Page 58 of My Girlfriend is Not the Father

Once, during the first month of work, they’d gone out and thrown back a few drinks. They giggled at embarrassing stories, including one where Shayna nearly re-enacted a swan-dive faceplant across the salon her first month of working. Jade remembered thinking it was the first time since her divorce that she’d laughed. And now, Shayna was stealing from her. Not just once.

For over a year.

How much had she taken? Jade wanted to calculate it, but when she started adding it up, the knot in her chest tightened so hard, she couldn’t breathe. She roughly knew. She could match it with the profits dipping. Thousands and thousands of dollars, gone. And it got worse – Jade had a profit-sharing mechanism in place for all the stylists. When they met the salon goal, they all got a percentage of the profits. So, Shayna had ripped that money out of their mouths as well.

Although Jade normally claimed she had no motherly instinct, some kind of deep, instinctual mother-bear rage roared. She flew out of the chair and paced the house, biting the edge of her finger. Deep breaths were doing nothing to calm the painful thud in her chest. She opened the door and let the cold slap her in the face. She stayed there until she started shivering and slammed the door.

She snatched the phone from the coffee table.

‘Hey …’ Lucy’s groggy voice answered.

‘I can’t believe this. I’m shaking right now.’ Jade stomped through the house, a rabid animal circling her cage. ‘Amanda called. I’m so fucking angry. I looked through all the security … hours and hours of it … I figured out what’s been happening with Shayna.’

A pause and a yawn followed. ‘You did? Oh … what was …’ The final words were incoherent behind a heavy breath and mumbles.

A burst of anger and exasperation ripped through Jade. She knew it wasn’t fair, but she couldn’t help it. She inhaled a sharp breath through her nose. ‘Did I wake you up?’

‘Yeah, um, yeah. But it’s okay. I’m here. Tell me.’ Those were Lucy’s words, but the tone of her voice was saying Let me go back to sleep.

Dammit! Jade really needed to talk to her girlfriend, who could talk her off the ledge. Maybe Lucy would put a comforting spin on this fucked-up situation and shepherd her through the numbers storm currently battering Jade’s head. Lucy, with her positive energy and sing-song ways, could assure her everything was okay, that it wasn’t as bad as she thought, and convince her to sleep on it and come at the problem with a fresh mind.

Another yawn.

‘No worries. Go back to sleep. I’ll call you in the morning.’ Dammit! With her insides fuming, Jade barely waited for Lucy to say goodnight when she hung up. She paced the house with long strides, her gaze catching on the sink, which hadn’t had a good scrubbing in forever.

Yes, good. Scrub the sink.

The citrus eucalyptus spray filled the room as she doused every inch of the sink and counter with the cleaner. Jade took out a fresh scrubber, the rough edges scratching against her skin. She pushed hard, scouring the cracks, the edges, and the grout until beads of sweat crept up her forehead.

Maybe Amanda could talk. But the second Jade picked up her phone, she set it back down. The last thing she needed to do was drag an employee into an HR-type situation. Although Amanda had long ago proved that she was the most trustworthy of all the staff, news like this could spread power-blow-dryer fast in a salon.

Think, think! Jade grabbed her keys, then set them back down. She’d only had one glass of wine but still hated driving with anything in her system. So, she did what any thirty-five-year-old, responsible, professional business owner would do.

She sent Shayna a text.

Tomorrow, come to work for a meeting at 9 before your shift.

She poured yet another glass of wine, an absolute rarity for herself, and stormed back to the bedroom.

Anxiety-filled dreams finally woke her at 6 a.m. The heavy comforter clung hot and sweaty against her skin. She wished she had Lucy sleeping next to her, although that happened less frequently than she hoped as they both realised they were creatures of habit and enjoyed the familiarity of their own beds. Besides, Lucy had a huge body pillow for some sciatic issues she’d developed with the pregnancy, and it got in the way.

Jade dragged her exhausted body to the kitchen and poured herself a coffee, but the acidic taste curdled her stomach.

A long shower, some dry peanut butter toast, and another cup of coffee did little to settle her stomach. She arrived at the salon at eight, where she stared at the blurred numbers from the quarterly reviews for half an hour. Backstock sorting was the next best option, and she flipped all the dye boxes right-side up, making sure to properly stock the colours and levels.

The door creaked open. Shayna stomped the snow off her boots and unravelled her hot-pink cable-knit scarf. Jade crossed her arms, begging if a god existed that Shayna would take one look at her, admit what she did, offer to pay back what she took, and quit. All the prep and mental rehearsals Jade had done the previous night bolted and her mind blanked.

Stay strong. Be strong. Do not waver.

‘Hey, what’s going on? Did the shipments get lost again?’ Shayna’s smile dropped at Jade’s face. ‘Dude. What’s wrong?’

‘I just, you have, I saw …’ Jade strummed her fingers against her biceps and exhaled a hefty breath. ‘I know what you’ve been doing here. After hours.’

Shayna opened her deep-plum lipsticked mouth, then closed it. ‘I don’t know what you—’

‘Please don’t. Please.’ Jade’s voice cracked and she hated, hated, that she couldn’t be one of those people who landed difficult conversation with confidence. ‘I’m really struggling with this and you’re making it worse.’ If she heard one more lie, she was pretty sure she’d break something in this small space. ‘You know. I know. Do I really need to spell it out?’

Shayna was unusually quiet.