21
PARKER
Jealousy coursed hot and heavy through my veins. One of the most basic and yet uncontrollable human responses, it ate me up from the inside out. Plain and simple. I couldn’t even deny it.
Some guy kept flirting with Isabella and she was basically flirting back, smiling and leaning into him, even setting a coffee date for after the pitch. It was bullshit.
And unexpected, since it was coming from Ms. Strict Professionalism herself.Who does that?
Neither of them behaved like we were about to sit down for a meeting to discuss a possible billion-dollar acquisition. As soon as we’d walked into the room, while everyone else was still milling around and waiting to get started, he’d zeroed in on her.
He wasn’t even subtle about the fact that he was checking her out, openly ogling her for everyone to see while he held on to her hand for much longer than was appropriate. I’d never understood assholes like him.
While I happened to agree that she was both beautiful and smart, who came right out and said shit like that in an environment like this one? I sure as shit wasn’t the poster boy for professionalism, but he was a walking advertisement for sexual harassment.
It was appalling that he’d treat her that way, undressing her with his eyes in front of the dozen or so other men in the room and coming on to her in the same fucking minute that he met her. Slimy, disrespectful assholes like him were a blight on the rest of us, but instead of calling him out on it, she’d fucking smiled at him. She had laughed and let him touch her hand like she wouldn’t have been perfectly within her rights to yank it away.
Despite my disgust about the whole situation, I took a deep breath and launched into the pretty words she’d hammered into my head. I even almost managed to ignore it when he slid his chair closer to hers and bent his head to scribble something on the notepad she had open in front of her on the table.
Almost.
When she glanced down at the note, smiled, and wrote something in reply, I saw red. Obviously, she was free to flirt with whoever the fuck she wanted, but she didn’t have to do it in front of me and she definitely didn’t have to do it when I was in the middle of delivering a pitch that—as she kept fucking pointing out—could change both our lives.
I stumbled over my words and she looked up, suddenly fucking interested again now that she could flash me an unspoken warning with the soft arch of her brow. I could practically hear her snapping at me in my head.
Focus, Parker. Just give it to them straight.
I was trying to do just that, but it was difficult when the asshole next to her wasn’t paying any attention to me and was grinning at whatever she’d written on that fucking notepad instead. Before I could stop myself, I forgot all about her pretty words and winged it, making a complete fool of myself if the confused frowns on people’s faces were anything to go by.
One of the men followed my gaze, and when his landed on John and Isabella, he rolled his eyes and very obviously zoned out right after. When I realized I’d lost him, the little that had been left of my concentration flew out the window and crashed to the ground nearly fifty stories below.
The meeting ended awkwardly, with silence following my presentation and glances being exchanged until a gray-haired dude put me out of my misery.
“Thank you for coming in today, Mr. Holmes,” he said and cleared his throat before arranging his features into a look that said it all. “Unfortunately, we’re not interested in the acquisition ofParker’s Get Fitat this time.”
Mother-fucking-fucker.Still, I picked myself up and dusted myself off, nodding and sending him a tight smile. “I understand. Thank you for your time.”
Slowly but surely, the men who had been seated around the table said their goodbyes and stood up, filtering out of the room. John hung back with Isabella, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying over the low murmur of the others talking while they made their way out.
Finally, Isabella shook her head and John sauntered away with his hands in his pockets and an almost constipated expression on his face. Once he was gone, the efficient receptionist appeared in the doorway again and escorted us back to the elevator.
As soon as we were alone, she turned to me and the mask of patience she’d been wearing since the end of the meeting melted away. There was a violent storm raging behind her eyes and her finger jabbed the air while she spoke.
“What the hell happened to you in there?” she seethed quietly, her gaze darting around to make sure no one was approaching us while we waited. “That was a disaster. You came off as an irate brat having a tantrum about how there’s no one better than him and yet nobody is giving him the attention he deserves.”
“You’re telling me off?” I scoffed, staring at her in complete disbelief. “If you want to talk about how anyone was acting in there, let’s start with you. I’m surprised you even have an opinion on how it went since you were too busy flirting to hear a word that I said.”
“That’s ridiculous,” she snapped. “You’re acting like a child. Honestly.”
The elevator arrived and we climbed on. Both of us were tense as we spun forward to face the closing doors. Two more people joined us in the car when it stopped only one floor down, and then more people climbed on at every stop until we were crammed in like sardines in a tin.
Isabella didn’t even look at me all the way down to the lobby, standing with her arms folded tightly over her chest, her jaw grinding, and her deadly gaze piercing the back of the woman in front of her. The crowd moved with us as we signed out at security and crossed the lobby, only dispersing once we hit the street.
“I’m acting like a child?” I picked up where we left off, rolling my eyes at her while we waited on the sidewalk for the car I’d hired to come around. “You’re the one who thought it was appropriate to flirt your way through a high-level meeting. Congratulations on being the biggest fucking hypocrite I’ve ever met.”
“Oh, please.” She scoffed. “You have no idea what was going on in there. Careful, Parker, your inexperience in the corporate world is showing. Maybe you’re not ready after all.”
“How am I not ready?” My breaths were coming hard and fast. My eyes were as wide as they could go as I stared at her. “I’m not blind. I know exactly what I saw back there, and unfortunately, it didn’t have anything to do with the corporate world. It looked more like speed-dating to me.”