Page 57 of Boss Abroad
Callie interrupts me. “A story for the ages. I’ll be telling it to my grandkids.”
I try my best to disguise the smile in my voice as I carry on. “My second day at work, my face is splashed all over the news as my patient’s lover.”
Callie cuts in again. “Cannot wait to hear your plans for day three.”
“Well…”
“Oh! My! God! You do have something planned! What? What is it?”
“Kind of. Day four, actually. When Liam left today…”
“TODAY? As in, he slept the night?”
Fucking hell, nothing goes past her. “Well, yeah, but that’s not the point, Calista.” I play it coy. “Before he left, he said I could give an interview before tomorrow’s game. So that’s happening.” I ponder my next words, and Callie reads into my silence.
“But there’s more. Spill it.”
“He also left behind a contract with rules for us to keep sleeping together.” God, it feels so embarrassing saying it out loud. “No strings attached, and no one ever finding out.”
When he proposed it, it sounded practical, reasonable. But now I feel like I’m telling my middle school bestie a dirty secret.
“Way to go, girl.” She chuckles, and it lifts the unwarranted shame from my body. “You're already breaking the rules telling me. We’re up to a great start, A.”
“You're basically my conscience, Callie. I’m the sensible angel on one shoulder. You’re the devil, full of mischief, dangling their legs on the other.”
“Ha!” Callie scoffs. “Babe, I’m fine being the devil, but you’re no angel.” She knows me too well for me to argue with her about that. “What else? I want to know the kinky stuff. Don’t hold out on me now.”
“That’s pretty much it.” I disappoint her and reach for the contract to flip it back open. “Agree to a bodyguard—you know, because of the paparazzi, keep the key to this room so we have a place to meet and only have sex with him while I—” The laugh that comes out of her is infectious. No matter how hard I press my lips together, I’m smiling at the sound.
“April Motherfucking Hadden!” See? Catchy. “Or should I change it to April ‘The Power of the Pussy’ Hadden?” No, God, please no, I think to myself, but I’m laughing too hard to protest out loud.
When the both of us stop laughing enough to form words, I tell her not to read too much into it.
“Well, babe. Kinda hard, you see? I think Good Dick is under a pussy spell and is looking after you. The bodyguard, the interview, the call to the hospital board.”
I bolt to a sitting position; the towel twisted around my head bobbing painfully to one side. “What call to the hospital board?” I yank the thing off with one tug.
“So, while you were having your fifteen minutes of fame and riding Good Dick, there was some commotion on this side of the Atlantic, too.” Callie sounds too cool for my spiking pulse. “I was with Preston when he was pulled into an,” she does a manly, dumb voice, “urgent meeting with the directors.” Callie huffs to punctuate. “This nosey bitch followed him and stood by the closed door, eavesdropping. You’re welcome.”
“Callie, tell me what happened already. You’re killing me.”
“Killing you? Bitch, shut up. You’re LIVING! You’re in London, in a five-star hotel, getting dicked by a billionaire who put it on a contract that he wants to go exclusive. Oh-my-God, babe,” she pauses, startled. “You have your first boyfriend,” she exclaims in pure mockery, and I pull the phone away so she won’t hear me laughing. “Took you a while, but wow, can’t wait to see how you’re going to top that.”
“For the love of my blood pressure, Calista.” I speak louder to bring her focus back to Earth and, if I’m lucky enough, this conversation. “Focus, or I’ll hang up on you and call Preston.”
“Yeah, right. Like he would tell you anything and have you worried,” she huffs. “Okay. So yeah, the directors were being a bunch of prissy little bitches, saying you were supposed to bring good press to the hospital, but now the spotlights turned to their doctor having an affair with the footballer, blah blah, blah.” Her tone goes from overly nasal to deadly stern. “They’re pissed they can’t control the narrative. Not your fault, obviously.”
“Thank you,” I murmur, needing to say it, but not wanting to interrupt her.
“Of course, babe.” I can hear the smile in her voice, but it’s gone the next second. “Then they said they’re bringing you back here on paid leave and Preston needed to pick someone else from his team to go to London. I swear I was about to barge into that room when a loud thump stopped me. Sounded like something heavy falling to the floor.”
She’s making light of it, but I’m still stunned at the board wanting to bring me back home. As if I did anything to be ashamed of. To bring shame to them.
I try to focus on what else Callie has to share, scared of how much worse it can get.
“I’m wondering, ‘Did Preston just kill a bitch? Was that a body dropping to the ground?’ But then he shouts at the board.” She pauses for effect and turns dead serious. “April. I’ve never seen the man raise his voice in his life. And now I’m partially deaf in the ear glued to the door because Preston screamed a ‘THE FUCK YOU WILL’ that flailed my eardrums.”
No, no, no, no, no. Is day three in London about to be the messiest one?