Page 95 of Power Moves
Planning a photo opportunity with the Prime Minister will take hours. Hundreds of emails. Too many texts. Last night he trapped me against a wall, and now he’s trying to trap me into spending a five-hour car trip with him, working until my eyes water and I’m nauseous from the uninterrupted screen time.
Why is he doing this?
Because he likes to control me.
The thought tumbles out as effortlessly as if I’ve known it all along.
It’s like a timelapse video has been turned on in my mind, a thousand frames stitched together to reveal a story that I wouldn’t let myself watch until now. The questionable compliments, the laughed-off comments … I see myself, young and impressionable, being cheerfully coerced into working yet another weekend.
‘I accidentally hired the car for a return trip,’ I say, standing up. My whole face feels glazed in sweat. ‘I’ve got to drive it back to Sydney.’
‘Just cancel it.’
‘I can’t.’ I shake my head at the table.
I glance up to see Boss’s narrowed eyes. He angles his head towards the garment bag folded over the spare chair.
‘Can you take my suit to the office then?’
It makes no logistical sense.Heis going to the office too. He can take his own suit. But now it makes sense why he’s up so early: to corner me. This is a test of loyalty.
‘Sure,’ I say, forcing a hollow smile. ‘No worries.’
I don’t know what else to do. He’s still my boss.
CHAPTER 43
I haul my trolley bag and Boss’s suit to the reception desk as a message buzzes in from Maxy.Have you told Jessie?
He’s been machine-gunning me with texts all morning to check on me, and I hate being made to feel like the family’s brittle china doll. I shove my phone into my handbag. No, I haven’t spoken to Jessie. I don’t want to be reminded that I really upset her.
I’m desperate to ask someone though:Was it my fault? Was Boss reading signs I didn’t know I was giving?
I pull the hotel room swipe card out of my handbag, my mind circling around a conclusion that I’m desperate to avoid: Archie’s the only person I can ask about what happened. No one else knows the backstory and he’s the only person I can count on to tell me the harsh, unfiltered truth. Archie never goes easy on me.
I think of his serve, of how the tennis ball skidded at my feet and how that thrilled me—to know he knew I couldhandle it. He can be goading and silly and ruthless in the way he hunts down stories, but he’s never treated me as anything less than an equal and he’s not a liar.
‘Are you okay?’ asks the receptionist as I arrive at the front desk. ‘You look a bit pale.’
No. Definitely not. I’m about to vomit in your pot plant.‘I’m fine,’ I lie, handing over my swipe card. ‘Just keen to get on the road. Has Archie Cohen checked out yet?’
The receptionist peers at me over her computer. ‘We don’t give out personal information about our guests, but if he’s one of the journalists, they’ve already gone. Their bus left at five-thirty.’
‘Oh.’ I nod.
I drag my bag into the car park under the cloudless blue sky. The sun now hangs above the crown of the eucalypts, searing my eyes. The bus parking bay is empty.
I make my way along the path that follows the highway to the car hire depot. Vehicles are whizzing past leaving flurries of bitumen, dust and exhaust fumes in their wake. The sound of a ute roaring past is like a battering ram against my temples.
I suddenly wish I could teleport myself back to that day when Archie took me on the media bus. I miss our banter. I miss laughing at him. I miss laughingwithhim. Over these past weeks, I’ve missed the challenge of trying to outsmart him and the see-sawing balance of our games, where winning hinged on every word so you could never relax, but that made it so fun and worth the effort of seeing him eventually crack and smile—and the way it made me soar, knowing he was smiling because of me.
I miss his body too. I almost laugh maniacally at how ridiculous it sounds in my head. I miss his body—and not even his naked body. I miss his fully clothed body. I want to sit next to him on a bus and lay my head against his suit-jacketed shoulder and absorb his steadiness by osmosis.
I pause to readjust Boss’s garment bag over my forearm as a semi-trailer trundles past. I need to yoga-breathe myself back to sanity. I simply want to cry on a starchy form of men’s clothing. Not Archie’s. I don’t really miss his body. I miss theideaof his body. The shoulder to cry on could be anyone’s.
The memory of Boss pinning me to the wall slingshots into my brain and my eye catches on the garment bag. A wave of nausea billows through my organs. I never want to cry on Boss’s shirt. Never, ever, ever.
At the hire car depot, I open my phone to pay and frantically swipe away my screensaver photo: ten-year-old me, flanked by Jessie, Maxy, Dad and Mum, grinning after conquering Wet’n’Wild’s Super 8 Aqua Racer. It’s my inescapable reminder that if you let yourself get distracted, life can change in an instant.
