“Are you going to do something about this phone ringing? Maybe put it on silent while you’re at work.” Grant walks over, handing me the phone.
“I’m sorry.” I rush to hit the accept button on the call. “I can’t talk, I’m at work,” I tell MJ. My face heats. I’m not sure if it’s because of the almost kiss or doing something I’m not supposed to be doing at work. I guess kissing the boss is doing something you’re not supposed to.
“Is he an asshole?” she responds back. All the blood drains from my face when I realize I must have hit speaker when I picked up the call.
My eyes fly to Maddox, who laughs. “Not to her,” he answers. “And she can have her phone at work.” He shoots Grant a look. He doesn’t look mad but it does look like they can share a conversation with a glance like MJ and I can do.
“She can do whatever she likes.” His eyes comes back to mine. My heart gives a flutter. Maddox once again making everything better for me.
“No, he’s not an asshole,” I tell MJ, not admitting that I might be in love with him.
6
Maddox
It isn’t exactly a declaration of love, but it’s close. I shoo Grant out of the office and pick up the welcome kit I had Human Resources prepare for Luna. She tucks her phone away as I take a seat beside her. It’s some kind of torture not being able to haul her into my lap for a proper kiss. I shouldn’t have given in to temptation and brushed our lips together, but she was so close and her lips were so kissable that only a monk would’ve been able to resist. Maybe not even a monk.
Now that I’m sitting next to her, it’s nearly impossible to keep my hands to myself. Her black skirt is ill-fitting and wrinkled, as if she dug it out of the bottom of her closet where she’d tossed it after the last time she wore it some six years or so ago. I add “shopping” to my list of items to do with her. It’s not that I particularly care what she wears because even in the black skirt and simple white cotton button-down with the coffee stain near her right collar, she’s still the hottest, most fuckable angel I’ve ever laid eyes on. Still, I’m forced to attend many charitable functions and industry events and I don’t want her to feel uncomfortable.
“Here’s your badge.” I hand her a small acrylic rectangle attached to a gold chain lanyard. The HR manager really came through. The gold is a nice touch. My darling girl doesn’t need cheap nylon hanging around her neck. “Standard issue,” I add when she hesitates to put it on.
“Your assistant—”
“Grant,” I supply.
“Right. Grant wore his with some kind of braided thing.”
“It’s hemp,” I lie. “Grant is very eco-conscious. All of his clothes are made out of natural fibers and dyed with berries.”
“Really?” She twists her head to look in the direction of the outward office, only to be stymied by the solid walnut walls. “I wouldn’t have guessed that about him. That’s pretty cool, but I bet expensive, huh?”
Great. Do I have to start wearing eco-conscious clothes? Do suits like that even exist? Are they dyed with squid ink? Poor Grant’s list is growing every second I’m sitting next to my future wife. But that’s what happens when people come into your life. Things change and in this case, for the better.
“Very. I take it that environmental responsibility is important to you?” I’ll have to have the whole house redone in natural wood, glass and stone. That Lucite table my mother bought me for Christmas will have to go.
“Sure. I recycle. Doesn’t everybody? That’s the least we can do. I’d do more, but it’s hard to find clothes and stuff that don’t cost a whole house. You probably don’t know what I mean.” She wrinkles her nose. “Anyway, forget it. It’s not important.”
I grab her hand and squeeze it. “What’s important to you is important to me.”
“It is?” She appears taken aback.
I remind myself that Luna is here because she came to spy on me, not because she’s ready to run off to Vegas to get married. Sad to say, but it’s true. I’ll give her time to adjust. She has to plan the wedding, after all, and that can’t be accomplished overnight.
“Of course. I want you to stay in this job for a long time.”
“I probably should be more environmentally conscious but other than recycling, I don’t do much.”
“We can improve together,” I suggest. “Any ideas you have on how to make anything better, including myself, I want to hear.”
“Ah, I don’t think I’m qualified for that,” she says. “In fact, I don’t think I’m qualified to do any of this stuff. I thought you’d want me to answer phones. Maybe do some filing, not”—she waves a pretty hand in the air—”real stuff.”