Chapter 57 - Fuck Buddies

Chapter 57: Chapter 57 - Fuck Buddies

For a second, the line went quiet.

"What did you just say?"

"I asked if you were done." Jesse eased the Porsche through the intersection. "Are you?"

Andrew’s breathing grew louder through the speakers.

"You’re acting like you’re untouchable now," he said. "Like you’ve forgotten who you’re talking to. I’m still your boss, Jesse. I still sign your paychecks."

"I asked if you were done," Jesse said, "because there’s no point talking to someone who’s screaming like he’s being dragged into a mental asylum. I couldn’t get a word in."

Andrew sputtered.

Before he could get a sentence together, Jesse asked, "Did you speak to HR before you called me?"

Silence.

Jesse smiled at the road.

"That’s what I thought. Somebody told you I wasn’t in, you got angry and you picked up the phone. You didn’t check the system or send HR an email first. You jumped straight to conclusions." He shook his head. "How typical. That’s how you run everything, Andy. You act first and think later, if you think at all. It’s exactly why this company is one fashion show away from turning the lights off."

"You’d better watch the way you talk to me—"

"I put in for leave," Jesse said, talking right over him. "All the paid leave I’ve built up over the last five years. I filed it through the HR portal on Thursday. It’s in the system, dated and approved." He paused. "So you can expect to see me back in about four months. Give or take."

The line went quiet again.

When Andrew spoke, his voice had changed completely.

"Jesse." He swallowed audibly. "Jesse, you can’t do that. Not now. The show is in two weeks. We can’t afford to have you gone."

Jesse almost laughed.

Five years of leave hadn’t piled up by accident. Every time he’d tried to take a vacation, his phone rang by the second day. Sometimes it was HR and sometimes it was Andrew, but there was always an emergency: a shipment stuck in customs, a vendor threatening to walk, a sample lost somewhere between Milan and New Jersey. Each time, Jesse packed up and went back to the basement, and the rest of his leave quietly rolled over into the next year. Once he’d spent an entire week of vacation at his desk, and nobody had noticed he wasn’t supposed to be there.

He knew the timing was terrible. The biggest show in the company’s history was two weeks away, and the Giza shipment was still sitting at the port. He had no real intention of disappearing for four months. His fingerprints were all over that collection, and he wanted to see it walk.

But hearing Andrew Hyland’s voice go thin and pleading was too good to pass up.

"I’m not the same guy anymore, Andy," Jesse said. "I’m not going to drop everything and come running every time you snap your fingers. I’m not coming in."

"Jesse, please. Be reasonable. There’s so much left to do. The runway logistics, the shipment, the vendor schedules, the venue load-in. Nobody knows that stuff the way you do. Without you, the whole thing falls apart."

"Rudy can handle it."

"Rudy—"

"Two days ago you thought he was qualified to be VP of Brand Operations and Supply Chain. You announced it at a party I wasn’t invited to. I heard you popped champagne." Jesse turned onto the avenue. "If he can’t handle a little logistics, then he was never qualified, was he?"

"Forget about Rudy," Andrew snapped. "Just come to work."

Jesse let that sit for a moment.

"Are you saying Rudy isn’t capable of doing the job?" he asked. "That the only reason he got the promotion is because you two are fuck buddies?"

Andrew said nothing.

The silence went on so long that Jesse glanced at the screen to make sure the call hadn’t dropped.

"You know what?" Jesse said. "I want to hear you say it. Say it out loud. Rudy only got the job because he’s your fuck buddy, and for nothing else."

"I’m not saying that," Andrew said through his teeth. "I can’t say that."

"Then this was a fun talk." Jesse reached for the screen. "See you in four months, Andy. Goodbye."

He hung up.

He’d driven two blocks when the speakers started ringing again.

ANDREW HYLAND.

Jesse declined it.

Thirty seconds later it rang again, and he declined that one too.

The third time, he waited until the fourth ring and then answered.

"Fine!" Andrew’s voice came out ragged. "You want me to say it? I’ll say it. Rudy only—"

"Wait a minute," Jesse cut in.

He pulled over to the curb in front of a bakery and put the car in park.

"I need to savor this moment."

He took the phone off its mount, opened the call menu and tapped record. A small red dot appeared at the top of the screen.

New York law only needed one person on a call to consent to a recording. Jesse consented wholeheartedly.

"Okay," he said. "Go on."

Andrew’s breath shook across the line. When he finally spoke, every word sounded like it was being pulled out of him with pliers.

"Rudy only got the job because he’s my fuck buddy. Nothing else."

Jesse closed his eyes and let it wash over him.

"That," he said, "was exhilarating."

"Now will you—"

"I’ll see you at the office on Monday."

He hung up before Andrew could say another word. He saved the recording into a new folder he named Insurance, slid the phone back onto its mount and pulled out into traffic.

*****

On the executive floor of Standard & Silk, Andrew slammed his phone face down on his desk so hard that the glass cracked.

He stood there with both palms pressed flat against the walnut, head bowed, breathing hard through his nose, trying to get his heart rate under control.

On the leather couch across the room, Rudy Mazer had heard every word. Andrew had left the call on speaker. Rudy had spent most of the last two days up here instead of in the basement office he’d been banished to, and right now his face was a deep, blotchy red.

Neither of them mentioned what Andrew had just said.

Rudy stood up.

"We need to get rid of him, Andy. As soon as possible. Today."

"Not yet."

"Not yet?" Rudy stared at him. "Did you hear him?"

"I heard him." Andrew straightened up and smoothed his tie with hands that still hadn’t stopped shaking. "We need him for two more weeks. Once the fall collection is on the runway and the reviews are in, I’ll get rid of him. I’ll bury him so deep nobody will ever find him."

Rudy dropped back onto the couch, folded his arms and glared at the office door, as if Jesse might walk through it any second.

"I just can’t wait to wipe that smug look off his face."