Page 1 of A Daddy for Christmas 3: Nova

Chapter 1

(Nova)

Ping!

Oh, come on, I wasn’t even on the plane yet. Hell, I hadn’t even had my coffee, which I was in line attempting to manage after catching the light rail to the airport terminal at butt fuck earlier than the miserably early hour I usually rise to go to work.

“Could I get an iced caramel macchiato with a double shot of espresso, please?” I asked when it was finally my turn at the counter.

It seemed like everyone in the airport not in line for a flight was there trying to caffeinate this morning, and who could blame them? The sun still wasn’t up yet.

I paid and moved off to the side, getting into an even bigger line to wait for my coffee to be made. One lone worker bustledaround looking red-faced and out of breath as he struggled to keep up with the drink orders.

Whoever had scheduled these two poor guys to work the stand alone on a fuckin’ Friday morning needed to march themselves down here and start slinging drinks until they were all caught up. It was asinine. It boggled my mind whenever I encountered a manager that was so out of touch with the job their crew was working that they were of little help when their team needed anything.

It was one of many reasons I was about to fly the fuck out of here until after the holiday shutdown was over in January. I was sick to death of managers without a clue and a daily grind that consisted of constantly fixing other people’s mistakes. Doing the work of those too lazy to take the time to figure out the right steps to accomplish the tasks they’d been given was starting to piss me off to the point where I’d nearly had a meltdown at work.

The problem with my meltdowns was that they rarely ended in tears the way other people’s did. Mine ended with my self-censor button malfunctioning and me telling everyone exactly what I thought of their behavior, in the loudest, most detailed explicit way possible. In full-on meltdown mode, I’d once broken down every facit of my job description, to drive home the point to my supervisor that my duties did not include making sure his presentation included a detailed breakdown of the proposal I’d put on his desk over a week ago. Had he actually read it and his emails, he wouldn’t have had to hear, third hand, about all the problems that still needed to be addressed with a major advertising campaign.

Some of my co-workers were applauding by the time I’d finished, and my volume had attracted the attention of one of my supervisor’s supervisors. Neither had been happy, though for vastly different reasons. Needless to say, my supervisor wasn’tmy supervisor for much longer after that, and I’d found myself with a heap of new responsibilities.

I still wasn’t sure who’d come out on the winning end of that one yet.

On one hand, Jason had been bumped up to department head, and he was much better at his job than his predecessor. On the other, he’d insisted on having his useless cousin Pete moved into our department, and guess who had the misfortune of overseeing his work?

He frustrated the hell out of everyone with basic and sometimes ridiculous questions that any basic marketing class would have taught him the answers to, so much so that they just went ahead and did the task themselves along with their own assignments. I kept meaning to dig further into his job qualifications, but other things had taken precedence.

I was more than ready for a break from that bullshit and the pushback I’d already received from Jason when I’d attempted to point out the uselessness of having Pete on our team. This was not a training department.

The second reason I was itching to kiss Minnesota goodbye was how much this time of year, with so many cold, dark nights and short, dim, and dreary days, tended to affect my moods.

I’d grown up in northern Minnesota, gone to college in the Twin Cities and stayed when I’d been offered a spot with my current employer, though not in the department I’d been hoping for. Most of my life had been spent in the Land of 10,000 Lakes, and while it was a beautiful state, and home to everyone I knew and loved, it was downright miserable in winter, even on a sunny blue sky day. On the gray ones, everything felt long and sad. The colorlessness made it feel like all the joy had fled for warmer parts of the world. I hoped it had. I couldn’t wait to see it when I landed in Maui.

I was flying into clear skies and a beautiful high of 86. There were palm trees in my future, drinks with umbrellas, miles and miles of beach, and if I was lucky, the worst cell phone reception known to man.

Please let me be that lucky.

Ping!! Ping!!

Are you fuckin’ kidding me? Come on, what the actual fuck! The office wasn’t even open yet. Whoever the fuck it was had to be texting me from their house or, at the very least, their cell phone on the way to the office. I really didn’t want to know what could have possibly gone wrong since the time I left the office last night. I was literally the last fucking person from our department to leave. There was no way something had gone wrong from then to now, when nothing but the bakeries and coffee shops were doing business.

I wasn’t going to look. No way. No how.

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Fine. What can I say? I was a paranoid fucker when it came to my job and making sure everything was done correctly.

Besides, this line was barely moving, so what the hell else was I supposed to do?

What time does the Reynolds presentation start? It’s in conference room 3, right? Did you leave the presentation on your desk? That’s where you said you were going to leave it, right?

Do you have packets for everyone? Gordon is leading the presentation, right? I’m just supposed to take notes on any suggestions and requests?

Do you want a copy of those CCed to you once I’ve typed them up?