The Billionaire's Heart (The Silver Cross Club Book 4) Read Free

understand that we have a corporate image to project. Consistent branding is the key to success. The way you keep going off-message—well, it makes me think that this just isn’t the right fit.”
    Cut through the manager-speak, and it sounded like he was firing me. My pulse thumped loudly in my ears. “I’ll do better,” I said, ignoring the pleading, desperate note in my voice. I could not afford to lose this job. “I won’t make extra versions anymore. I’ll just do exactly what you tell me to, and—”
    “It’s too late for that,” he said. “You just aren’t a team player. You don’t have the right mindset for this job. I’ll contact HR about your final paycheck. Please have your things out of your cubicle by the end of the day.” He closed the folder and handed it to me.
    I took it with numb fingers. Had he really just fired me? Me ? After all of the unpaid overtime I’d put in, the pet projects I’d worked on for him at the expense of my actual job, the three major clients I’d convinced to stay with the company after they were ready to walk—all of that, and he was firing me?
    “I’ll be happy to give you a good reference, of course,” he said.
    That was the final straw. I stood up, blood boiling in my veins, and said, “You know what? Screw you. I don’t need one. Have fun with your pathetic little life.”
    Maybe that was petty, but I didn’t care. I was so angry I could hardly see straight, and I tripped on the stairs as I made my way back to my cubicle.
    God. What was I going to do ?
    I had bills to pay, and absolutely zero leads on a new job.
    My computer was still turned on at my desk, with my most recent revisions pulled up on the screen, glowing brightly, mocking me. I sat in my chair and stared at the screen without seeing anything.
    It looked like it was time to go freelance.
    “How’d it go?” Tom asked, breaking my reverie.
    “I got fired,” I said. The words felt strange in my mouth. I tried again. “Potato Head fired me.”
    There was a long pause. “What?”
    I looked up and saw my own shock reflected in Tom’s face. “He told me I’m not a team player,” I said.
    “He’s delusional,” Tom said. “He can’t have—did he really fire you?”
    “I’m supposed to remove all my things by the end of the day,” I said. “So yes.”
    “That’s not—he can’t do that,” Tom said.
    “I’m afraid he can,” I said. “He’s the boss.”
    Tom blew out a slow lungful of air. “Shit. What are you going to do?”
    Well. That was the question.
    * * *
    First, I decided, I was going to get drunk.
    That was pretty easy to accomplish. I left the building, hauling the cardboard box with all of my things in it—my stapler, my granola bars, the pictures of the Bahamas I’d tacked to my cubicle wall—and headed for the bar down the block where we always went for happy hour. Well: where I used to go with my former co-workers. There would be no more happy hours for me.
    The bar was almost empty at that time of day, which was a small mercy. I didn’t want to interact with anyone. I ordered a beer and sat at one end of the bar, my box on the stool beside me, and planned my next move.
    I needed a job, but more than that, I needed a plan . I had spent the last year just going through the motions, some twilight creature who ate and worked and exercised but didn’t really live .
    I thought maybe I was ready, now, to be alive again.
    The problem was how best to go about resurrecting myself.
    I ordered a second beer, and dug a notebook and pen from my box. I turned to a blank page and wrote SADIE’S LIFE PLAN at the top, and underlined it with a thick, dark line. I was a big fan of lists. There was usually so much stuff bouncing around in my head that the only way to keep track of it all was to write it down.
    My top priority, of course, was getting a job. Find interesting work , I wrote, and underlined interesting . God, I’d turned into such a princess. There were more