Page 19 of Play the Game
Raising an eyebrow at Cooper, I adopt my most convincingI’m fine, how are you?look. “I work here.”
Cooper rolls his eyes and damned if the exasperation on his face doesn’t make him, like, at least seventy percent more attractive. Hate that for me. “Last night you were throwing up in a trash can and I had to practically carry you out of the stadium and put you into a car. Now you’re sitting in your office looking like you spent the entire night with your head in the toilet. So, I’ll ask again. What the fuck are you doing here?”
I lean back in my chair, making a silent deal with my stomachto stay put, at least while the hot, grouchy man is standing in my doorway, staring at me like I’ve personally wronged him by being in my own place of business.
“Jesus, Cooper, you really know how to make a girl feel good about herself.”
Going for casual, I grab the coffee mug sitting on my desk and lift it to my lips. I know immediately it’s a mistake. The acrid smell hits my nostrils, and in a flash, I’m at the edge of my chair, leaning over and emptying the contents of my stomach into the trash can.
“Fuck.” Cooper bites out the curse, and out of the corner of my eye I see him striding over to me. The thought of him rescuing me twice in less than twenty-four hours has me sitting up straight through sheer force of will, plucking a tissue out of the box on my desk and dabbing at my mouth like I wasn’t just bent over, hurling my guts out. Nothing to see here.
“Go home, Rhodes. You’re sick.”
I blow my nose, tossing the tissue into the trash can. “I’m fine.” My hoarse, strangled tone is not givingfine, but a girl can dream. “I have to draft the answers to all those motions today, and we still have hours of discovery to go through. I’m fine because I have to be fine. I don’t have time to be sick, and you don’t have time to be in here, haranguing me about being sick.”
“Who’s sick?”
Cooper and I turn to the doorway in unison at Austin’s voice. Cooper glances back at me and I glare at him, silently conveying that if he outs me as being sick to the managing partner of our firm and head of our group, I’ll kill him and laugh over his lifeless corpse.
“No one,” Cooper says, smart enough to get my message. “We were just talking about the case. Evan is drafting the motions to dismiss today.”
“Ah, yes, Evangeline, make sure you send them to Cooper to review before you send them to me. The liability portion of their complaint is tricky, and the motions to dismiss need to beperfect. The judge we pulled is no fan of pharma, and we don’t want to give him any reason to stick it to our client. That won’t look very good for us.”
At the hot rush of anger, I shoot up from my chair, gripping the edge of my desk when my stomach flips, praying to the goddess of female lawyers who work for fuckhead male partners that I don’t throw up in front of Austin. “With all due respect, Austin, I’m a seventh-year associate. I certainly don’t need another seventh year reviewing my work.”
And my name is Evan, you smug, self-righteous, egomaniac.
Austin shakes his head, disappointment all over his face. I hate him so much. “Now Evangeline, that’s not the kind of team player attitude I expect from members of my group. Especially not members of my group who hope to advance, when there are already so few advancement opportunities available.”
The veiled reference to the open partnership position has me seeing red, but I suck it in, because there is nothing to be gained, and everything to lose, by fighting with him in this moment. If I had been able to get some writing done this morning, I would be so much more centered now, but just like yesterday, I slept through my alarm and then spent so much time throwing up that I barely got to the office in time to start my actual work. All I managed to do was jot down a few sentences of dialogue in my notebook, and that’s not nearly enough to empty my brain. “No problem. I’ll send the drafts to Cooper when I finish them.”
Austin nods, a look of triumph on his face, like he won a fucking Olympic medal for putting me in my place. Asshole. “Excellent. I’ll leave you to it. Have a wonderful day.”
“Shove your wonderful day,” I mutter as Austin walks away.
“You don’t have to send me the drafts,” Cooper says casually. “I’ll just tell him you did. Better yet, why don’t you let me take care of all the first drafts and you go home and rest.”
I toss him another glare, this one the most menacing I can manage. “Don’t do me any favors. I’m fine. I don’t need any special treatment. Not from anyone, but definitely not from you.Just because you saw me throw up in a stadium trash can doesn’t make us friends.”
Cooper smirks at me. Fucking smirks. “What about if I saw you throw up in the trash can under your desk, too? Does that make us friends? Or is the third time the charm? Maybe I’ll see you hurl into a trash can in the cafeteria at lunchtime and then we can really be besties.”
The noise of frustration I make is somewhere between a groan and a scream, and without thinking about what sudden movement currently does to my equilibrium, I shove up from my desk and sail out of my office. It’s a good thing I work mere steps from the bathroom, because thirty seconds later, I’m slamming a stall door shut and puking into the toilet, regretting all my life decisions.
The bathroom stays mercifully empty until I’m standing at the sink washing my hands, staring at my pale reflection in the mirror and thinking longingly of the makeup bag in my desk drawer. All my money for a highlighter stick right now.
“Hey, Evan!” The bathroom door swings open, revealing Cindy, the chattiest assistant at the firm. “Any chance you have a tampon on you? I’m positive I just got my period and of course I forgot to restock my emergency supply.”
I open my mouth to answer Cindy, but then a loud buzzing fills my ears as reality slams into me so fast at her innocent question that I get dizzy. Only this time, it has nothing to do with being sick.
Tampons.
Periods.
Fuck.
Cindy is still talking, but I don’t hear a word she says as I rapidly flip back through the last month in my head. Two months? Three? When was the last time I needed a tampon? I have no fucking idea.
Shitshitshitshitshitshitshit.
