Tight-jawed and tense, I make my way down the hall toward the conference room as quickly as possible, bumping carelessly into a woman as she’s stepping out of the break room.
“Ow,” she umphs, groaning as I step on her toes.
Shit.
Instantly, I grab her by the waist to keep her from falling. “I’m sorry. Are you okay?”
She flips her hair up and out of her face, a smile prepped and ready to forgive me, when our eyes meet.
“You,” she growls.
And at the exact same time, I spit “You” through a clenched jaw.
It’s her. The woman from the gym. The smartass in the Metallica T-shirt with the all-consuming hate for my father’s prize hotel. I’ve been thinking about the flippant way she talked about everything my family’s business is built on ever since she sauntered out of the fitness center, and seemingly, it hasn’t done anything to diminish how annoyed she makes me.
Not to mention, she didn’t even wipe down the equipment she was pretending to use, and I had to spend the last twenty minutes of my workout inhaling her sweet fucking perfume.
I mean, it was a good sweet. A soft and seductive kind of sweet.
But fuck, she should’ve stuck to gym etiquette.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Once again, our timing and our words are completely in sync.
“I asked you first,” she argues snottily and settles her red-painted fingers into the perfect crook of her skirt-covered hip.
I snort. “I think not.”
Her impressive blue eyes turn cold, and my blood pressure skyrockets. Today of all days—the beginning of the next phase of my career—I have to run into her again. Talk about the last thing I fucking need.
“What are you doing here?” I demand. “At my company.”
“Your company?” she shrieks, her wavy brown locks swaying with the agitated forward motion of her upper body. “I work here.”
My heart pumps twice instead of once, and my vision tunnels around her words. Her awful fucking words. “You…you work here?”
“Oh good,” my father says, appearing out of nowhere. Apparently, the strength of my surprise and disdain at the sight of the rude woman from the gym was enough to completely block out the action of him walking down the hall toward us. “I was hoping I’d get a chance to introduce you two before you meet the rest of the team.”
His smile is as radiant as the sun, and sweat drips appropriately down my back.
“Greer, this is my son, Trent. And, Trent, this is Greer Hudson. She is going to be heading up the design in New Orleans.”
Heading up the design in New Orleans? At my hotel?
You have got to be kidding me.
“Trent,” she sneers.
“Greer,” I snarl, memorizing the name that goes with my enemy’s face.
It’s a showdown worthy of any old Western, and I can practically hear the clank of our spurs as we take our positions opposite each other.
High noon and the fastest draw, winner take all.
Oh man, if only office politics were that simple.
Reluctantly, knowing my dad is watching, I stick out a hand for her to shake. She takes it roughly, digging a fingernail into the back of it. I’m almost certain her attempt at skin mutilation is on purpose.
My father is oblivious to our silent showdown. “It’s safe to say the two of you are going to be working very closely together over the next year, so the sooner you can get to know each other, the better.”
Greer’s face is a mirror of what I imagine my own looks like—sheer horror.
When it comes to a hotel, there’s no more important relationship than the one between the project head and the designer. Together, those two roles on the team are building an experience that is supposed to translate to everyone who steps inside. Most of all, they need to be able to work together.
Instantly, the logistics of my new reality become crystal clear.
Me and this woman. Working together. Side by side. For nearly a year.
This is so fucked.
“Come on,” my dad says, somehow unscathed by the singe of our eye lasers. “Let’s meet the rest of the team.”
Greer nods and smiles, which is more than I can say for myself. I’m still locked in a nightmare and struggling to wake up, and my body acts accordingly.
Either that, or I’m having a small stroke.
My dad, of course, notes the lag and files it away as yet another mark against me.
“Jesus, Trent. Did you not sleep last night or something? Look alive.”
I jolt into action, but not before I notice Greer’s smirk. My dad’s castigation of me amuses her.
Something inside me ignites and starts running at high idle.
She might think she’s ready, but she has no idea what she’s getting into with me—how much animosity I’m built to withstand when it comes to working at Turner Properties.
For the first time ever, my father’s criticism of me may serve a greater purpose.