Switch by EllaArdent

wouldn’t, if you stopped doing them now.” Marty
snapped his fingers. “Think of something about recipes for the holiday weekend,
too. You can’t get started on that too soon. Three easy suppers for unexpected
guests. That kind of thing.”
    Joanna didn’t move. “Are you saying that I’m stuck doing
these frilly pieces forever?”
    “Forever is a long time,” her boss said with a smile. “Let’s
just see what comes up in the year ahead.”
    “I’d like to work with Rick on the article about the Plume.”
    Marty removed his glasses. “That’s not your assignment. It
isn’t going to be your assignment.” He pointed his glasses at her. “Remember
that you were out sick last week.”
    “If I hadn’t been sick, if I’d been here, would you have
given the Plume story to me or to Rick?”
    Her boss looked away, then met her gaze. “I would have given
it to Rick, because I need that story and I still need ten ways to make
strawberries special. Rick can’t do that stuff and you can.”
    “But I don’t want to do it. And you’re never going to hire
someone else to do it as long as I’m here!”
    He put his glasses back on and gave her a hard look.
“Professionals don’t have tantrums, Joanna. That’s why you belong on the
women’s pages.”
    Joanna put down her cup of coffee hard. “Well, that’s too
bad, because I’m not going to do them anymore.” She strode to the door of the
meeting room, then turned back to face her boss. “I quit.”
    He didn’t look sorry or even surprised, which meant that
Joanna went to her desk. “I don’t suppose you have the three luscious lipstick
colors piece done yet?” he asked, with just a spark of hope.
    “No!” She packed up her belongings, grabbed her coat and
purse, and headed for the door.
    Rick, she noticed, was still discussing strategy with their
boss, and both of them were pretending they didn’t see her. Joanna slammed the
door as she left, not caring if she ever saw her last check or not. Instead of
this newspaper offering her big break and her chance to become a real
journalist, she’d wasted three years writing garbage.
    She was never going to do that again.
    She was standing in the street before she realized she
didn’t have a job or a firm plan.
    And she probably wouldn’t get a good reference—unless
she wanted to continue writing the same kind of articles she’d been writing for
three years.
    That wasn’t going to happen. It was time for a fresh start,
time to make a change. She’d see this as an opportunity, and she already knew
she had Mike’s support. She pulled out her phone to tell him the news, then
froze.
    She should let him continue to try to persuade her.
    She should be bad and not tell him that she was already
convinced.
    Because then, he might have to come up with some very
interesting method of disciplining her. Joanna smiled and put the phone back in
her purse. She’d say nothing to him for one whole week.
    Then she’d tell him the truth.
    She couldn’t wait to discover what he’d do then.
     
    * * *
     
    Mike arrived at the restaurant, hoping that he was judging
Joanna’s reactions correctly. He was afraid that she didn’t really like being
dominant, but it really worked for him to switch things around once in a while.
If she’d just tie him down and queen him once or twice a year, he’d die a happy
man.
    He was confident that they could work it out, but he’d take
the lesson to heart. Exploring their respective fantasies had nearly come at a
high price. They needed to maintain the ritual of discussing their feelings and
desires. They still weren’t out of the woods, so to speak, even though he was
optimistic. He wanted to reclaim the impetuous passion of their early days
together, and was sure he’d found the perfect solution. He remembered how
Joanna had loved it when he played the burglar, and thought that could be used
again.
    It had worked beautifully the night before, prompting such
an enthusiastic