Chapter 109

I didn’t hear from Dylan for the rest of the weekend. I tried not to worry about it too much. Dylan’s a professional, after all. Whatever he had thought of that had called him away must have been important. But that didn’t mean he would forget about me and my request.

I wanted to be divorced, and put this whole ugly of my life behind me.

Maybe, part of that, was looking for a new job.

Monday morning, 8 am on the dot, I sat at my desk ready for the day. I hesitated before I opened my email, half expecting to be called into Logan’s office at any moment and further reprimanded for what happened during his last date.

But ten minutes ticked by, then twenty. And no one called me away from my desk.

What I wasn’t sure of now, though, was what I should be doing? I wanted to go back to my real work tasks, but if Logan wanted me to do anything other than plan more dates, he surely would have said so.

Sighing, I opened the desk drawer where I stored Logan’s datebook, and readied myself for more emotional distress for the day. Letting other women live out my romantic fantasies was not very fun.

Yet, when I reached for the datebook, it was gone.

Panic shot through me. I had put it in my desk Friday end of day. I was certain of it.

I opened the drawer wider, but it was gone. I shuffled around some other papers and pens in a mad rush, hoping I would find it tucked away behind something. There were only so many places in this drawer it could be.

Closing that drawer, I instead opened the next and searched through that for the datebook. It was emptier than the last drawer. It wasn’t there.

Nor was it in any other drawer in the desk, or in the file cabinet close to my station. I checked on the floors, behind the computer, under the monitor stand and my keyboard. Anywhere it could have conceivably and even unconceivably get to, I checked.

Did I leave it on the copier? I never made copies from it, but who knew? I searched. Nothing.

Had it fallen into the trash? The trashcan beside my desk was empty. Oh, God, what if the cleaners had already taken it out. I picked up the phone.

“The weekend’s trash is down in the loading bay,” the head of the cleaning department said. “I wouldn’t recommend going through it, but you can if you need to.”

“I have to find this datebook,” I explained. “It could mean my job.”

“I’ll hold off the garbage truck as long as I can, but you better be quick then,” the cleaner said.

“I’ll be right there!”

Hanging up, I jumped from my chair.

“Lose something?” Sabrina called from her desk. She typed merrily away at her keyboard, even as she turned an amused glance my direction.

A sinking feeling opened up in my stomach. The way she was looking at me… She seemed too pleased with herself.

“Did you have anything to do with this?” I asked.

His smile widened. “I can’t be held responsible for the things you accidentally throw away. If you were more responsible, maybe Mr. Hatfield would be able to depend on you more.”

Her words sliced through me more than I should have let them. But the truth was plain. I had lost this datebook, the most important key to my current duties. Admitting it would make me look like a massive failure.

Regardless of whether or not Sabrina had been the one to throw it away – I greatly regretted not locking my desk – I needed to be the one to find it.

Even if I had to crawl through the trash to find it.

Turning from Sabrina, I grabbed my phone and headed toward the elevator. On the way, I quickly texted Maria.

‘Logan’s datebook is missing. Excuse me while I dumpster dive.’

Maria’s reply was quick.

‘Wear gloves. Watch for needles.’

Sound advice.

Her texts continued.

‘What happened? You would have never lost something like that.’

As I waited for the elevator, I glanced back up the hallway, the way I had come.

‘Never turn your back on Sabrina.’ I texted.

Logan wasn’t hiding from Hazel, thank you very much. He had a lot of work to do today and what better place was there to do so than in his own office?

He hadn’t recovered yet from his realization at the restaurant, that it was his own foolish self-sabotaging perfectly fine dates Hazel had arranged. His need to blame her had come from his own feelings.

After all, it was her fault the dates went bad. Though, not in any way that she could control.

Maybe Logan should have pulled her off of this assignment for both of their sakes. But who would he set to arrange his dates instead? Sabrina?

He cringed at the thought.

Sabrina was an adequate-enough secretary, he supposed, but she was a dime a dozen. Hiring her had been a short-sighted decision. Logan had wanted a barrier between himself and Hazel, to help stretch their emotional distance from one another.

Perhaps in doing so, he had made a monster of Sabrina. He wasn’t immune to the way she strutted around like she owned the place. Or the way she cast snide remarks at Hazel like they were going out of fashion.

Today, as Logan glanced at Hazel through the window, he noticed that she seemed very stressed today. Sabrina wasn’t helping supposedly. She said something that made Hazel pale a little.

Logan should stay out of it. This strange hierarchy was theirs to figure out.

But he didn’t like the way Hazel stormed down the hallway, or the way Sabrina laughed once she was gone.

It was that lingering, screech-like laughter that had Logan rising from his chair. He went to the door and opened it. Sabrina stifled her laughter at once.

“Mr. Hatfield?” she asked, twisting her face into one of professional coolness. But I had seen the cold way she had been looking before. The professionalism was the façade, hiding a devil underneath.

Had she been bullying Hazel from the start?

Easy, Logan reminded himself. It wouldn’t do to jump to conclusions. He couldn’t let his attraction to Hazel ruin his professional life like it was messing up his personal one.

“Where was Hazel going?” Logan asked Sabrina in an effort to give her a chance. Maybe he was reading this situation all wrong. He had to be sure of Sabrina’s motives here.

“She didn’t clear her leaving with me, Sir. I was just about to tell you. She just stormed straight out of here.” Sabrina’s smile widened slightly, adding her canine teeth. “Would you like me to write her up?”

“No. That will not be necessary.”

Logan glanced at Hazel’s desk. It was chaotic, with papers and pens strewn about. Even her computer keyboard was askew.

She was typically very tidy at work. Logan hated the small nervousness clawing up inside of him.

“If I may speak candidly, Sir,” Sabrina said.

Logan wanted her advice as much as he wanted to run his face over a cactus, but he had a nagging suspicion she might reveal her true nature if he let her.

So he curtly nodded.

“It’s not with any personal grudge that I say this,” Sabrina said. “But Hazel truly has not been committing herself to this job. She made so many careless errors that I sometimes wonder if they weren’t errors at all. In fact, I think she might be trying to sabotage you.”

“What makes you think that?” Logan asked.

Sabrina opened her desk drawer and pulled out the datebook that I had personally trusted to Hazel.

“Why, last Friday, I caught her trying to throw this away. I had to pull it from her trash can myself. It’s yours, Sir. Isn’t it?”