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“I suppose I should as well.”
Hunter stood quickly, trying to push in his chair; it bumped against mine, which whacked into my leg, and I stumbled, cursing my decision to wear heels to dinner—
Hunter caught me.
“Are you all right?”
His voice was so deep, and it rumbled through me—I could feel his chest rising and falling with each breath, I could feel his heartbeat through his skin—he smelled like bourbon and cedar and oh, his hands were so strong and warm—
His eyes, gazing down at me in concern, his eyes were like molten gold—
“I’m fine,” I whispered, breathless.
And then the moment passed. Hunter released my arm, stepped away. “Good.”
I took a step backward too. I seemed like the only thing to do. “Well, I’ll be going.”
And yet I didn’t move.
“So will I.” Hunter turned, and then turned back. For a second, my heart filled with ridiculous hope.
“Thank you,” he said. “For all that you do.”
“We soulless minions aren’t so bad after all, eh?” I tried to joke.
But his smile was perfunctory and far away, and he was unreachable once more as he turned and walked away from me.
SEVEN
I was hitting a brick wall. No. A brick wall was practically a feather pillow compared to the wall that I was hitting. This was a marble wall, no, a diamond wall, hell, this was a wall made of some super hard experimental carbon fiber. And I was running into it again and again.
I knew the social responsibility angle was the way to go, but I just couldn’t make the copy sing. I had to make the customers fall in love with the company, not bog them down in a history lesson.
Knox has a long proud history of—
No, no, it was crap, it was all crap, everything I had ever written was crap.
I couldn’t let Hunter down like this.
Hey, bro, you hear about Knox? They’re pretty dope, ‘cause—
Even worse. Fucking terrible. I sounded like a ‘Don’t Do Drugs’ video written by a fifty-year-old man.
Maybe statistics would save me.
Compared to liquor companies of a comparable size, Knox has donated a quantitatively larger percentage to charities and nonprofits—
“Dammit!” I threw my pencil against the library wall and glared at the book. If it wasn’t so old that it was worth more than my entire apartment, it would’ve been getting the same treatment.
I needed a preliminary campaign by the end of the week, and I was going around in circles. Knowing how high the stakes were for Hunter wasn’t helping. There was so much riding on this for both of us.
But apparently the universe thought I needed a reminder of that, because just then my phone rang. It was my boss.
“Just calling to check in,” he said breezily. I could hear seagulls in the background. Was he calling me from his yacht? He was definitely calling me from his yacht. “How’s it going?”
“Great! Everything’s falling into place; I’m on the right track.” It wasn’t really a lie, was it? It was just a little…chronologically misplaced. I’d totally be on the right track by the end of the day, and what my boss didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.
“Wonderful,” he said. There was a little slurping sound. Probably downing champagne. “Do you need any help? This is your first big rodeo after all.”
“Nope, I’m good!”
“Are you sure? Harry Blackstone and his boys just wrapped up a beaut of a project for Mammoth Tire Company, under time, under budget, and the numbers we got coming in—wow! Those guys are definitely looking at some big Christmas bonuses. I could fly them down, have them oversee your thing, give you a few pointers.”
“No, I’m fine!” I tried not to sound desperate, but the pitch of my voice sounded like it had risen at least an octave.
“Uh-huh.” I couldn’t tell if he was buying it, but his voice took on a warning tone. “I went out on a limb for you on this one, Allison. Lotta guys on the board didn’t think you were ready. Don’t be ashamed to ask for help if you need it.”
“I will!”
“Well, all right. Long as you don’t let us down.”
“I won’t, I promise!”
After a few meaningless pleasantries that left my memory as soon as we made them, I ended the call and tried to return to work. But suddenly, all my notes might as well have been written in Sanskrit.
So much was riding on all this…what if I failed?
I looked out the window, at the beautiful expanse of green and gold and blue.
Maybe a walk would clear my head.
#
“Ally!”
Hadn’t even made it to the front door of the manor house when I heard Martha calling my name. I caught up to where she was leaning across a car in the driveway and frowned, uncertain for a second why she looked strange to me before the answer came to my wearied mind.
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