All kinds of new age shit about ergonomic chairs and workplace feelings.
Ariel is standing next to a thicker, red-faced man who looks like he had a long night of drinking. The way he leans into her personal space instantly grates on my nerves for some reason.
Watching for a moment, I can see how his brain must be processing her attractiveness, thinking of the ways he would use her in bed. Hah, fat chance of that. She may be a total fucking bombshell of a woman, and has a brain to match my own, but the wedding band on her left finger, and the fact that she’s as gay as I am straight, means he has not even a snowball’s chance in hell of that happening.
Still it fucking irks me. Especially with my shit fucking morning. No one fucks and annoys my damn people.
“Ariel,” I say to get her attention, then frown at the red-faced, middle-aged asshole. “How are the personnel files coming this morning?”
The man immediately takes a step away from her as if he’s some little fucking child caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Yeah, he had shitty intentions on my assistant.
Fucking loser.
“Good, Mr. Ericsson,” she answers with a smile at me.
Normally she calls me Bryce, but this dickhead must be really upsetting her if she feels the need to make sure he knows who I am.
“Good,” I say, before turning to the man and extending my hand out. “Bryce Ericsson, and you are?”
He stares at my hand for a moment before shoving his into my own. It’s as cold and clammy as can be. Fucking disgusting. His limp handshake tells me all I need to know about the kind of man he is.
It makes my stomach churn when people give me limp-fish handshakes.
“Chad Pennington,” he says with a grimace as I clench his fist once.
“Good to meet you,” I say as I turn away from him.
I don’t bother with another thought of him. Whoever the fuck he is, he can easily be replaced within the hour.
“Ariel, where do you have us set up?” I ask as I look around the place once more.
There are several offices, cubicles, and a couple of large glass conference rooms. No surprises here in setup, just like every other company I’ve taken over.
“This way,” she grins at me as she leads us away from Chad.
I feel his beady eyes staring at my back.
She breathes out an angry huff once we’re situated in a large office that’s mostly empty except for a desk and a couple of chairs.
“What’s wrong, Airy?” I ask her.
She’s one of my best friends and I know when she needs to vent.
“That fucking slimeball has been breathing down my neck for the last three days. Every time I sit in the open somewhere, he’s tries to stand right over my shoulder to get a look down my blouse.”
“So, he’s being the typical perverted asshole,” I say with annoyance, not for her but for him.
She deals with this shit all too fucking often.
The last time we had an issue like this was because some assclown decided that just because she’s a blonde bombshell, she must be asking for it. It felt good to ruin the man’s reputation so irreparably that he had a hard time getting a job at the local fast food joints.
“What’s his position?”
“Senior marketing manager. He’s got close ties to the president of the company, but when we finalize all the paperwork, he won’t be missed, in my opinion.”
“Good, he does anything else, let me know. I wouldn’t mind firing him right now,” I say as I set down my briefcase.
Popping open the case, I pull out a couple of files to run through before the morning conference.
“Bad mood?” she asks as she sits down across from me.
“Yes. Very.”
And I’m not lying right now. I would fire the whole damn place if I could just get on with my day and search for Zoe.
“Anything I can do to help?”
“Not unless you have a bottle of rum somewhere.”
“Ha!” She laughs, shaking her head, “You wouldn’t dare.”
She’s right, I don’t drink and fire.
“Alright, get me caught up on the business and what’s going on. Who are we firing today?” I ask as I flip open my first file.
Ariel and I have run over our time, it seems. As we walk out of my office, the place looks like a ghost town. There’s a low, steady murmur coming from a conference room though, and I figure that’s where we need to head.
Walking towards the conference room, we’re about halfway past the long glass window, looking into it, when I see something that makes me stop in my tracks.
My heart stops dead for a moment.
There, sitting across from the window, is Zoe. She’s looking to her side, talking to another coworker. And she looks so beautiful that it brings a sharp pain to my chest.