Sacked! Read online

  SACKED!

  A Bookish & Sexy novel

  Melinda De Ross

  SACKED!

  Copyright © 2019 Melinda De Ross

  Cover design: CoveredByMelinda.com

  Edited by Susanne Matthews

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission. All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  Dear friends,

  As Charlie Chaplin said, “A day without laughter is a wasted day.”

  The world has had enough drama. We only have to watch the news to get depressed because the ugliness of reality beats any thriller or horror novel. The world needs laughter and escape in cute, lighthearted books that brighten the days.

  This is why I’ve written the Bookish & Sexy Collection, a series of romantic comedies featuring sexy booklovers and heroes who love them. Forget about formulas and prototypes. Each of these stories is different, but they all provide a nice, relaxing, heartwarming experience, a few steamy moments, and some great laughs.

  The books may be read in any order. I hope you have as much fun reading them as I did writing them!

  Melinda

  Dedication

  To Sue. I would be lost without you.

  Contents

  A note from the author

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Epilogue

  THANK YOU!

  About the author

  CELEBRITY – Excerpt

  Chapter One

  I’d really put my foot in it this time. Broken shoe in hand, trying to hide all five foot nine of me behind the potted palm, I surveyed the damage.

  The firefighters had finished packing up the last of their gear and had just allowed us back into the building. It would take days to clean up this mess.

  “Jackson. My office now,” Mr. Finch bellowed, his face a furious red, water dripping from his hair onto the shoulders of his thousand dollar wool suit.

  “Yes, sir,” I said, limping around the fire suppressant foam soaking the carpet and burned cabling.

  I was still in awe as to how quickly the firefighters had managed to put out the blaze and get the sprinklers turned off. But nobody at Finch & Associates was happy about this impromptu opportunity to see the new fire suppression system in action—especially not Mr. Finch.

  I sat in the hard metal chair across from his desk, waiting for what I was sure would be my worst dressing down ever. My wet hot pink polyester blouse stuck to me, and with the air conditioner blowing frigid air into the room, I knew my nipples were standing at attention. I crossed my arms trying to hide them.

  I, Camilla Jackson, had been cursed. I wasn’t ugly or dimwitted—I could have fixed either of those problems. No, I was without a doubt the world’s biggest klutz with an uncanny ability to move through life creating one disaster after another. Just when I thought my luck had changed, something always happened to prove me wrong, and usually in a grand and spectacular way.

  In high school, I’d been a member of the school band with a promising chance of joining the university band in the future. That was until I turned left when everyone else went right during the half-time show. It’s amazing how two seconds out of formation can lead to disaster. Lucinda Myers hasn’t spoken to me in six years, but I guess getting the slide of a trombone in the face couldn’t have been pleasant. The plastic surgeon had worked wonders, but she still held a grudge.

  I wouldn’t say that I loved my job at the law firm, but I did enjoy the steady paycheck, and if it meant I had no life, well, so be it. I didn’t need a man to be complete. A lot of women lived chaste lives and were productive—like Mother Teresa, Elizabeth I, and Emily Dickinson. While my life might not be world changing, it was interesting—most of the time.

  As the firm’s paralegal, my job was to help the lawyers with their cases. I spent hours analyzing and summarizing depositions, drafting procedural motions, and performing legal research and analysis. I couldn’t sleep without envisioning legal books and briefs—not the ones on hunky guys—in my dreams. But while to some sleep was overrated, unfortunately for me, the lack of it was why I was here in the hotseat. Sleep deprivation, new shoes, and loose wires didn’t mix well.

  The door opened, and Mr. Finch entered the room, clutching a pile of documents, some with singed edges. He moved around the desk and sat, still holding the papers. From the grim look on his face, he hadn’t called me in here with good news.

  “Mr. Finch, I can explain,” I said, punctuating my words with the toe of my new shoe, its heel at a wonky angle. “I had my arms filled with those file folders—” I stopped. Those file folders, now scattered all over the floor in the main office area, some of them singed and burned, others covered in sticky white foam, weren’t going to help me.

  “Enough, Camilla. It pains me to do this, but I’m afraid we have to let you go.”

  My heart plummeted to my feet. He couldn’t be serious—it had been an accident, a stupid unfortunate accident.

  “You’re firing me because I tripped over a freaking cable?” I shrieked, but the words came out as a whisper.

  Finch’s bushy unibrow stretched across his forehead, and his lips pursed. He leaned forward, dropping the singed file folders, linking his hands on his desk.

  “No, Camilla. I’m firing you because you ignored clear DO NOT ENTER signs. When you ‘tripped’ over that cable, almost electrocuting the technicians working on upgrading our systems, you shorted out all of the electronic equipment, costing this company thousands of dollars and forcing people to put in hours of overtime to recover lost files. I’m firing you because when you ‘tripped’ over that cable, you yanked the plug from the wall and the sparks set the nearby papers on fire, forcing the sprinklers to come on and further damage all the sensitive equipment back there. And, since this is the second time we’ve had this kind of incident since you started working for us, my choice is to either find a new insurance company or get rid of you. Can you guess which is the more feasible option? This company can’t afford to have you working for us. Do you have any idea what grief the insurance company gave me?”

  His voice which had been reasonable initially rose several octaves.

  My eyes grew round and as shiny as a kicked puppy’s. “But-but ... that first time wasn’t my fault. I thought the plant needed watering. How was I supposed to know there was a power bar just behind it?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” he said, steepling his fingers under his chin. “Maybe you could’ve asked why it was there in the first place. My secretary would’ve told you it was an artificial palm put there to stop someone from tripping over the power bar!”

  “Well, it looks real. Mr. Finch, what happened today wasn’t my fault,” I mumbled, tears so close to the surface I could taste them. “I didn’t see the sign.”

  “No, and you didn’t hear the announcement either because you were late again.”

  This was going nowhere. I’d never been very good at defending myself, especially when in truth I was guilty as sin, but I needed this job. I made another attempt, clutching my hands in supplication.

  “Please, Mr. Finch. I promise it won’
t happen again. I’ll get a better alarm clock. Give me another chance.”

  “It won’t happen again, precisely because I’m not going to give you another chance. Now, you can pick up your final check and release papers from HR. Goodbye and good luck, Miss Jackson.”

  With that, he stood and ended the meeting.

  I got to my feet, numb with shock. I’d expected a scene, but this was too much. When I wasn’t klutzy, my work had been more than adequate, but apparently that wasn’t good enough to keep me.

  Tears stung my eyes as I walked out of the office, my head down, still dazed. Coworkers who passed me, a lot of them still in wet shirts thanks to the efficient sprinkler system, avoided my gaze. I saw a few pitying glances as I headed to my desk to gather up my things, but I was certain most of them were glad to see me go.

  I’d been with Finch & Associates for the past couple of years doing whatever was asked of me. I’d hoped this job was the one for me, but the truth was I was going nowhere with it. My degree in Law, with a minor in English, hadn’t prepared me for much. It was unfinished, just like I was. Don’t get me wrong. I liked the law, but I didn’t have a burning desire to go that one step farther and finish up the courses I would need to take my bar exams.

  The truth was I didn’t know what I wanted out of life, but I did know it didn’t involve hours of overtime and a cold lonely apartment. I’d gone to university to please my parents, and had picked Law because it was the discipline with the shortest name and the hunkiest guys outside of Engineering, which had way too much math.

  If I had an aspiration toward any particular vocation, I’d yet to discover it. At three, I’d wanted to be a princess. By eight, I knew that not having been born the daughter of a king or queen, it wasn’t going to happen. But, hey, I was only twenty-four. I had plenty of years ahead of me.

  Other than princess, the only thing I’d ever really wanted to be was a singer. Sadly, even the neighbor’s dog howled when I sang in the shower. According to my fifth grade teacher, I was tone deaf, and that hadn’t improved with age. My one dream career down the toilet.

  Now, here I was sacked! Fired from my first job. I sniffled as I emptied my desk drawers, slipped on the flats I kept there when my feet hurt, and dumped everything into a slightly soggy, medium-sized cardboard box. Thankfully, since it was the lunch hour, there weren’t many others in the building to watch my walk of shame to HR and add to my humiliation. I still thought firing me was a little extreme, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. I had caused the problem, and the damages had to be in the thousands. I should be grateful I wasn’t being asked to come good for them.

  I stopped in Human Resources, collected my final check, and nodded dejectedly as I received a sympathetic pat on the hand from Susanne, the HR manager.

  “I’m sorry, honey,” the plump, petite blonde said in her high pitched voice that always brought Megan Mullally from Will and Grace to mind. “You’ll find something else soon. There’s always work in Jersey City.”

  “Sure, there is,” I agreed without much conviction. I took my severance papers from her. “Thanks. Bye, Susanne.”

  “Take care, honey.”

  I left the building, box balanced on one hip, and walked to my car. The July sun was scorching, the humidity so high you could cut it with a knife. When I opened the door to my sassy, red Volkswagen Beetle—a present from my parents for my twenty-first birthday—a wave of stale superheated air blasted me, knocking me backward. Somewhat startled, I noted the front of my blouse was now dry.

  I shoved the box onto the passenger seat and climbed behind the wheel, starting the engine to let the air conditioning do its job. The seat burned the flesh on the back of my thighs where my skirt failed to cover them.

  “Son of a bitch,” I cursed. “What else can go wrong today?”

  I drove away and merged into the busy traffic, my palms damp on the hot plastic steering wheel. I was still numb. Perhaps it was time to reevaluate my career choices. Instead of looking for another position as a paralegal, maybe I should explore alternate career paths.

  While I wasn’t sorry that I was no longer a member of the staff of Finch & Associates, I was concerned about paying the rent on my apartment and eating regularly. If I couldn’t find a way to do either of those, I would be forced to move back home with my parents and sister—something as alluring as root canal.

  My parents were the best, but I’d never really gotten along with my eighteen-year-old sister, Carrie. A six year age difference had guaranteed we had little in common growing up, and that disparity had only gotten worse as she entered her teen years and I left them.

  As far as appearances went, we were both tall with pale-blonde hair, rather spectacular gray eyes, and good genes that kept us svelte without much effort. But that’s where it ended. I was pretty, but I didn’t make a fuss about it. Bitchzilla, on the other hand, had a colossal opinion of herself. She was shallow, selfish, and a constant flirt, flaunting her looks to attract as much attention—especially male—as possible.

  When I started working for Finch & Associates and finally moved into my own place, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. I’d gotten used to living alone and valued my independence. To keep it, I needed to find a new job fast. But first, I deserved a pity party, and what’s a pity party without chocolate and ice cream?

  I’d just paid for my purchases at the supermarket when I realized I needed to go quite urgently. I grabbed my bags and headed toward the ladies’ room. The room was empty but when I opened the door to the first stall, I was stopped in my tracks by a naked man’s hairy ass.

  “What the hell?” I cried, almost dropping my bags in surprised indignation and more than a little shock. “Get out of here, you asshole! This area is for women.”

  “So is this,” he said, turning around, his semi-flaccid penis in hand.

  My eyes bulged in a strange combination of revulsion and fascination. I gawked at the tiny appendage protruding from an impressive forest of pubic hair.

  “Put that thing away and get out of here,” I shrieked, momentarily distracted when the door opened and two women stepped into the room chattering loudly.

  They couldn’t see the guy still inside the stall. I wanted to close the door, but he was holding it open with his free hand.

  “Wanna touch it?” he asked.

  The women stopped talking and gasped.

  I pointed to the exit door. “Get out,” I enunciated.

  “No, no. Right here, so everyone can see,” the pervert said, stepping forward to give the ladies a better view, holding his wanger and wiggling it at me.

  “Jesus!” One of the women echoed my thoughts as she inched closer to get a better look. “Martha, call security. Tell them there’s a nude man in the women’s restroom,” she ordered in a high, snooty voice

  The other woman, slightly older and plumper, peeked at the exhibitionist, gasped, then clamped a hand over her eyes and ran toward the door.

  I rolled my eyes in disgust and followed her. There weren’t a lot of things in Jersey that shocked me, but that guy was more than I could handle, especially today. The last thing I needed was to be on the witness stand facing a lawyer I knew personally and describing the man’s willy for the jury. Let Martha and company do it.

  I drove with my legs squeezed tightly, trying to ignore my full bladder’s protests as the occasional pothole bounced me in my seat. Never had I been happier to see home.

  My one-bedroom apartment in Greenville, a neighborhood with more green spaces than parking lots, was on the second floor of a six-story brick building. From my small balcony, I could even glimpse Newark Bay. All in all, I was fond of my digs. The thought of having to move out because I was jobless depressed me.

  I unlocked the door, threw my keys and grocery bags on the kitchen counter and raced to the bathroom to answer Mother Nature’s demands. Feeling better physically, I returned to the kitchen, dug into one of the sacks, grabbed the ice cream, then took a spoon before going
into the living room. I kicked off my shoes and plopped down on the sofa.

  I turned on the TV and stuffed my face with ice cream until I felt queasy. I had no idea what to do next. Fate had given me a swift kick in the derriere and I was flat on my face on the sidewalk. I needed a plan. I had to start looking for another job—but not just any job. If I was going to do this, I needed to do it right. And I needed advice. But first, I deserved a good pity party and no one pity-partied alone.

  I called my best friend, Anna. We’d known each other from the age of three. Even though she lived in Trenton, we’d remained best friends. We often talked on the phone and visited one another every few months.

  Anna’s cheerful voice answered on the third ring. “Hey, girlfriend!”

  “Hey.”

  The single syllable, spoken in an unenthusiastic tone, gave me away.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  I sighed. “I just got sacked.”

  “Sacked—as in fired? Get out! No. Wait. What did you do this time?”

  “Nice. Why do you assume I did something?” I bristled.

  She laughed. “Face it, Camilla. You’ve been known to be accident prone, and since there hasn’t been a disaster in months, you’re due.”

  Great. Even my best friend thought I was a klutz. That dampened my spirits even more.

  “Come on. Give. What happened?” she asked again.

  “I sort of caused a fire,” I admitted.

  “Not again!”

  “This really wasn’t entirely my fault,” I whined. “I was working late last night, burning the midnight oil to get a brief prepared, and fell asleep at the desk.” I went on to explain about the alarm clock, the files in my arms, and the cable. “To make everything worse, I broke the heel on my new Jimmy Choo knockoffs. I paid fifty bucks for those damn shoes. Mr. Finch wouldn’t even listen to my explanation. He axed me, just like that,” I wailed. “Bottom line is that I’m jobless, and I don’t know what to do.”