Page 16 of Boss Me

“Not in the regular stock market. But Synergy’s charter lets the holders convert them to a larger number of regular shares.”

“Look at you and your fancy business degree.”

My cheeks burned. “Business degree in progress.”

“What did he say when you asked him about it?”

I winced. Before, I didn’t want to let on that Cooper was missing. And he hadn’t been gone forty-eight hours yet. But Marlee could help me track him down. Plus, I was desperate to share the burden.

“Cooper left. Vanished. Didn’t show up in Boston.” I spilled out words, telling her about Cooper’s phone, his housekeeper, the unreturned messages to the pilot, the email. Even the note telling me to take a few days off, though I couldn’t meet her eyes when I told her about it.

By the time I finished, Marlee held her hands over her mouth. “That’s not right,” she mumbled between her fingers. “We have to track him down.”

“I’ve been trying for the past day and a half, but no luck.”

Marlee let her hands fall to her sides, and she straightened her skirt. “The good thing is, we know he’s alive and at least reasonably well if he’s sending email to the compliance officer.”

I hadn’t thought of it that way. The tension in my body eased the tiniest bit. “What a Boy Scout. He checks the boxes even when he’s M.I.A.”

Marlee snorted. “Boy Scout. Still, we have to find him. Someone’s going to find out at some point, and having your COO go missing isn’t a good look.”

“Okay, so what’s the plan?” Marlee always had a plan.

“I’ll talk to Jackson. If Cooper told anyone where he was going, it would’ve been him. And I’ll use some of my Jackson-tracking techniques to find out where Cooper went.”

“Jackson-tracking techniques?”

She smirked. “Jackson’s favorite coping technique for stress is to disappear. I can’t even begin to tell you all the places he’s tried to hide. Let me work on it for a couple of days. Today is Thursday. If I haven’t found out anything and he’s not back by Monday, we’ll reevaluate.”

That fit into the few days he thought he’d be away. “Maybe he went to a spa.”

“One of those silent monastery retreats?”

I chuckled at the thought of Cooper Fallon remaining silent for a week without bossing anyone around. “God help those monks.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll find him.”

Clutching my friend’s hand, I felt the tiniest bit better.

6

BEN

They waited until dessert to ambush me.

Dad had just brought out his homemade lemon pound cake with raspberry sauce when the doorbell rang.

“Want me to see who it is?” Mimi set down the coffee carafe.

“No, no.” My mother fluttered her hands nervously. I narrowed my eyes at her. Mom, an environmental lawyer, was never nervous. “I asked an associate to bring me some papers tonight. Remember, I told you about him. The new one. David.” She scurried off toward the door.

My mother never scurried.

I raised my eyebrows at Dad, but he focused his attention on cutting thick slices of cake. So I turned to Mimi. She twisted her lips to the side.

“What do you know, Mimi?”

“Nothing.” She got down another china cup from the old-fashioned hutch. Even the back of her curly hair looked smug.

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