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Goldie

Iliked to think I was a reasonable person. When someone bumped into me, I was never angry, often apologizing even if it wasn’t my fault. Someone stole my parking spot? Totally fine—I brush it off and move on with my day.

But Lexington fucking Bosede made me entirely unreasonable. He was arrogant, egotistical, and hadn’t taken a single thing seriously in his life. He was infuriating.

He was also late. I shouldn’t have been surprised. He was always late.

Lexington acted as if he were the only person on this planet.

For nearly five years, I had been running Fibonacci Files, and we were soaring. The academic journal, dedicated to sharing the truth behind popular true crime stories and conspiracies, had more subscribers than ever before. As manager and editor, I was fending off countless calls and emails, all trying to get their very own piece of our company. We were even working on moving into the podcast world.

Our two main writers, Jackie and Oliver, were household names. Oliver had an ability to get the truth from anyone; his disarming smile and understanding nature took down most people’s natural defenses. If he wasn’t able to do it, I just had to send in Jackie. She was a force of nature disguised as a woman with kind brown eyes and a mess of blonde hair. She was also a bit crazy cat-obsessed, but if her husband didn’t care, why would I? The two of them were behind all of our major stories as of late. They were also two of my closest friends, and I barely had to step in to manage them.

Our newest writer, however, was too much to handle most days. Lexington was good at what he did, but he didn’t put the care into his work that it deserved. Much like his older brother Oliver—who was the entire reason Lexington even had a job here—he was disarming. But where Oliver was kind, Lexington was charming; where Oliver was patient, Lexington was playful. Most people fell for his charm easily, handing over their secrets without question.

Most people… me being the exception. I saw past the smooth words and shining smile. I saw him for what he really was.

Obnoxious. Annoying. Handsome as shit. The reason for most of my headaches.

The headache blossoming now was because, once again, he was late. He was supposed to turn in his article last night, but he was out of the office before I could demand it and wasn’t in yet despite the day starting two hours ago. My entire schedule was running behind because I didn’t have his article to edit and format. My main job as editor was ensuring the journal was ready for publication each month, but he was pushing deadlines more and more often.

Lexington was slowly making me lose my mind.

“Goldie,” Jackie called as she sauntered into my office, her gaze focused on a stack of case files I had handed to her this morning when she showed up. On time, I might add, unlike some people.

God, I was beating a dead horse at this point, but I couldn’t move on from his carelessness.

Before I took over as manager, I assigned every case to the writers. In the years since, I usually gave them a handful to pick through. While I was damn good at my job, I wasn’t a writer. I had the tech skills of a god and could find any piece of evidence they needed. Track down a cult? Done. Don’t know who your parents are? Found them. But pick out the stories that needed to be told? I was never any good at that.

“I’m going to take the case about the serial killings in Massachusetts, and Oliver claimed the case on the UFO sightings here in Oregon,” Jackie explained. I shouldn’t have been surprised she had already spoken to Oliver. While the two were my friends, they were each other's in-laws, Oliver having married Jackie’s sister. “His youngest has one of those Little League baseball tournaments he doesn’t want to miss.”

When people heard that we wrote about UFOs, ghost sightings, serial killers, cults, and any other sensationalized story, they assumed we were a tabloid or a joke of a journal. In fact, our mission statement was the opposite. We didn’t research these cases to bring fame to ourselves, but instead to find and share the truth. So many stories were convoluted in the media for the sole purpose of gaining more clicks. The creators didn’t care that they were lying; they cared about getting more views than anyone else. At Fibonacci Files, we only cared about the facts. It’s why so many trusted us as their source of truth.

Jackie handed me the remaining file in the pile, the only potential case not picked. “That leaves the weird notes going around that small town nearby. How’d you even find that one?”

The Watcher.

Dozens of notes had been mailed to various businesses and residences in a local small town, Cherrytree Hills. The details of the notes hadn’t been released, but from what I could tell, they had been showing up to random people and businesses for nearly twenty years.

It was the case I was the most intrigued by and the one I was the most invested in. I kept my eye on the town over the years, hoping for new information, maybe some answers. It was obvious the notes weren’t threatening in nature, as there wasn’t a police presence surrounding them, but I was still curious.

Jackie snapped in front of me, pulling my focus back to her. “You good?”

I sank into my office chair. “I was secretly hoping you would take this one on.”

She huffed a laugh. “I’ve dealt with enough stalkerish behavior and notes in my old cases. It’s time we pass it on to a newbie. Lex will do well.”

‘Lex’ would do well if he could show up on time, I thought to myself.

“He isn’t even here yet, his last article hasn’t been turned in for editing, and he doesn’t give these cases the care they deserve,” I complained. It was bordering on whining, but I didn’t care enough to stop. My feelings for Lexington were obvious to everyone. “He doesn’t know the first thing about researching a case, and this one will be heavy on the investigation and research. It’s not mainstream yet, so all of our information will have to come from the town itself and cooperation with their sheriff’s department. It’s going to be intensive, in a way he hasn’t experienced yet.”

”Then show him.”

I glared at Jackie. She had been trying to convince me to shadow Lexington on one of his cases, from start to finish. Apparently, the owner of Fibonacci Files, Fai, had done it with her when she first started, and it made a world of a difference in her skills. The article she wrote during that period was her first to be nationally recognized. I had even asked Fai about it myself—he was a father figure and mentor to me—and hoped he would agree that it would be a useless endeavor to try and do the same with Lexington.

He thought it was a great idea. Traitor.

Jackie had been trying—and failing—for years now to get Lexington on my good side, but that was impossible at this point. My mind was made up on him shortly after we first met, and it would take a lot more than hopeful words to fix his mistakes.