Carter Reed

mouth and two large suitcases beside her. She was holding onto a large poster, but it started to slip out of her hands. “OH!” She scrambled to catch it, losing her other grip on the briefcase. It fell to the floor and opened, scattering papers, pens, folders, and flashdrives all over the floor. “Oh no.” She bent and started to grab for her stuff.
    I got in, hit my button, and knelt to help her.
    “Oh gosh. You don’t have to do that. Really, Emma.” She gave me an awkward smile around the pencil still in her mouth.
    I settled back on my feet. That wasn’t the reaction I had been expecting. “Oh, no. It’s no problem.” I glanced down at some of the papers in my hands and saw the logo for the new Richmond Bourbon. The two suitcases seemed ominous next to her. “So you’re going to the airport from here?”
    “Oh yeah.” She brushed her hand back and smoothed her hair from her forehead. It only pulled more out of the ponytail. “Since Noah added Allison, this week has been hell. I meant to call you the other day and see if you wanted to meet at Joe’s for a drink after, but I never got time to do that. I haven’t had a chance to check my email. Can you believe that?” She groaned. “I know that once we finish this, I’ll have a week’s worth of email stuff to catch up. And that’s on top of everything we’re going to be doing after we present to the board.”
    “Wait.” This wasn’t making sense. “Noah pulled me?”
    “Noah pulled Mr. Worthless. He didn’t want your boss to get the credit so he added Allison and Harold instead. Talk about being ineffective. With you, we would’ve had a great week and had all this done by Monday. With her, I’ll be lucky to get it all done by the time we walk into that boardroom. I wish you were coming, trust me.”
    “Oh.” That was unexpected. “I thought it was you that requested the switch.”
    “Gosh no! I wish you were still on it. We could’ve been relaxing poolside with margaritas by now if you were on the project.” When the last piece of paper had been picked up, Theresa stood, smoothing out her skirt and her hair. More strands were pulled from her ponytail. “By the way, who was the hottie getting into that car with you?” She laughed, “Next thing I know, I’m returning from the bathroom and Noah’s says you got a ride home. Imagine my surprise when we leave later and there you are, holding hands with Mr. GQ himself.”
    Mr. GQ himself? Did she really not know? “Uh,” I laughed. “It was kind of sudden.”
    Theresa snorted as the elevator slid open. “You can say that again.” After she stepped out and saw that I remained, she caught the door. “Aren’t you coming?”
    My exit was a floor down. “I forgot something by the lobby. I’ll see you next week.”
    “Oh. Okay. See you! Let’s have wine when I get back!”
    When the doors closed behind her, I was left with one very confused thought. What the hell had just happened?

I should’ve gone through the back exit I had come to use since Carter came back into my life. I should’ve gone home, but I didn’t. Feeling rebellious for some reason, I went out the main entrance and turned into the café where Amanda worked. With a quick scan, I saw that she was working. She was placing cookies onto a tray for their display case so I rounded the counter and leaned against its side next to her.
    She kept sliding the cookies onto the tray and ignored me.
    I had sent another text earlier that morning, but it went unanswered. Again. I wasn’t sure what she was doing, pretending I didn’t exist, but I knew Carter advised against communicating with all three of them. He said they were a risk. They could hand me over to ensure their safety, but when I glanced over my shoulder, I saw Mike pretending to study the menu by the door and one of the other guards just came out of the bathroom. I was safe. I had no idea how they moved that fast, but they were good and since my visit to Joe’s they had upped their surveillance over me.
    “Amanda.”
    Nothing. She rearranged a row of the cookies now.
    “You can’t ignore me.”
    She sighed and moved an entire row of cookies to the side on the tray.
    “Why are you mad at me?”
    She shot me a dark look, moved the same row back to their original spot.
    Okay. I got the message, but I wasn’t going anywhere. I was tired of being alone. Since I got the boot from the account, the other girls I’d previously been friendly with had taken