Page 30 of Game Change

“You feel disrespected, Mr. Kincaid? You?” She gestures at me. “The one who was handed a cushy job the first day you stepped your Tom Fords in this office?” She raises an eyebrow and takes a step closer. “Do you want to know howIfeel?”

“I didn’t cause any of that.” I know my words are empty. The optics are bad, and if I were in her shoes, I wouldn’t believe me either.

“And you think that makes a difference? You come swooping in, take something you didn’t earn, and threaten to fire anyone who isn’t thrilled to have you.”

“Oh, you were thrilled the last time you had me,” I announce.

“Don’t youeverbring that up again, you con man. And for the record, I don’t report to you. Everyone else, maybe, but not me. If you have a problem with that, fire me.”

“Con man? You can’t be serious.”

“I’m very serious. You lied. You pretended to be someone else to gain my trust so you could get me into bed and have this over me.”

I throw my head back and give a humorless laugh. “Really? I didn’t realize I was that good. For the record, I’ve never had to con a woman into sleeping with me, but since you’re so damn delusional, let’s go over what happened. Remember the night at the club? The night where you had your hands all over me. Rubbing my chest and touching my ass. Remember how you pressed your body against mine and saidyouwanted to go home withme? I asked if you were sure, and you said you were. I took you back, and you made love to me all night. I spent every spare moment with you after that, and now you want to say that was all a lie?”

“Itwasa lie!” she yells. “And you set it all up. Walking around with no shirt on, flashing your washboard abs. Wearing those ridiculous Crocs so you could appear approachable and smiling like some wanna-be GQ model.”

“So, I asked for it? My outfit made you do it?” I challenge. “It was my fault you asked to go home withme?”

“Don’t you dare use that argument on me, and if you were honest about who you were, I wouldn’t have touched you with a ten-foot pole, but you knew that.”

“I offered to tell you who I was. You’re the one who said no. You wanted to use those stupid code names while on vacation mode.” I put vacation mode in air quotes. “Rememberthat?”

“No,” she lies. “I don’t remember any of that.”

“And you call me the liar,” I challenge.

“If the Crocs fits.”

“Okay, so you fucked me, and now you’re mad about it. Do I have that right? Well, stay mad then.”

“Of course, you would reduce it to just that,” she says, “but on the contrary, Mr. Kincaid, I’m the one who got fucked. And since we’re on the topic, you can go ahead and fuck yourself.” She walks out of my office and slams the door behind her.

Frustrated, I toss my penholder to the floor and let out a string of curse words.

My plans with Brynne blew up in my face, but I still get to have dinner with two beautiful ladies. The first thing I do when she opens the door is force a smile. She gestures for me to come in, and I walk to the living room and drop myself on the couch face first.

“Oh, boy,” my sister, Lisa, says. “I’ll fix you a drink, but really, Paddy. I warned you about getting wrapped up in Uncle Milton’s business.”

My only response is to groan, but I’m not alone for long. I hear multiple footsteps before I feel two little people climb on me. Then I feel a set of paws on my lower back, followed by a loud bark. I turn over, and my niece and nephew smile down at me. I hug them both.

“This is the best part of my day,” I say as I ruffle Archie and Milly’s hair.

“Look, Uncle Paddy,” Milly says as she points at her feet and shows off her bright blue Crocs. “Mom got you ones, too.”

Archie, who can’t yet talk, claps his hands and points at his own feet. He is wearing the same pair of shoes.

“Thanks, Milly. The ones you got me for Christmas were great on vacation.” My sister returns, holding a drink, and orders the kids to the kitchen for dinner, where the nanny will help them.

“What the hell happened?” Lisa asks. “When I talked to you last night, you said you had plans with a woman you met on vacation. How do you go from sounding like that to looking like this?” She gestures at me, and I grimace.

I take the drink and down it in one gulp before I tell her everything. She smiles and swoons at the parts where I met Brynne, but when I mention that Brynne is the same person our uncle promised the job to, the look of horror on my sister’s face is almost comical. It would be if this happened to anyone but me.

“See?” she says. “He’s like a damn genie. He gives you something, but there’s a twist. He always takes it from someone else, like that stupid car. Now this.”

I groan again and feel like a man fifty years older than I am. Lisa is right, as always.

“But even you couldn’t have predicted this,” I say as I finally sit up, “of all the women on the planet, I meet and fall for the one whose job I took. And she doesn’t believe me at all. She spent the day calling me a liar or pretending that what happened between us didn’t happen at all.”

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