"If you don't tell me who it was, I'll just yell at all of them," he says, mouth twisting into a humorless smile. "So you might as well spill."
Taking a deep breath, I stare him down, unwavering. "I just told you: I did it. So you can go ahead and rant at the interns all you like, but you're just going to look like a crazy person."
"I have to save my voice for the board meeting anyway," he says. "I'll give you the rest of the day to come clean. And get me another coffee."
I blink at him. "We're all out."
He gives me a so what? look.
"No," I blurt out, before I have a chance to stop myself. "Mr. Risinger, I can't. Not today. I didn't even have time to place the order in the first place."
"Ah ha." His eyes glitter, and he sits up in his chair. "I knew you were lying."
Fuck. Me.
I have to take a cab across town to the "only coffee shop that actually makes something worth drinking," and it's going to be at least half an hour, and I do not have time for this.
Plus, now he's not going to stop hounding me until I tell him which intern screwed up the order.
Plus, I've barely slept, and I have whatever the female equivalent of blue balls is.
I'm either going to end up killing him, or humping his leg. Either way, I might as well clean out my desk now.
***
There's an accident on the way to the coffee shop, and it takes me almost an hour to get back. I'm considering decking myself out in riot gear before I walk into his office, but he looks a lot calmer than I was expecting. When I set his cup down, he doesn't even seem to notice me at first. But then he looks up from his drafting paper and sort of nods in acknowledgement.
"So." He makes a shut the door gesture, and I do. "What did you think?"
I sit down, folding my hands across my lap, watching him evenly. "About what?"
"The books, Meghan." He gives me a pointed look. "Did you get enough sleep last night? I hope they didn't keep you up."
I don't know how I'm keeping my composure, but I'm gonna be pissed if I don't at least get a Golden Globes nomination for this. "Dunno. I feel like I might've missed something. I should probably read the other ones so I can follow the plot."
Pretty convincing. I'm feeling fairly smug.
Mr. Risinger frowns. "What do you mean, the other ones? Didn't you start with the first book?"
Shitfuckdamn.
"No," I say, slowly. "I just, uh, I thought they were standalone."
He's drumming his fingers on the desk, the way he does when his patience is frayed down to the very last thread. "Did the volume numbers not provide an adequate clue?"
I roll my eyes, trying to remember how normal-Meg - or whatever passes for her nowadays - would have reacted in this situation. "I don't know, Mr. Risinger. I didn't examine them closely. I just pulled one out of my bag on the way home and I started reading. I didn't know it was a continuing storyline, or I would've paid more attention."
My boss looks like he's holding something back. Usually, when he's biting his tongue, it's to keep from hurling insults at the senior partners. But this isn't that. No, not quite. I can't figure out why he'd feel the need to hold anything back from me; God knows he never does. Except basic human courtesy.
"Well, let me catch you up," he says. "They fight, they fuck, they fall in love. Lather, rinse, and repeat. Not always in that order."
"They fall in love more than once?" Don't blush. Don't blush. Don't you dare fucking blush.
"Of course. I have to keep things interesting somehow," he says. "Fall in love, fall out of love, fall back in - my readers have been locked in the same secure, level-headed, boring relationships for decades. They don't want to read about Dirk and Amanda unloading the fucking dishwasher."
I actually wouldn't mind, but he's not really asking for my feedback. Not intentionally, anyway. I still can't resist getting a barb in. "You know your readers awfully well, for somebody who's never actually met an average middle-American housewife."
"I know how they spend their money," he says, dryly. "And that's all that matters."
I've known Mr. Risinger for a long time, so I shouldn't be particularly grossed-out. But even I was taken in. I actually thought Natalie McBride was a kindred spirit, and that she cared about her characters and her writing, and the way she connected with readers. Mr. Risinger just wants to pad his already obscenely swollen pockets, and that's legitimately horrifying.
"Why do you do this?" I ask him.
It comes out unbidden. I don't mean it as a genuine question, but now that it's hit the air, I realize it kind of sounds like one. And it's thrown my boss for a loop, more than I would have expected. He frowns a little, his brows knitting together slightly, and I wonder if he has the same permanent headache there that I do. I tried taking a yoga class once for coping strategies, but I left in shame when my phone went off during the silent meditation portion. It was Mr. Risinger, of course. And my fault for not turning it off. I never went back, but I do remember they talked a lot about holding tension in your third eye center.
If Mr. Risinger has a third eye, he definitely uses it for nefarious purposes only.
"I told you already," he says. "I had an idea and I wanted to make it happen, especially when people told me I couldn't."
"So, spite, then." I cross my legs at the knee, delicately. I'm tugging my skirt down while I do it, and I notice his eyes following my hemline. "That's not a very good answer to give the readers, when I meet them."
He pauses, halfway through reaching into his bourbon drawer. "When? I'm surprised at you, Meghan. I expected more of a fight."
I shrug. "The whole thing threw me off for a minute, but it's not like I can afford to turn down an extra paycheck."
It's genetically impossible for this man to feel guilt, although he does offer me a glass of bourbon again, which I decline this time.
"I just brought you coffee," I point out, as he puts ice in his glass. I don't even know where the hell he keeps ice in his fucking desk.
He stirs the bourbon with his finger (what?) and then sucks it into his mouth, licking off the alcohol. My heart stops beating for about five seconds, and then kicks in, trying to make up for lost time.
"Hmm," he agrees. "I think I've lost the taste for it, by now. It's nearly lunchtime."
I'm going to kill him. I'm going to do it. I am going to murder him with the shards of his own decanter, and not a court in the land would convict me.