LEON

Like everyone else, Darby Caughill probably has very good reason to dislike me greatly. But luckily for me, she doesn’t need to like me. She just needs to marry me.

I swivel in my desk chair with my cell gripped tightly in my fist. The urge to hurl it at the wall is monstrous. I guess I’ve earned my nicknames. They call me Monster Montague. That or my favorite Lord Lee On Poo, shortened down over the months to Lord Poo. The first has a nice ring to it. I don’t mind it at all. The second irks me, but only because the people who work for me can’t say my last name, which is part of the name of the damn company they work for. They’re calling it Mont-a-gue, not Mon-tag, which is the right way to say it.

One monitor pings on the side of my desk, and I swing back around. My head is a mess this afternoon afterthecall. My brain feels like someone opened up my skull and rammed shards of glass into the gray matter. My left eye is twitching because I can already feel it coming on. Pain. Hot, like the edge of a blade, stabbing behind my eyes. My teeth also ache from grinding them.

Stress is a trigger.

Sunlight is a trigger.

Being called any version of Lord Poo is often a trigger.

Triggers are a trigger.

My whole fucking life is a trigger for the pain.

I’ve learned to cope with the stress, even if everyone thinks I’m strange. I’m also rich. Aren’t rich people always a bit strange? I’ve learned to handle the stress because I live with it daily. The threat of deportation, however? Not so much.

It’s that new, added stress that’s making my head feel white-hot. My stomach rolls nastily, roiling in a way that makes acid climb up and burn the back of my throat. The first signs that I need to get the hell out of here are already happening, but I’m not leaving this desk or office until I have what I need.

I’m about to pick up my office phone to call my assistant when my computer pings again. I glance at the screen, and my hand falls away from the phone.

Oh, this is good. This is too good.

One of many chat windows pops up, and I survey the whole system. Each and every message any employee sends in this place is monitored by my IT team, security, and me. It’s a new system we have in to facilitate communication between departments but we also needed to ensure there were no information leaks from sensitive departments. I guess most people already forget that someone is reading these on the back end. It’s not that they don’t care because there’s no way they’d risk sending things like this to each other and saying the things they do if they thought someone was actually reading them.

Darby’s name pops up, entering the chat between herself and three other employees. Friends of hers, I assume. I click on her chat and let my eyes browse the screen, sitting back as the messages come in. The pounding in my head eases up just a little since they are rather entertaining.

Jane:Be careful. Lord Poo is in a serious mood today.

Darby:Thanks for the warning, but I’ve got things under control.

Darby’s face flashes through my mind even though she’s just a few offices down from mine, where the big open floor and everyone else’s cubicles are. I would give everyone an office if I could, but the building isn’t big enough for all those walls. I also know for a fact that when given too much privacy, people get out of control. Such as these chats, for example.

Darby, though, is sweet. She’s twenty-four, but she’s so level-headed and efficient that she seems older despite looking younger. Some people might call her plain, bordering on mousy, with her long brown hair, which is always worn in a perennial bun at the nape of her neck, and her pale blue eyes and creamy skin. She even has the waiflike stature to match. But others might call her a librarian fantasy in the waiting.

I don’t know why, but whenever I think about who those others might be—on either side of the equation—I have a strong desire to start breaking things. Breaking things is a bad idea for me, as indicated by the whole triggers for pain thing listed above.

I turn my attention back to the chats. I’m curious to see what Darby has to say in my defense. She’s so nice that she usually finds something. She’s neutral ground. Instead of getting a business degree, she should have gone into psychology or social work. Or maybe even family law.

I only have to wait a few more seconds before something interesting pops up on the screen.

Amanda:Dude, I don’t know how you freaking manage to work with him. I couldn’t handle him for more than a minute a day, and you’re his damn assistant. That’s rough. We pity your poor soul.

Jane:Speaking of souls, Lord Poo is kind of the devil. But I wouldn’t mind being sent down to the fiery furnace place if he was the one ruling over it all.

Amanda:Gross. He’s rude.

Jane:But his eyes, though. God, those eyes. So, so blue and gray and stormy. And oh, his bottom in those expensive suits he wears.

Oh, look. Margery from accounting is chiming in.

Margery:Got invited in a minute ago and was waiting for the right moment to say something. What better time than a thirst trap in the waiting? Lord Poo might be a jerk, but you’ve got one thing right. I wouldn’t mind it one bit if that man threw me over his shoulder and carted me off to my demise. At least I’d get a good look at his backside and could die happy.

Jane:That ass is good enough to lick. Or taste. Or eat.