Not Playing Fair (The NOT Series Book 2) Read online

  “Hey, I can’t talk.”

  “I’m sorry. I thought you’d be off work by now.”

  “No, I’m still here.”

  “Oh.” The nausea returned with a vengeance. “I’ll let you go then.”

  I was about to ask if he could call me later when he said, “I’ll see you Friday.”

  The line went dead and I sat blinking, phone still pressed to my ear. Maybe he was having a bad day. Or was stressed about the meeting Coach had mentioned. I shouldn’t have taken his abrupt tone personally, but I couldn’t help but feel… scolded. Like I’d crossed some line I shouldn’t have.

  The only option left was to talk to Rachel after the interview. To explain my faulty thinking and hopefully convince her to let me tell Ryan before she did. Or she might say her brother deserved better and that would be it. That was no less than I deserved, after all, but in the grand scheme of things, this wasn’t the worst lie in the world. I hadn’t catfished him or pretended to be someone I’m not. He knew my name and where I lived and even knew the details about Cassie, which not even Dad knew.

  If the roles were reversed, I’d like to think I’d be forgiving, but would I? Could I continue seeing a guy who didn’t tell me the truth from the start? How could I trust him after that? I couldn’t, and that realization put the situation into perspective. A lie was a lie. I would not be asking for forgiveness or expecting another date. The best I could hope for was a cleared conscience and a lesson learned.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I had never given myself so many pep talks in my life. From my first cup of tea to the moment I walked through the ornate black doors into the main library, one simple phrase kept running through my mind.

  You can do this.

  This was by far my favorite of all the branches. The first in the system, housed in its original building dedicated in 1895, the main branch was expansive, ornate, and included a music hall and a museum. Numerous large windows let in a ton of natural light, while the columns and arches, visible in every direction, hearkened back to another time. The only reason I’d never requested a transfer to this location was because I had no desire to live in Oakland, which was one of the busier parts of the city thanks to being the home of the University of Pittsburgh.

  I also didn’t want to be so far from my friends, and commuting would be a bear.

  Stepping up to the long front desk, I found a familiar face. “Morning, Donald. How are you?”

  “I’m good, Megan. What brings you all the way out here?”

  “I’m sitting in on some interviews this morning. The email didn’t tell me where they were holding them. Do you know?”

  He pushed up his glasses as sunlight glistened off his almost bald head. “Third floor conference room. You know where the elevator is, right?”

  “I do, thanks.”

  I made my way through the quiet space, passing beneath the arches on my way to the far back corner where the elevators were. For a second I considered taking the stairs, but I’d worn a dressier pair of shoes that were not broken in and didn’t want to chance a blister. There was also the sore leg to consider.

  Casting a quick glance toward the children’s room as I went by, I made a note to stop by the space after the interviews. Though we didn’t have a designated kid’s area due to lack of space, I still liked to get ideas for small touches we could add where possible.

  As I approached the elevator, I heard someone call my name and turned to find Pamela walking my way.

  “Hello, there,” I said.

  “Hello, yourself. What brings you to my neck of the woods today?”

  Her once bright-red curls were now dark gray, but little else had changed. She had an interesting face with a sloped nose, full brows, and a tiny mole right above her top lip. One of my favorite fellow librarians, Pamela was sharp as a whip, and I wished we weren’t losing her to retirement.

  “Didn’t they tell you? I’m sitting in on the interviews to replace you.” I’d assumed she’d be included as well, since she knew the job better than anyone.

  She smacked her forehead. “That’s today? I completely forgot with this consultant thing they’ve thrown me into.”

  My ears perked up. “You’re in on the consultant meeting?”

  “Yes, but not willingly. You’d think having one foot out the door would get me out of boring money stuff, but I guess not.”

  I would have killed to be in her shoes, and not because I wanted early retirement. “Do you know anything about the consultant and what he might suggest for cuts?”

  Pamela pursed her lips, revealing more wrinkles than I’d noticed before. “I’ve met him, and I don’t know that he’s coming in with any preconceived ideas. That’s what the meeting is for, after all. For the branch managers to give their input, and then he’ll take the suggestions and crunch the numbers, I guess.”

  Then I just needed Jeffrey to make the right suggestions. Something I didn’t trust him to do. I couldn’t put my finger on anything specific, but I had a bad feeling about the fate of my programs being in his hands.

  Before I could ask another question, Pamela said, “Here’s the consultant now if you want to meet him.” I spun to find a very familiar face staring back at me. As my heart skidded to a stop, she introduced us. “Megan Knox, this is Ryan Stallings.”

  “Ryan?” I said.

  “Megan?” Dark brows drew together. “What are you doing here?”

  “You’ve met?” Pamela said.

  Jaw tight, I held his gaze. “Yes, we’ve met.”

  Though I should have been trying to explain myself, I couldn’t get past the fact that he was the consultant. He’d said he helped people manage their money, and I supposed in some twisted way that was an accurate statement. But I couldn’t help but feel like I’d been purposely misled.

  “I guess it makes sense to run into you at a library,” he said, and I realized he had yet to catch on.

  “That is where librarians are usually found,” Pamela said with a chuckle.

  Seconds passed as the truth clicked into place, and I watched his expression change. “Wait. I thought you worked in a bookstore.”

  I embraced my right to remain silent, since I had no excuse for the outright lie. Poor Pamela was very confused.

  “A library and a bookstore are similar, I guess.” Her eyes went from Ryan’s face to mine. “I feel like I’ve walked into a conversation already in progress so I’m going to leave now and let you two carry this on alone.”

  Neither of us stopped her as she walked away.

  “So you’re a librarian?” Ryan said.

  “Yes.”

  “But you told me you work in a bookstore?”

  “Yes.”

  He crossed his arms. “I’m going to need a little more than one-word answers.”

  “You told me you work in finance,” I reminded him.

  “And I do.”

  “Helping people cobble together a retirement plan, and working with a major institution to decide where money is and isn’t worth spending are two very different things.”

  A muscle twitched along his jaw. “Explaining what I do is complicated.”

  “So you didn’t think I was smart enough to understand the word consultant?”

  “At least I didn’t tell an outright lie. Why didn’t you just say you were a librarian?”

  Why didn’t I? Oh, right. Because I’m an idiot. “Some people make negative assumptions about librarians, and I wanted you to get to know me first.”

  “I wouldn’t have made those assumptions.”

  Anger waning, I looked away. “I know that now. I’ve been trying to tell you the truth since the night of our date, but the timing never worked out.”

  “Stallings, what’s the hold up?” boomed Jeffrey, far too loudly for the library floor. “Ms. Knox, why aren’t you in the interviews? Do you two know each other?”

  Ryan shook his head. “I thought we did, but I was wrong.”

  The words sliced li
ke a knife, and I regretted every word I’d just uttered. The finality in his statement said it all. I’d messed up. I’d lied. And I hadn’t even had the dignity to apologize.

  He and Jeffrey walked away, leaving me frozen in place. How had I made such a mess of everything?

  “Megan?” said a voice from my left. “They called down looking for you,” Donald said. “Are you okay?”

  No, I wasn’t. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Tell them I’m on my way.”

  “You sure? You look a little pale.”

  Taking a deep breath, I nodded and offered an empty smile. “I’m fine. I just got a little sidetracked.” He didn’t look convinced so I tried the smile again before giving up and crossing the short distance to the elevator. The world went on and I had a job to do. I just hoped I would keep it together until I could get to my car and have a really good cry.

  Paying attention hadn’t been easy over the next hour. Concerns warred in my mind from what would happen to the programs to if Ryan would ever speak to me again. I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t, but we still had to play on the team together. We weren’t likely to be friends, but I hadn’t exactly committed the crime of the century. As far as sins went, I wanted to think I was still redeemable. Even if only to the point that we could be civil to each other on the field.

  Rachel was the last interview, because heaven forbid the universe cut me a break and let me get the final blow over with quickly. We were total strangers except for a one-minute conversation a few nights before so this wasn’t the same as the scene with Ryan, but she had looked quite confused when she took a seat and found me among the interviewers.

  Because Pamela did so much, we were actually hiring two people to take her place. One required more experience, but a newbie fresh out of school could fill the other. That’s where Rachel came in. She was up against only one other applicant, and even if I’d never met her before, I’d have given her my vote for the position. She was smart, had done a great deal of work while in college, and possessed excellent people skills, which were needed in a job that required constant interaction with the public.

  When the interview ended, I gave an excuse and hurried from the room, hoping to catch her.

  “Rachel,” I called as she pressed the button for the elevator. “Can I talk to you?”

  To my surprise, she offered a genuine smile. “Sure. I was surprised to see you in there.”

  “Yeah. About that…” I looked around for a place we might find some privacy. Pointing to a table at the edge of the genealogy section, I said, “Can we sit down?”

  She agreed and we both took a seat.

  “In case you don’t know,” Rachel began, “Ryan is downstairs.”

  Oh, I knew all right. “We ran into each other. That went… not well.”

  “I’m not surprised. My brother can be a stickler for the truth. I’m guessing you don’t work in a bookstore and here at the library?”

  “Technically, I work at another branch, but no, I don’t work in a bookstore at all.” Hoping she might understand, I said, “You see, sometimes when I tell people that I’m a librarian, they make a few assumptions.”

  Rachel snorted. “Tell me about it. I’ve lost track of how many guys have made a lewd joke about me letting my hair down and turning into some wild cat in bed.”

  “Yes,” I said. Though that wasn’t exactly the reaction I got. “Except for me, it goes the other way. They think I must be boring and never take my nose out of a book.”

  The leggy blond looked perplexed. “I haven’t gotten that one.” Of course, she hadn’t. She was young and beautiful and not the size of a Cabbage Patch doll. “But I get it,” she added. “Ryan should, too. He has the same hang-up.”

  Now she’d lost me. “What do you mean?”

  “Did he tell you he’s a consultant?”

  “No, he didn’t. I had no idea until we met by accident today.”

  Lips pursed, Rachel rolled her eyes. “He’s gotten crap from people who think consultant equates to con artist. You can imagine not everyone is happy to have an outsider come in and tell them what to change. Some of the jobs he’s taken have resulted in everything from his car getting keyed to someone putting salt in his coffee.”

  That was much more than I had to deal with.

  “But he didn’t know that I was involved with the library or had any connection to his job. Why not tell me the truth?”

  Rachel crossed her arms on the table. “Sadly, it doesn’t just happen at work. Some woman he dated in Chicago broke up with him because she was too embarrassed to tell her friends she was dating a consultant. That’s only one person, but those things can stick with you.”

  Yes, they could. “So we basically did the same thing for similar reasons. I’d laugh at the irony if I could get that look on his face out of my head.”

  “He isn’t unreasonable,” she said. “Once he gets over the initial anger, he’ll normally hear a person out.” Her phone buzzed and she checked the screen. “Speak of the devil. Ryan says his meeting is over. If you want, we can go down together. Maybe with two against one we can convince him to at least let you explain.”

  “You’d do that for me?”

  She slid the phone back into her purse. “Ryan hasn’t talked about anyone like he’s talked about you. I know you guys still barely know each other, but he’s pretty guarded about who he spends his time with. So long as you haven’t lied about anything else…”

  “No,” I said. “Nothing. He’s been to my house. He knows my family history. Heck, he’s even seen me without makeup on. There’s no hiding anything there.”

  Her laughter filled the space before she remembered where we were. In a whisper, she said, “I’m meeting him in the coffee shop. Let’s go straighten this out.”

  “I would love to.” As I pushed my chair in, I caught sight of another familiar face across the room. Why hadn’t I thought of this? Of course, she’d be in the genealogy department with the largest amount of archives in the city. “Wait,” I said to Rachel. “I need to talk to someone first.”

  Rachel followed by gaze. “Oh, okay, but Ryan is waiting.”

  I couldn’t let Cassie slip through my fingers again. “You go on down. I’ll be there in a couple minutes.”

  “Should I tell him you’re coming?” she asked as I made my way through the tables.

  “Yes.” Trying to run the two scenarios through my mind at the same time, I stopped and spun to face her. “No. Just keep him there. I’ll be there as soon as I deal with this.”

  If Ryan was still angry, he would either leave to avoid me or get mad at Rachel for taking my side. All I had to do was convince Cassie to meet me for dinner tonight, and then I could hurry downstairs.

  When I turned back around, the seat where Cassie had been was empty. How could she have moved that quickly? I scanned the area and was about to ask another patron if they saw where she’d gone when her head popped up from behind a shelf. I hurried through the tables to reach her.

  “Cassie,” I said as she began to walk off in the other direction. “Cassie, wait.” As if not sure if she’d heard her name or not, she paused and tilted her head. “Cassie, over here.”

  She took a step back, searching for the voice and when our eyes met, hers went wide. “Hey, Megan. What are you doing here?”

  After dodging a slow-moving patron to reach her, I took a second to catch my breath. “I was sitting in on some interviews and they just wrapped up. I was surprised when you stopped coming to the library.”

  “Oh, Thomas told me about this collection, so I’ve been working here for the last few days.”

  Thomas. Why hadn’t I thought to ask him if he’d seen her? “Have you found anything?”

  Her face fell. “Not yet. Based on my DNA results, I have a lead on someone who might be a distant uncle. I’ve reached out but no response yet, so I’m back to searching old birth records.”

  Hearing the seconds tick away in my head, I searched for a way to ask he
r to meet me without sounding creepy or cryptic.

  “I think I might know something about your mom, but I don’t have time to discuss it right now. Could we meet later? Maybe grab a bite?”

  “Did you find something?” Cassie said, ignoring the invite to dinner.

  “Kind of.” I had no idea how long Rachel could keep Ryan in the building. “Where are you staying? Maybe we can meet close to there.”

  “I’m at a short-term rental on the South Side. Are you saying you have information about my mom? What is it?”

  “I’m sorry. I really have to go. Meet me at Café Du Jour at six o’clock, okay? It’s on East Carson Street. You can’t miss it.”

  “But, Megan…”

  Rushing off, I said, “I’ll see you there at six o’clock. I’ll tell you everything then.”

  Skipping the elevator, I charged down the stairs, anxious to reach the coffee shop as soon as possible. By the time I hit the bottom step, my injured leg was on fire, and I had the start of a mean blister on my left heel. Hobbling as best I could, I entered the little shop out of breath, but Rachel and Ryan weren’t there. I returned to the main space and looked in all directions, thinking maybe they were waiting in another area.

  They were nowhere in sight, and my leg and heel hurt too badly to search the entire library. As I bent down to pull my foot out of the shoe then bend the back under, Donald found me once again.

  “There you are. Someone named Rachel said to tell you she tried but she’s sorry. Do you know what that means?”

  With a sigh, I pushed my hair out of my face and wiped my damp forehead. “I do, thanks.” He waited as if hoping I would explain. I would not be doing that. “I need to get back to work. Have a good afternoon, Donald.”

  “You, too,” he said as I limped toward the exit with as much dignity as I could muster.

  I needed an adhesive bandage, a change of shoes, and a stiff drink. None of which I had with me. That’s when I made the executive decision that I deserved the rest of the day off. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d used vacation time, and if there was ever a day I’d earned some, this was that day.