Page 5 of Bosshole Daddy

T hursday arrived wrapped in the same pre-dawn anxiety that had become my constant companion.

The executive elevator climbed toward the sixtieth floor while I pressed my thumb against the worn ear of my rabbit, hidden deep in my bag.

Half an hour until seven sharp—enough time to brew his coffee exactly right, organize the chaos of yesterday's files, and pretend my hands weren't still shaking from the memory of his voice saying "little one. "

Two weeks. It had only been two weeks. Somehow, I felt like I’d been here two years.

By the time his private elevator chimed at seven, I had everything ready.

Coffee positioned precisely six inches from the right edge of his desk.

Morning emails sorted into color-coded folders—red for urgent, blue for financial, green for legal.

The Wall Street Journal folded to the business section, because he always started there before moving to international markets.

"Good morning, Mr. Stone." The words came out steadier now, though my pulse still jumped when he swept past my desk in a cloud of expensive cologne and controlled power.

He never responded to the greeting. Just collected his coffee with those elegant fingers that made everything look effortless.

But I was learning his language—the slight pause when the coffee was the right temperature, the way his shoulders dropped a fraction when his inbox was perfectly organized. These tiny victories sustained me.

The rhythm emerged slowly, painfully. How to translate his clipped, brutal dictation into emails his executives could stomach.

When "Tell Henderson he's an incompetent fool who couldn't manage a lemonade stand" became "Mr. Stone has concerns about your department's performance metrics and would like to schedule a meeting to discuss improvement strategies.

" How to gauge his mood by the way he rolled his sleeves—neat folds meant a good day, harsh yanks meant someone was about to bleed.

But learning his patterns didn't make the days easier.

Each evening, I'd stumble out of the building feeling like I'd been put through a corporate wood chipper.

The subway ride home became a blur of exhaustion so complete that twice I missed my stop.

My tiny apartment welcomed me with the same cracked mirror and peeling wallpaper, but now it felt like a sanctuary.

I'd collapse on my bed still wearing my work clothes, too tired to change, too wired to sleep.

My rabbit became my confessor, absorbing the day's humiliations into her threadbare fur.

"He called me an imbecile today," I'd whisper into her ear.

"Because I knocked over a pen. A pen." But even as I catalogued his cruelties, that traitorous flutter would start in my stomach.

The way he'd looked at me when he said it, those gray eyes holding mine a beat too long.

The way "imbecile" had sounded almost fond.

The morning flew by in a blur of controlled efficiency.

When he dictated the company-wide memo about the quarterly restructuring, I kept pace with every word.

My pen moved smoothly across the page, capturing his vision for the Berlin expansion, the staffing changes, his expectations for the next fiscal quarter.

He'd paused mid-sentence to take a call, muttering something vicious about Morrison from Legal as he grabbed his phone.

"Useless fucking lawyer thinks billable hours mean sitting on his ass contemplating his navel. Should have fired him last quarter when I had the chance."

I captured it all in my careful shorthand, planning to clean it up and take the edge off in the typed version. The call stretched on, his voice fading as he moved to the window. I gathered my notes and slipped out, eager to get the memo drafted while his words were fresh.

Back at my desk, I attacked the keyboard with something approaching confidence.

The sentences flowed, professional and clear.

I double-checked every figure against my notes.

Spell-check caught two typos I fixed immediately.

Reading it through, I felt that alien sensation again—pride.

This was good work. Clean, professional, exactly his tone without the harsh edges.

The printer hummed, delivering crisp pages that I aligned perfectly before carrying them to his office. He was still on the call, pacing behind his desk like a caged predator. I set the memo in the center of his desk, precisely squared to the edge, and retreated.

For twenty minutes, I actually felt competent.

I filed invoices with smooth efficiency, responded to scheduling requests without panic, even managed to book his lunch reservation at Le Bernardin without stuttering.

The feeling was so foreign I almost didn't trust it.

But maybe, just maybe, I was getting the hang of this.

Then his voice cracked through the intercom like a whip. "Conference room. Now."

The tone froze my blood. Not the usual irritation or impatience, but something colder.

Deadlier. I grabbed my planner with trembling hands and hurried to the executive conference room, where his senior team was already assembled around the massive table.

They looked like mourners at a particularly tense funeral.

Damian stood at the head of the table, the memo in his hand. My memo. My stomach dropped somewhere around my ankles as I realized whatever was about to happen would be public and brutal.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he began, his voice carrying that particular tone that meant someone was about to be eviscerated. "I'd like to share with you all a fascinating piece of corporate communication. Drafted by my assistant. Distributed company-wide ten minutes ago."

Oh God. Oh God oh God oh God.

I'd sent it? When? How? My fingers must have hit send instead of save, must have—

He began to read, each word precise and damning. The quarterly projections, the Berlin timeline, all fine until—

"'As for the Morrison contract delay, our legal department continues to demonstrate why billable hours are inversely proportional to actual productivity. Useless fucking lawyer thinks billable hours mean sitting on his ass contemplating his navel.'"

The blood drained from my face. I'd left it in. His muttered aside, his vicious comment, typed directly into the official memo and sent to every employee in the company.

Including Morrison.

Including Legal.

Including everyone now staring at me with a mixture of pity and second-hand embarrassment.

But he wasn’t done.

"Mr. Morrison, as you can imagine, was thrilled to receive this assessment of his work ethic. He called me personally to express his... appreciation."

A few executives shifted in their seats. Someone cleared their throat. No one looked at me directly, but I could feel their peripheral attention like needles in my skin.

He set the memo down with deliberate precision, smoothing it against the table's surface. The gesture was almost gentle, which made it worse somehow. When he looked up, those gray eyes swept the room before landing on me with the weight of an avalanche.

"Of course, what can we expect?" His tone shifted, becoming conversational, almost philosophical.

"When we hire assistants who can't distinguish between personal commentary and professional communication.

Who lack the basic intelligence to differentiate between what should be captured and what should be filtered. "

My face burned so hot I was surprised my hair didn't ignite.

I couldn't move, couldn't run, couldn't do anything but stand there and take it while fourteen of Stone Enterprises' most senior executives witnessed my destruction.

"My assistant," he said, and something twisted in my chest at the possessive pronoun, "contrary to what her performance up to now might indicate, is as incompetent as the rest of you."

Wait. Was that almost a complement?

His gaze swept the room again, taking in his senior team with the same cold assessment. "At least she's new, still learning. Unlike those responsible for the Q3 projections I'm seeing from your departments."

The focus shifted slightly, executives straightening as they realized they weren't entirely safe. But the damage to me was done, thorough and public and irreversible.

"The memo will need to be retracted," Damian continued, addressing the room but no longer looking at me. I'd ceased to exist except as an object lesson. "Legal will draft an appropriate clarification. Though I suspect the damage to Mr. Morrison's apparently fragile ego is already done."

Nervous laughter rippled through the room—the kind that came from people grateful they weren't the target. The blonde woman from Marketing actually smiled, though she tried to hide it behind her hand.

"Now," he said, returning to the agenda as if he hadn't just ended my career in front of everyone who mattered, "let's discuss the Berlin timeline. Hopefully with a little competence."

He waved his hand then—a casual, dismissive gesture that somehow hurt more than all the words. Get out. You're not worth any more of my time. The message was clear, and I took it, backing toward the door on legs that felt like water.

The last thing I saw before escaping was Pearson's expression—a mixture of pity and satisfaction that said she'd already written me off. They all had. Another assistant who couldn't hack it.

The hallway stretched endlessly before me, plush carpet muffling my footsteps but not the sound of my ragged breathing. My hands shook as I navigated back to my desk, muscle memory guiding me because my vision had gone blurry with unshed tears.

I sank into my chair, the leather creaking under my weight. The computer screen swam before me, inbox already filling with replies to the memo. Subject lines like "Clarification Needed" and "Regarding Your Recent Communication" and one simply titled "???" that was probably from Morrison himself.