Barton and I spent four hours together the day before without him hitting on me. That was… different. Good different, but also frustrating. Like, let’s put headphones on the kids and go fuck in my bedroom kind of frustrating.

Of all the ways I’d expected my next meeting with Barton to go down, it hadn’t involved babysitting two children. At least they’d helped hide the awkwardness. The things I did with Barton… I’d never done anything like that before. I mean, I’d given a couple of guys head, but it had been more polite. More reserved. With Barton, I’d been like a porn star.

My mind had been wracked with worry. Would he look at me differently? He’d only started chasing me because I wasn’t like the other girls. Now I’d behaved like the other girls, would he still want me?

Did I still want him? Okay, some questions were easier to answer than others.

Likewise, I didn’t have to ask Tasha how her date with Clyde went yesterday.

“Morning, Clyde,” I said cheerfully as I walked out to breakfast.

“Hi Kristi.” He had a huge grin on his face, as he finished off a bowl of cereal. My sister certainly knew how to make a man happy.

“Tasha about?”

“She’s in the shower.”

“Nope, I’m done,” Tasha said, coming out of her bathroom. “You still insisting on studying today?”

“Yep, sorry, darling. Has to be done.”

I watched as Clyde and Tasha said a sweet goodbye on the doorstep. Tasha didn’t usually do sweet goodbyes. She usually hopped in the shower with the parting words “make sure you’re gone by the time I get out.”

“Date went well?” I asked.

“It was okay.”

“Okay? You’re grinning so wide the corners of your mouth are almost reaching your ears.”

Tasha immediately tried to stop smiling, but she couldn’t. “We hung out and then spent the night together. Nothing I haven’t done with guys before.”

“Why won’t you admit you like him?”

This time Tasha’s face did turn sour. I’d struck a nerve. “Just leave it, okay. We’re having fun, but it’s not going to last.”

“Why not?”

“For one thing, he’s a couple of years younger than me.”

“So? He looks and acts older than you do. No offense.”

“I just don’t think it’s going to work out. Now drop it, please.”

Tasha didn’t give me much choice. She stormed off into her room and slammed the door behind her.

Good work, Kristi. You’ve managed to make your sister go from happy to sad in seconds. What a great sister you are.

I might be a bad sister, but I could still be good for Barton. Seeing him with his nephews yesterday had given me an idea.

I logged into work’s server from my laptop and prepared an email to Leona.

Hi Leona,

I’ve had an idea for Barton Fenner. Can we arrange for him to pop by a children’s charity (hospital, orphanage, etc)? Turns out he’s great with kids, and he’s been pestering me about doing it.

I convinced him that we wouldn’t want it to look like a photo op and therefore wouldn’t invite the press.

Let me know what you think.

Kristi

Every senior person at the firm knew that we were only pretending to help Barton improve his image, but Leona would still kill me if I put it in an email. I settled for mentioning the lack of photographers and hoped she would pick up on the hint.

The reply came back within minutes; Leona was probably tied to that outdated Blackberry device she insisted on carrying around.

Okay, if you think it’s necessary to keep the client happy. Careful though—it won’t just be the media with cameras. Make sure no pictures get out! We wouldn’t want it looking like a photo op.

Yeah, wouldn’t want Barton getting any credit for being a nice person.

My plan relied heavily on a picture leaking out. Even kids had cameras these days, and there were bound to be parents around who couldn’t resist sneaking a quick picture. Now Leona had warned me about it, so I couldn’t plead my ignorance. Oh well.

I’ll make some calls. Don’t worry, no pictures will get out.

There wasn’t anything we could do to stop people talking about the visit on social media, but it really was true that pictures told a story. More importantly, they told it quickly—an essential attribute given the attention spans of my generation.

Barton didn’t deserve what we were doing to him. I could still help him, but at some point I was going to have to choose. My job—and my career—or Barton, a man who I still thought would leave me within a day of us finally having sex.

Whichever I chose, the important thing was that Barton never find out. He’d never forgive me.