*Reese

Reese wanted to hide in the bathroom the entire Friday morning. No matter how she tried to distract herself and concentrate on work, her stomach was in knots.

She had to explain to him. Kenneth deserved it. In fact, he deserved for her to talk to him face to face. But every time she thought about his reflections on life and love, what he wanted in a girlfriend, the sort of partner he could fall in love with, she chickened out.

Reese, life coach, and total wimp. She was a fake. All that grit and determination she encouraged her readers to find for their problems?

Her grit wasn't worth the smear of lipstick wiped onto her cheek that she discovered when she went to the bathroom. Her determination wussed out in in her cubicle, afraid to go to any of the other floors to get a file. In other words, she didn't have any grit or determination. What she had was smoke and mirrors.

She had taken the high road and made the honorable decision. Despite not handling it well—because refusing to leave her cubicle except for bathroom breaks was a great example of not handling things well—her decision was sound. Once the sparkle and glow of sex had diminished, Kenneth would never be satisfied with her.

They were too different. They lived for different goals, had opposite hobbies and dreams, had no intersections besides physical attraction.

She had dropped her head on her keyboard more than once. Yeah. The sex had been fun. And she had needed it. After the dry spell of nearly two years since her last break-up, Kenneth was a shining star in her dark night. Or a shooting star that burned and disappeared on entry. She had made a wish. It hadn't come true.

At every available moment, she jotted notes on a pad of paper. It was a blog entry for Kenneth, if he was still subscribed to her site. Right before eating her pasta salad lunch from her Tupperware, she broke her sacrosanct rule of not mixing her dream career with her current job.

She logged on and posted her letter to him.

It was for him, although hidden in a blog post for her readers. She wasn't going to cry. There was nothing to cry about.

They had had fun. It wasn't meant to be.

She wouldn't cry.

Salty tears plopped in her salad. She wiped her face with a tissue and kept eating.

***

The afternoon wasn't any better, but the weekend was finally within reach.

Reese double-checked her slides and notes for the presentation. Who the hell scheduled meetings at four-thirty in the afternoon on a Friday? She had been ready to go home and drink wine since lunch.

"Hey, sweets," Clem said, leaning an elbow on the top of the cubicle divider. "You said you were supposed to go to Kenneth's last night, right?"

Her heart fisted at the mention his name. "I think I said that yesterday, yes."

"So I've been waiting very patiently for an update all day, but there's been a big fat nothing from you. Don't tell me you were strictly professional. I know you better than that."

Reese glanced up at Clem, wondering if she was pouring lemon juice all over her open wounds on purpose. Even if pressing her for dating details was her usual modus operandi, she had to see life sucked swamp water at the moment. Swamp water full of swamp rats and smelly mud. "There's not much to say."

Clem smacked the divider, making the wall shake. "Tell me what he said. What did he do? You know you deserve someone who worships you, takes out the trash without being reminded, and can cook using the stove top and not just the grill, right?"

Reese shushed her. "There is no story. Things got weird and I left. I've quit being his coach and there is nothing between us."

"What about hanky-panky? That is not the whole story. Did he break your heart? Because if he did, I swear I will find him and do something...like, really terrible and make him suffer...and shit, are you crying?"

"No," Reese lied, wiping her cheek furtively with her sleeve.

"I really will do something terrible to him, just wait. Big-time suffering. I'm dried up for inspiration at the moment, but if you keep crying my ideas will flow, too."

"That's all right. You don't have to get creative." Reese sniffled and wiped her cheek dry. She was done. She was pulled together. "I am the one who broke things off. He isn't for me. Really. And I'm not the one for him, even if we did have some hot chemistry. You know that one-night stand feeling? So good while it lasts, but the second it's over you just know it wouldn't work?"

"Nope. Don't know that feeling. I never do one-night stands; they last at least a week."

"Well, it was pretty obvious once I thought about it. He wrote he could never feel like an equal partner with someone who wasn't a natural blonde and had less than a master's degree, preferably in a scientific field. A PhD, like he has, would be even better."

"Wow. He wrote that? Where?"

"Doesn't matter. I shouldn't have said anything. We'll have to talk later. I have a meeting."

Clem's face flushed, bright pink splotches darkening her neck and face. "Don't you dare belittle yourself."

"You're right." Reese took a deep breath, nodding. "I won't belittle myself because he has standards that don't fit me. But, I really do have to haul ass to this meeting. Meet me later for happy hour? We'll celebrate being single like there's no tomorrow."

"I'm in. See you." Clem gave her a peck on the cheek, a wave of her fruity shampoo filling the air. For some weird reason it made her think of how different Kenneth smelled.

She shook it off. Meeting, now. Drinks, later. Cuddling her pillows much later.

Her phone buzzed in her hand with an incoming message. She checked. They were notifications for her blog. Another one came in. And another one.

There wasn't time for this. The phone went back into her phone in her purse and she woke up her laptop in order to power down. She would take it with her for the presentation, and then get out of the building immediately afterwards.

Except, the screen blipped and went black. Her heart plummeted. No reason to panic, there was still her desktop computer, and it appeared to be fine. She scrolled through her documents, searching for the presentation. The easiest solution would be to copy it on a USB key and use the meeting room Wacom screen.

And...all her documents were locked. It didn't make sense. No one should be able to access the files that she created unless they had her password. Not even the help desk—

No. He wouldn't.

Her blood began to boil. He was messing with her.

Melanie stormed from her office, blazing a trail through the maze on her way to the meeting room. She must have sensed Reese's fear, because she suddenly veered for her cubicle. "Ready to present the project numbers?"

Hands trembling, Reese cleared her throat. "There seems to be a slight problem."

"What sort of problem?" Melanie asked in a voice that could make seasoned criminals nervous.

"The file is blocked. I can't access it."

One eyebrow shot up.

"Why don't I make a quick call?" Reese asked, breathless. "Have someone from the help desk take a look. I'm sure it won't take a minute."

"I hope so. We'll start on something else. Come in as soon as you can."

The second Melanie turned her back, Reese punched in the number on her desk phone. He would either fix her files and computer, or she would make him suffer. Unlike Clem, that sweetheart, she had no lack of imagination of what she would do to make Kenneth pay.

Nipple clamps, leather whips, running amok through his apartment, and opening his mint condition, in-package figurine toys from the original Star Wars movies. Oh yes. She would tie him up in a corner and not only open his toys, but she would play with them with chocolate coated hands, too.

Kenneth's smooth voice flowed to her ear. "This is Kenneth, may I help you?"

"My laptop is dead. My files are locked. You did this. You infected my files and I have a presentation. Fix it. Fix it now."

"Of course. I'll be right there."

She huffed into her phone, furious. Not a second later, he strode god-like into the office. If a god wore faded suit tops with elbow patches and a knitted tie, that is.

Good grief.

Had he learned nothing? She ached to relieve him of his clothes which he obviously picked up from the back of his closet with his eyes closed.

No. She would not be relieving him of his clothes. He was playing a petty game to harass her and make her look bad.

Through her blog, she received dozens of letters a week, many asking for help in relationships. She had developed methods that others only distantly dreamed of for dealing with small-minded, petulant, self-centered man-boys. Petty? She was intimately acquainted with petty.

She could play his game. But you didn't fight fire with fire if you wanted to win. You snuffed it out.

"Kenneth," she said, "you do realize I have a presentation for the head of accounting, half a dozen department managers, and the CEO himself starting in five minutes? I'd hate to have to take you in there with me to explain why I can't access my files late on a Friday afternoon. It would be like throwing the lamb to the hungry wolves."

*** Yes, Kenneth, you can help me... ***