The Guy Who Became My Grumpy Boss (Curvy Girl Crew #7)

Chapter 20

-Peter-

When I saw Jessica practically run from the room behind Patrice, I decided I needed to pass Marissa off to someone else so I could go help.

Even though we’d agreed that Jessica could take care of everything before the actual party started, I had a feeling she was overwhelmed.

For the eighth or ninth time, Marissa reached back and put her hand on mine. “Let’s go that way.” She pointed, and I felt like a servant at her beck and call.

Tyrell had been with us for a few minutes, which had given me a chance to process and plan, but he’d gotten distracted by one of the teams that had a hoard of pirate stuff for their theme.

“I need to go check on something,” I said as I pushed Marissa in the direction she’d indicated.

“I can help.” Marissa craned her neck to look up at me. Thus far, I’d avoided making more than casual eye contact with her, but now she’d caught me off guard, and I noticed the tightness in her face, and I wondered how much pain she might be in.

“You should rest,” I said.

“Resting is boring. I need to be here. Where’s the problem?”

I grunted, unwilling to bring her to Jessica.

We stopped by a team that had brought in a bunch of painted square boxes put together to look like blocks. I knew one of the people on the team was a friend of Marissa’s. “Tiffany, would you be so kind as to make sure Marissa is comfortable?”

Tiffany, an energetic woman with long dark hair and a thin frame, jumped to her feet. “Marissa, what are you doing here?”

Marissa shot me an angry glance, but I ignored it as she was swarmed by the team.

“Call me if there’s an emergency,” I told Marissa as I hurried away.

My plan was to get to Jessica, but three people with questions that I answered directly from the emails that had been sent out interrupted me, and by the time I got to the door that Jessica had disappeared through, my hands were shaking.

I thought I’d been ready for this, but apparently not.

“Hey.” I jumped at the sound, then found Tyrell coming toward me. “You okay?”

I shook my head. While my friend didn’t know everything about me, he did know that I preferred solitude to crowds.

“What do you need?” he asked.

While I knew I shouldn’t show weakness in front of my boss, I rubbed my forehead. “I need a minute.”

“Marissa was a bit much?” Tyrell motioned me through the door.

I nodded.

Tyrell chuckled but then pointed down the hallway. We were in a service area of the hotel. “There’s a little break room down there that the hotel manager says no one uses. Jessica designated it for nursing moms or anyone who needs a few minutes of downtime. There’s a quiet room sign on it.”

Jessica had done that? She hadn’t told me.

Tyrell pointed again. “Go.”

“Thanks,” I muttered as I slunk away down the corridor.

A voice sounded from behind me, and I flinched away from it. “Did I see Peter come this way?” I wasn’t sure who it was.

“He’s busy,” Tyrell said. “What can I do for you?”

It had been years since Tyrell had run interference for me. He’d protected me in college a few times. How had I forgotten that? I needed to thank him and made a mental note to do so as soon as I didn’t feel like the sky was falling and crushing my chest.

The room, as promised, had a sign on the door outside and was blessedly deserted on the inside. A couch and several soft chairs sat in one corner, and three round tables and mismatched seats filled the rest of the space. There were snacks and water, and even a couple of eye masks. Small arrangements of flowers sat on the tables.

I settled at one of the tables and glared at the flowers. Whoever had done this arrangement hadn’t even tried. All of the pink was in one place, and the baby’s breath was clumped in the back. I pulled the round glass vase toward me and tugged out the bundle of greenery.

While I wouldn’t have chosen these to go together, I could make it work.

Unless I didn’t have to. I glanced around, noted the other arrangements, and decided they could all use an upgrade.

When I had them all before me, I began disassembling them and putting new color schemes together. Light green here. Purple there. No pink with that orange, and who had tried to bleed blue into the white carnations?

The edge of pressure from this past week drained away, and I lost myself in arranging.

As I did so, my mind relaxed, and I was able to process again.

Why did Marissa stress me out so much? I’d just spent days with Jessica, and while I was mentally tired, I wasn’t totally exhausted.

Twenty minutes with Marissa and I was ready to run from the building and not look back.

When I was in the same room as Jessica, I didn’t feel the crushing weight of life.

Was this what love felt like? Or was this something different? I wasn’t sure I could feel love, not with the way my brain worked, but something was happening that had never happened before.

The lavender flowers weren’t matching with the yellow roses, so I moved them.

Maybe I should call Aunt Mei and ask her about it. She knew me better than anyone else and had never judged me for what she called my “quirks.”

When I thought about her, I compared her to Marissa and then Jessica. While Aunt Mei didn’t drain me like Marissa did, she also didn’t energize me like Jessica. She fell somewhere in between. I could be myself around her and not feel guilty. I rarely sought her out, but I did value her opinions and advice.

Whereas Jessica was someone I wanted to be with more and more.

Maybe that was the result of having a crush on her for so long and now being able to be close to her. It could wear off. Or I might feel this way around her forever.

Forever.

What would my life be like with Jessica in it outside of work?

After working together for a year, I knew a lot about Jessica, but each time we interacted, I learned something new about her. In some way, she completed me.

I winced at the cliché comparison, but it felt right.

If I didn’t know she was drowning in issues for the retreat, I would have pulled out my phone and called her right then, but that wasn’t the plan, and I was going to stick to the plan.

Technically, I was chilling out, just as she’d ordered me to.

I blinked and wondered when my hands had stopped moving. Three new flower arrangements sat before me, more beautiful and filled out than they had been before. I knew I’d done a good job and had the belated thought that I should have taken before-and-after pictures for Mrs. Santos. She would have laughed.

“You really do know a thing or two about flowers, don’t you?”

Jessica’s voice made me jump up out of my chair. I turned and found her leaning against the wall with her arms folded and a huge grin on her lips.

I frowned. “When did you come in?”

“A few minutes ago.” She pushed off the wall and walked toward me. My heart sank when she stopped and left several feet between us. Had I done something wrong? But then she offered me her hand.

Was she worried about giving me space? While I appreciated the sentiment, I needed her near, so I took her hand and tugged her to me.

Like the purple and orange flowers, we worked. She fit perfectly into my embrace, and her arms snaked around my waist to hold me tight.

Jessica was my lifeline. What had I done without her?

“Are you going to make it?” She looked up at me.

I leaned down and took the opportunity to kiss her.

She smiled, and a contented sigh came from her throat.

“I am now,” I said.

Only then did I notice how tense she was under my touch. I leaned back and met her gaze. “Are you okay?”

Jessica closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “It’s madness out there.”

“Can I help?” I asked.

“No.” Jessica snuggled her head into my chest. “Just as we got the allergy thing worked out, one of the teams started their smoke machine, which sent someone into an asthma attack.”

“We said no smoke,” I said.

“I know that, and you know that, and they probably know that, but they don’t care. Or didn’t, until Catherine went after them.”

The thought of the stern older woman berating people for being idiots warmed my insides. “Did she enjoy herself?”

Jessica laughed. “I think she did.”

Someone’s phone buzzed. It didn’t matter whose it was, because I glanced at the clock and saw that we had five minutes before the official start time. “We need to go.” I kissed the top of Jessica’s head.

“I know. I just needed a second.”

I rubbed her back and felt the muscles loosen.

“Thank you,” she murmured into my shirt.

“No, thank you.” I kissed her again, then gently pushed her away. “You did your part, now it’s my turn.”

Jessica smiled up at me. “I’ll be right there when you need me.”

I squeezed her hand. “I’m counting on it.”

She squeezed back and then we walked into the hallway. We held hands until we turned the last corner. I felt a keen loss as her fingers slid away from mine.

Catherine must have put her foot down, because when we arrived in the ballroom, everyone seemed to be in their spots, waiting.

“Peter! There you are!” Marissa cried from where she’d parked herself on the low dais that the hotel had erected at one end of the ballroom. Amelia and Tyrell were there too. Behind them stood a table covered in trophies.

Some of the pressure I’d released built back up, but Jessica’s next words kept it from becoming too much.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take care of her.”

I should tell her she didn’t have to do that, but instead, I replied, “Thank you.”

“You’ll owe me, mind you,” Jessica said from the corner of her mouth as we drew closer.

“Name your price.”

She laughed.

I resisted the urge to put my palm on Jessica’s back as I followed her up the two stairs to the dais.

Marissa tried to maneuver her wheelchair toward me, but Jessica skirted around everyone, came up behind Marissa, and held her in place. Jessic said something to Marissa, and while Marissa’s expression didn’t fall, it did change.

Jessica raised her eyebrows at me as if to say I’d better get started because she was charging me for this by the minute, so I plucked the microphone from the table and turned it on.

This was it. In a few hours, I’d be free of the retreat disaster and off for a week. Mrs. Santos had agreed to let me hide in her store as much as I wanted to, and I was looking forward to it more than I could say.

Until then, I had an activity to run.