Alone in the Dark by Karen Rose

designers.
    You pay me too well. That’s never been the issue .
    So they were back to why she burned the candle at both ends, working for him all day and taking classes for her degree at night. Then sometimes, like tonight, coming back to work through the night, just to make a deadline. Why?
    ‘But,’ he said, ‘I now realize that there is much that I don’t know about you.’
    She rolled her eyes. ‘Jeez. Y’think?’
    He ignored her sarcasm. ‘I asked you why you were killing yourself for a degree and you answered by asking me why I was looking at the threat list. I don’t get the connection.’
    ‘No, I don’t suppose you do. Why did you ask my aunt to catalog the threats?’
    He was getting tired of her answering his questions with her own. ‘I needed to keep track of them.’
    ‘That’s not a good enough reason.’
    ‘It’s all the reason I feel compelled to give you,’ he said. ‘I am your boss, after all.’
    ‘Yes, you are. For now.’
    He lifted a brow. ‘You plan to quit?’
    Anger flashed in her eyes once again. ‘No, boss . I plan to have to find a new job when you’re murdered by one of the many people you’ve pissed off, and most employers do care about “stinkin’ degrees”.’
    Ah. The pieces fell into place, relief settling over him. ‘You’re worried someone on that list will kill me.’
    ‘So are you,’ she challenged. ‘Otherwise you wouldn’t be here looking at it and cursing. Here.’ She tossed him a flash drive. ‘The most recent, complete list.’
    Reflex had him reaching out to catch the small drive, the movement sending a spear of pain through the bruise on his back.
    Her eyes narrowed at the grimace he hadn’t been able to control. ‘Somebody got to you, didn’t they?’ she asked. ‘You’re hurt.’
    Fuck. ‘I’m not hurt. What do you mean, this is the most complete list?’ He pointed at his screen. ‘This one isn’t complete?’
    ‘No. The file you’re looking at is stored on the Ledger ’s server. That’s the one that Aunt Gayle works on. She believes it’s complete, for what it’s worth.’
    Marcus rubbed his eyes. ‘What have you done, Jill?’ he asked, suddenly exhausted.
    ‘I’ve been intercepting the mail for the past nine months. Any letter that’s just a garden-variety-I-hate-your-guts-and-you-need-to-die, I let go through. Aunt Gayle logs it in. The really vicious ones, I move to that flash drive so she doesn’t see.’
    His head was starting to throb. ‘Why?’
    ‘Because she loves you too much to be reading all that vitriol. It terrifies her that people want to kill you. I love her too much to let her sacrifice her health, so I took . . . liberties.’
    ‘What other liberties have you taken?’
    ‘I pay the bills and sort your mail.’
    Both things Gayle was supposed to do. That didn’t sound like the Gayle he knew. But the Gayle he knew had had a heart attack without telling him too. ‘What did you leave for her to do?’
    ‘She keeps your calendar, answers the phones, schedules all those fancy meetings that you hate so much, and tracks the threats against you and your team – minus the ones I remove first, of course.’
    ‘Gayle knows about the duties you’ve taken on?’
    ‘Everything but the threats. She didn’t want to let me do it, but it was the only way I’d allow her to come back to work after her heart attack. She should have stayed home, but she said you needed her here since you were still recuperating from being shot.’
    He closed his fist around the flash drive, not sure who he was angriest with – Gayle for keeping this from him, Jill for aiding and abetting, or himself for being so blind. ‘I’ve been back for six months. She could have retired or quit or, heaven forbid, even told me the truth. What did she think I’d do? Fire her?’ Like that could ever happen . ‘I’d cut out my own tongue before I’d even raise my voice to her.’
    Jill’s lips curved, the small smile seeming genuine.