My Secret Lover Is Actually My Boss novel · Chapter 4 of 32
Chapter 4: Seven O'Clock
At six fifty-nine I knocked on the old man's door.
"It's open."
I'd never been in this office after dark.
The old man used to keep it lit, green lamps and the radio on low.
Now one lamp was on, and Leon was sitting behind his grandfather's desk with his jacket off and his sleeves rolled.
He looked wrong there.
He also looked good there, which was worse.
"You're early," he said.
"I'm on time. You said seven."
"It's six fifty-nine."
"Then fire me."
That almost got a smile out of him.
I sat in the leather chair across the desk, the one I used to sit in when the old man read my cards out loud and laughed at the wrong parts.
I put a legal pad on my knee.
"Report," he said.
"Three things."
"Go."
"One. Booth 1958 at the National Stationery Show. Javits Center, New York, May seventeenth to nineteenth."
"We have a booth?"
"Your grandfather prepaid it last fall. He always took the same number. He thought it was funny."
Leon looked at the gold kettle on the paperweight by his hand.
"It is a little funny," he said.
"Two. The Thursday line. Sixteen cards. Lyle presented them, but they're mine, and they're the best thing this studio has made in ten years."
"I'm aware they're yours."
"You're aware. Nobody else is."
He let that go.
"Three," I said. "Every big bookstore chain sends a buyer to that show. If one of them orders the line, Winship has a future, and you have a reason not to sell."
"Or a better price when I do."
"Or that."
He leaned back in the old man's chair.
It creaked exactly the way it used to creak for the old man.
"You've thought about this," he said.
"I've thought about it since lunch."
Keep reading free with an account. Start My Secret Lover Is Actually My Boss from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.
← Chapter 3 · All chapters · Chapter 5 →
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend