sticking my hand out. She grinned at it, then reached out and shook it. “Why do I get the vibe they don’t like me?”

“There are two sides here. You’re either in his inner circle, or outside it. Nobody really wants to risk talking to someone in his inner circle.

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