“I’m not doing it,” Art says. “No fucking way.”
Kinsey grips Art by both shoulders and actually shakes him. “Are you nuts? Art, this is incredible.”
“Did you not hear the part about my ex-girlfriend being my coworker?”
“Technically,” Kinsey says, holding up a finger, “you two never broke up.”
Kinsey Gill is, and always has been, a very tall, very beautiful woman. Her skin is a dark rich umber, bright, earthy eyes that could silence a room of wailing toddlers, an energy as imposing and authoritative as she is. She paints her lips bright red and manicures her nails to match.
Kinsey wears her natural curls like a crown.
Art drowns in his.
She’s intimidating and smart and always knows what to say, and to this day it’s a total mystery why she decided to hang out with a loser like Art. Even so, they’ve been thick as thieves since first grade. She makes his life better. Brighter.
Art doesn’t know where he’d be without her.
“That’s—Kinsey, if you don’t talk to someone for six years that means you aren’t together anymore!”
She rearranges herself on her living room couch—which has doubled as Art’s bed for the last few months—so that she’s as close as she can get to his face without touching it. Pop-star brand perfume clogs his nostrils. “How was she? Happy to see you?”
“Funny. She was pissed. What did you expect?”
“Think of it this way,” Kinsey says. “On one hand, you’re unemployed and basically homeless. Not great. You’ve been out of work for six years. Six! A gap that large is going to raise red flags for any employer. You might get something eventually, but do you really want some shady, shit job where you don’t make enough to pay for rent? Or are you going to follow through with this amazing opportunity and stockpile money so you can retire at fifty?”
“I don’t even know how much it pays—”
“I do.” Kinsey holds out her phone. “I found the job listing. I had to sign up for a bunch of weird housekeeping websites and fake some experience working for private employers, but I found it.”
“Jesus Christ, you did this all last night?”
“Read the pay, Art.”
Art reads the pay.
Art re-reads the pay.
Art reads the pay a third time. “Holy fuck.”
“Exactly.” Kinsey taps the corner of her phone to her head. “I’d work with all my exes for that sum. Hell, I might sell the bar and apply for the job myself. It’d be absurd to pass this up.”
And maybe it would. Art grabs the phone and scrolls through the listing. Room and board included. Meals included. Utilities included. Weekends off and paid vacation days. Photos of the room, small but functional and fully furnished. A note at the bottom of the listing gives him pause. “Mr. Dubois is preparing for some kind of event. An annual summer auction? Looks like he’s in a rush to hire someone.”
“Does that matter?”
“Why is he hiring someone to plan an event this close to the event date?”
“Art,” Kinsey says, “he’s looking for a butler and he’s rich. Rich people like this are seldom without butlers. The last one must have quit.” She wiggles her immaculately threaded brow. “Or maybe he got fired ‘cause he was too frisky with the boss.”
The sheer sum of the salary is mind-boggling, and more than enough for him to consider it. But his lack of experience is a deterrent. Not to mention he’d be working with an ex-girlfriend that has every right to slap him. He almost wishes she had.
Art rubs his temple. “What am I gonna do about Caite?”
Kinsey’s teasing smile dies. She wraps an arm around his shoulder. “That’s up to you, babe. Maybe you should tell her the truth. Why you left school.”
Art shakes his head. “No. No, I know her. It’s not enough.”
“She’d understand.”
That’s what he’s afraid of.
Art’s relationship with Caite wasn’t always romantic. They started as friends. Art and Caite and Kinsey. The Three Musketeers. It wasn’t until after high school things started to change. The friendly jabs turned flirtatious, accidental bumps of their hands turned intentional, whispers into each others’ ears turned amorous. It was great. It was nice.
Until Art utterly fucking ruined it.
“I don’t know, Kinsey. I don’t know what to say to her.”
“‘I’m sorry’ is a great place to start,” she tells him kindly. But those are two of the hardest words to say. Kinsey knows that. Her suggesting it anyway speaks volumes. “Art. Do the interview. It’s not like you two’ll be sleeping in the same room.” She takes his hands. “This is huge. This is exactly what you need. You haven’t lived for yourself in so long and you deserve the chance to. Just the interview. Okay?”
He hesitates. “I’ll think about it.”
Kinsey pats his shoulder. “Okay. God, how lucky are you, anyway? You literally ran into the one person that could give you a livable wage.”
Jean-Baptiste Dubois is a bit of a mystery. According to the internet, he’s one of the richest men in all of North America, yet no one seems to have heard of him. There’s barely any results when you search his name, just his profile page on the university website he teaches at and a few articles from a few years ago about his generous donations to various charities. Who affords an entire household staff on a professor’s salary? He must be old money. Very old. Art’s initial assessment of him is that he’s eccentric but charming, odd but compelling.
“He did this weird thing,” Art blurts.
Kinsey’s brows shoot up. “Oh?”
“I told you my nose bled when I bumped into him, right?”
“You’re so embarrassing, but yes.”
“He gave me a handkerchief to use, then he wanted it back when the bleeding stopped.”
“What? Like, right then?”
“I offered to clean it first.” Art shakes his head. “I don’t know. It was weird, man.”
Kinsey utters, “Rich people,” and Art can’t help but laugh. Kinsey always makes him laugh. “If one ex and a weirdo millionaire are all you’re worried about, you’ve got no reason not to go to this interview. Whatever kind of strange he is, it can’t be worse than a collection of bloody handkerchiefs, okay? I’ve dated people with way freakier hobbies.”
“Ew, there’s no way he’s keeping it like that! He probably washed it. Gross, Kinsey.”
Kinsey snickers and tosses her legs in his lap. She’s so tall she’d need two of these couches to properly contain her. Art gets lost somewhere behind a knee. “You don’t know that. But who cares? He’s loaded and he might hire you. And he sounds hot. Wait, is he hot? Do you think he’s hot? Is he single?”
“God, listen,” Art groans, “I’ll do the interview if you get off me. I sleep here, you know?”
“And you pay no rent.”
“That’s a low blow.”
“If you don’t like me calling you out don’t just go to the interview.” Kinsey shrugs and doesn’t move her legs. “Get the job. I love you to pieces, babe, but you’ve got to get the hell out of my apartment. Bringing dates over with another man sleeping on my couch is not sexy.”
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