He scrubbed his hand over his jaw; the short, stiff hair scratched his palm with each stroke. “Yes, everything’s fine.” He took his seat across from her. “Why do you ask?”
She shifted in her seat, and Drew sat rigid in his. “You beat me to the office, which hasn’t happened in a while, and from what I can tell, you haven’t had your morning coffee yet. And excuse me for this, but you look exhausted.”
Over the past couple of days, Drew did what Lacey had asked and backed off. He was going out of his mind, not knowing what conclusions she was coming to on her own. Drew did send a text reaffirming that when she was ready to talk, she should call him.
Consequently, everything began to grate on Drew’s nerves. He even snapped at the poor intern who was ten minutes late this morning. Normally, his office was a place of solace, somewhere he knew would bring him the utmost satisfaction. But in the past days, it had become the complete opposite.
It didn’t help that each night, as he laid his head down and tried to sleep, he thought of her. When he closed his eyes, he remembered what her skin smelled like, how it felt against his lips. Whenever he stretched out his arm, all he could think was that he should be wrapping it around Lacey’s warm body… and every time it landed on his cold bedsheet.
Drew expelled a long breath. “I haven’t been sleeping well. Andthe reason I haven’t had coffee is because the coffeehouse isn’t open before five a.m., which is when I got here, and I’ve yet to figure out the new futuristic coffee maker someone thought should be in the break room. What happened to just putting water into the reservoir, spooning coffee in the filter, and pushing brew?”
Anita let out a small laugh before clearing her throat at Drew’s unamused expression. She flipped open the cover on her tablet. “On the bright side, your day isn’t horrible, which is a good thing… clearly.” Drew quirked a brow. “Sorry.” She shrugged. “Anyway, all of your meetings are on-site today and should be completed by four. I’ve emailed you the agenda for the first two.” Drew nodded. “I’ll be sure to order you lunch, since you probably won’t have time to go out. Your usual?”
“Yes, please and thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Can I offer some unsolicited advice?”
“If I say no, will you offer it anyway?”
“Probably.” Anita smiled. Drew waved his hand, giving her the go-ahead. “If this has to do with a woman, which I’m assuming it does, since I know everything here at work is going well, may I suggest sending flowers? I have the number of a couple local florists and a national one. Whichever you prefer.”
He didn’t even know if Lacey liked flowers. “Thank you, Anita.”
“My pleasure. I’ll email the numbers to you. Is there anything else I can do?”
“No.”
With a nod, Anita headed toward the door.
Drew needed to get out of his funk. If he could just explain everything to Lacey.
After a quick phone call to a florist on Anita’s list, and then one to a business associate, he began to put a plan in place that he hoped would make everything better.
He called his assistant, and she answered on one ring with an overly chipper tone. “Yes, boss?”
“Anita, can you please do me a favor? There’s an intern who works here; I think his name is John. He’s been in the copy roommost of the week.”
“His name is Shawn. What about him?”
“Right, Shawn. I sort of lost my cool with him this morning. Can you please buy him lunch today as well? Anything he wants—just expense it to my account.”
Anita laughed. “Wow, taking out your frustrations on a lowly intern. Tsk, tsk, Mr. Mitchell.”
“Anita…” Drew said in his stern boss voice.
“Yes, sir. I’ll take care of it. Oh, I printed out detailed how-to instructions and posted them next to the convoluted coffee maker.” Anita giggled as Drew ended the call.
All in all, Anita wasn’t half-bad.
“So what happened, exactly?” Drew had just called Ethan to try to get some clarity.
“Pete had called to discuss fraternity business,” Drew said. “But then he went on to tell me about how his new account exec was this spitfire who ambushed him in his office, and he was completely impressed by her. At the time, I had an inkling of who he might be referring to, but then he said her name was Lacey Winters.”
“No kidding. What are the odds?” Ethan said.
“The odds were high because I knew she had a pitch meeting with him. Back on the island, when I told her Pete and I were friends, she made me promise not to say anything to him. Which I didn’t. Except when Pete added that he thought Lacey was feisty and gorgeous, I jumped in and said she was taken… by me.”
“Okay, I’m still not seeing the problem…” Ethan paused. “Oh… Oh! She thinks she got the job because of you.”