As he opened his own soda, I looked at him and took stock of the person I would be employed by for the foreseeable future. Old was not the adjective I would have used to describe him at all, though he was clearly older than me. He was tall and built, and I suspected his work clothes hid a great body. His dark brown hair clearly enjoyed trying to get into his deep brown eyes, and there was something about his chiseled cheekbones that made him look rugged.
Whatever I'd thought yesterday, I'd been wrong. I had a hot boss. He had a bit of a nerdy vibe to him, but it was a sexy, smart kind of nerdy that I found intriguing. I’d had my fill of bad boys and jocks. Nerdy was appealing now.
As soon these thoughts entered my head, I blushed and felt the need to mentally chastise myself. The man, good looking as he may have been, was my boss and I couldn’t go about having the hots for my boss. It was unprofessional and impossible to boot. A wealthy boss falling for his young secretary? It was so clichéd, and I reminded myself to keep it together.
Even if shades of what Maddie experienced began to make me wonder if I'd ever have that with Mark.
Focus, Emma. This job is to make you money. That's it.
I repeated that a few times as he talked about something involving the building and the history of it.
"So, be here at nine every morning and be available until five. I’ll probably send you home early some days if it's slow and there are no meetings to deal with. Should I need something extra that I think you can handle, I may come to you. I had you come in a little early today so that I could familiarize you with some of the things you'll be doing."
I looked around for his partner in the business but saw no one. "Mr. Tanchen, you mentioned a we? Will I be working for someone else as well?" I asked, hoping my sly way of trying to find out if he was referring to a wife or not wouldn't come off as too obvious.
He nodded, and as he wrote something down on a white board on the wall, said, "Sort of. I have a business partner who is more of the work away from the office type. Josh stops in here and there, but if someone needs to make an appointment with him, they'll go through you the same as they would for me. He's a good guy. You'll like him. If you ever see him, that is. The guy is usually in Hawaii working with some financiers there. I know that's code for hanging out with beautiful women, but the man sure can network, so I don't give a damn."
I smiled and nodded as he looked at a message that came in on his phone and I looked around the place a little more. It was a genuinely masculine space, with no real art or color to speak of. The floors were hardwood, and everything else was either black or white. It wasn't the scheme I would have chosen as I thought about my apartment bursting with color, but it did suit the needs of an office space.
Mr. Tanchen looked up and must have caught me looking around as he said, "We just bought the place a few months ago and finished renovating it to be more like an office I can work at home from. I hate commuting into a huge building filled with people I don’t know."
"It must be such a nice advantage to be able to wake up and just go straight to work, Mr. Tanchen."
"It’s one of the nicer perks, yes," he said, gesturing for me to follow him into my little office area. "Come this way, and we'll go over some of the finer points of the job."
Chapter Two
Mark
I'd wokenup with a splitting headache that morning, but it had been tempered the moment I opened the door and found my new secretary waiting for me. DeVille had sent her paperwork over ahead of time and assured me Emma was the right person for the job. His exact words were that she'd be perfect and was sure I'd think so too, even though I'd specifically asked for someone older. I didn't have the patience or interest in taking the time to teach someone a job I didn't want to do myself, so seeing someone so young at my door made me question this whole thing with DeVille Staffing.
Then again, maybe I could afford a few days to try Emma out.
When I opened the door and saw the petite brunette with the big blue eyes standing on my front porch before me, I was stunned by just how attractive she was. For a moment, I forgot that I'd made a point of requesting the secretary be in her forties.
But as we spoke, I reminded myself that I was running a business and I didn’t intend to run it into the ground by getting preoccupied with the cute girl setting my appointments. Sure those stunning blue eyes and pouty lips were going to be a slight distraction, but I needed to keep my head in the game. I’d spent years focusing on getting my tech company off the ground, and I'd finally gotten to the point of success. I didn't have time for many women along the way, at least not anything more than one night with one, but that was something I could focus on when I reached my thirties.
Work was the name of the game, and I was winning that game.
I’d ordered a nice desk and chair for our new secretary, and as she took her seat, I stood next to her and logged onto the computer. "They haven't been delivered yet, but I do have some filing cabinets and more office furniture coming, so it won't be this sparse in here. Feel free to add your little touches as long as they're appropriate. Just no Red Sox stuff. We're diehard Yankees in this company," I said at an attempt at a joke.
She turned and made a face like she just sucked on a lemon before replying, "I wouldn't think of touching something Red Sox. I was born and raised a Yankees girl, even though we were from Minnesota. Anything else, even anything Twins related, would be the highest form of heresy."
I smiled but reminded myself to focus, no matter how cute she looked and how much I liked that we had something in common. I went over the programs she'd be using, none of which were too complicated, and she took to everything quickly. She appeared to have a knack for the work she'd have to do from the questions she asked, and she was personable too. I liked that. I'd thought Josh was a little crazy when he agreed with Louis DeVille about finding us a secretary that night at the bar, but she quickly proved me wrong.
"Did you go to school for computers?" I asked, noting that she had a natural aptitude for computers and the programs I showed her. I figured maybe she was involved in some kind of lower level computer science. That would have been an interesting person for DeVille to send.
Emma frowned. "Not yet. I want to, though, for psychology," she answered quietly as she typed the required personal information into the document I'd setup for her.
I was surprised. I hadn't taken her for someone who wanted to be a psychologist. When I was in college, all the psych majors had been as boring as hell. I hadn’t spent much time talking to them, but every time they were around, they wanted to psychoanalyze everyone and acted far superior to those of us who worked with machines like computers. I didn't know why, but I hoped Emma wasn't like that.
Not wanting to make judgments too soon, I nodded. "I never took to the psych stuff myself. You want to be a therapist?"
"Sort of. My uncle joined the military right after September eleventh and came back with some severe PTSD. I want to help people like that. We send soldiers over to these places and then don’t have people here to help them mentally when they come home. I consider it a bit of a calling really."
Her answer surprised me again. She didn't sound like those psychoanalytical pains in the asses from school. "Want to help the troops. That's noble of you. I respect that."
I didn’t often understand the dumb career choices people made. Christ, every other student when I graduated seemed to be a business major. Emma's answer impressed me, though.