Coldhearted Boss

The crew gathers around Hudson and another tall man with a white mustache and a booming voice who introduces himself as Robert, the foreman. While he explains that we’ll be split up into teams to tackle the demolition for each building, I surreptitiously search the crowd for my cabinmate. No such luck.

Hard hats and neon green safety vests are dispersed through the crowd. The guy handing them out pauses when he gets to me and he narrows his eyes curiously. I’m still wearing my hair hidden up under my baseball hat, but my flannel shirt is tucked in today because the billowing fabric seemed like it’d be hazardous on the jobsite. I don’t need it getting caught on a bulldozer or something. No thank you. That’s not the way I’ve leaving this earth.

“You’re the girl, aren’t you?” he asks. “The one everyone’s talking about?”

“Yes,” I reply tentatively.

And then he nods, hands me my gear, and moves on.

Jeremy and I exchange a relieved glance.

That’s when I hear my name being shouted. It’s the foreman, telling me I’m needed in the office. A hush falls over the crowd as heads turn in my direction. It seems, even if I don’t know the names of 99% of the crew here, they all know mine. It’s not shocking. I’m the only one with boobs.

I arch my brows at Jeremy and the crowd parts to give me a clear path to the white trailer nestled in a cluster of pine trees back in the direction of camp. It’s command headquarters for Lockwood Construction, an ominous place I’d hoped to avoid at all costs. In fact, as I start heading in that direction, it feels almost as if I’m back in high school being summoned by the principal.

I brace myself as I knock on the door. A deep voice bids me to enter, but I linger there on the precipice for a moment longer, trying to gather courage. If they’re going to fire me just because I’m a woman, I’ll fight it. Somehow. Maybe I can find a lawyer who accepts Monopoly money.

With that thought, I push the door open and am arrested by the sight that greets me: Him, the suit, my cabinmate standing behind a desk with regal posture and a formidable presence.

Somehow, it’s shocking, though it shouldn’t be.

Of course he’s not a common construction worker. He wasn’t with the rest of the crew back at the jobsite. He’s not staying in the bunkhouses with the other men. He was wearing a suit all those weeks ago, and that thought propels me toward another: right now, he doesn’t look all that different than he did that night in the bar. It’s more like looking at two sides of a coin. One version seemed perfectly composed, gentlemanly even. This other version might be wearing jeans, boots, and a blue Lockwood Construction shirt rolled to his elbows, but his hair is the same shade of dark brown. His jaw is still carved from marble. His eyes are just as piercing as he looks up and pins me to my spot by the door.

“You asked to see me?” I ask, my voice wobbly.

His eyes scan me quickly, halt at the hard hat and safety vest I’m clutching in my arms, and then he nods toward the chair at my right. “You can drop that gear. You won’t be needing it.”

So this is it.

He’s finally connected the dots and is going to send me on my way—or worse. Maybe there’s a police squadron hovering in the bushes outside waiting to leap out and haul me to jail. Ten-four, we’ve got the wallet thief. How many years in the clink do you get for taking someone’s wallet but not actually stealing anything out of it?

I set my gear down then stand back up and catch my elbow behind my back to conceal the fact that my hands are shaking.

His attention has already fallen back to his work. To me, his desk looks like a chaotic mess. Blueprints curling at the edges. A laptop obscuring the paperwork underneath it. A cell phone precariously positioned at one corner, millimeters away from toppling to the ground. I want to step forward and nudge it to safety, but I stay right where I am.

It comes to my attention then that we’ve both been quiet longer than is socially acceptable. It almost feels like he’s forgotten I exist. Isn’t he going to come right out with it? Tell me he recognizes me as the woman from the bar? Fire me? Imprison me?

“You won’t be working on the jobsite,” he finally says as he continues to write something on a construction drawing.

“Are you…are you firing me?” I blurt out, sounding almost panicked. I immediately think of my phone call with my mom last night, how desperate I am to keep this job.