It was all planned. The table is booked. We’re right on time. But suddenly, I have a pressing need to use the bathroom.
“Can we call in at the office first, Dad? Can you let them know?” I ask.
He gives me an okay. He’s never one to turn down a visit to the headquarters of the business he built. Dad’s technically retired now, but he likes to know what’s going on. Much to Mason’s delight in particular. The two of them are close, but it presses my brother’s buttons when Dad calls in unannounced and tells him how to do his job. I can’t resist a grin at the thought. That’s an added bonus.
Dad messages them to let them know, then tells me I need to get a phone. It seems insane for a man of my age not to have one, I know, but so far I’ve resisted. I don’t like the idea of being plugged into the Matrix 24/7. Besides, it drives them all insane. They may think I’m a pacifist Zen master, but I’m not beyond enjoying their frustration.
Though if I did have a phone, I could call Ellie…
Fuck.I am such a creep. She’s made it perfectly clear that she’s not interested in seeing more of me. Each time I’ve found an excuse to pop into the office and accidentally seen her, or more specifically, loitered around the place she works, she’s been polite but distant. No sign of that easy familiarity we shared. No hint of that carefree laughing girl with the gorgeous hair and the killer curves you could lose your mind over.
Well, she still has the curves and the hair, thankfully. But she does not seem thrilled to see me. I’m not sure what I’ve done to offend her. I’m probably so far up my own ass for even thinking that. I’m sure I’m not important enough to offend her. I’m certain she just doesn’t give a flying fuck about me.
We take the elevator up to the top floor, and I leave Dad with Mason, who glares at me behind Dad’s back as he starts a lecture on something to do with currency exchanges. Suppressing a smirk, I leave them to it.
I pretend I’m heading to the men’s room, but what I’m really doing is wandering the corridors of power, hoping to get snubbed by Ellie. Yep. That’s how pathetic I seem to have become. What’s with me and this girl? I’m celibate, for fuck’s sake. I don’t date. Is it just a challenge? Is the asshole part of me in charge right now—the one who was hyper-competitive on the football field, who refused to ever give in, to ever back down?
Before long I’m in the staff break room at the end of the hallway. Someone has added a small indoor herb garden, and I lean down to inhale the rosemary and mint. The scents of Morocco. There the rosemary would be calledazir.
The fragrant smell calms me. Higher powers come in many forms.
I’m mid-sniff when she struts in, holding her water bottle as if to refill it. Her hair is pinned up in combs, but a stray tendril is dangling down the side of her face. Fuck. It’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. She freezes on the spot and anxiously stares at me.
“Hi,” I say.Yeah, real smooth, Mad.“How are you?”
“I’m good, thanks. You know, busy busy.”
She bustles past me as if to prove it, pressing the buttons on the water cooler. She fumbles her bottle, seeming flustered. Probably a lot of work on her plate, knowing my brothers. It would explain how stressed she seems to be.
“Are they working you too hard?” I ask, meaning for it to be lighthearted. “Because I can have a word if my brothers are being assholes.”
She whirls around, glaring at me, her bright blue eyes on fire. Jesus. What did I say?
“I don’t need you to defend me, Maddox. I love my job and I’m good at it,” she snaps. “And I’d rather you didn’t talk to your brothers about me at all.Period.”
I relent, trying not to look as taken aback as I feel. Okay. She has a point. I didn’t mean anything by it, but when a guy steamsin and implies a girl needs rescuing, that’s some borderline sexist bullshit right there. I hold up my hands in surrender. “I get it. I’m sorry. I know you’re good at your job. They tell me you are, all the time.”
She softens slightly, her warrior stance settling to something less aggressive. Then she quirks an eyebrow. “They do?”
“They really do. Not that we discuss you a lot. Or that we say anything, uh, inappropriate.”
She nods abruptly. “Okay. Well. I have to go. Have a nice day.”
And just like that, she’s gone. I hate the fact that I watch her juicy round ass sashay out the door as she goes. What the fuck has gotten into me lately?
Chapter 6
Ellie
Isit back down at my desk and take some deep breaths. Is he the world’s biggest asshole, or am I the one being unreasonable here?
That was, like, the fifth time I’ve seen him in this building. I go without setting eyes on the man for years, and suddenly it feels like every time I turn a corner, he’s there. Lurking. Filling the space with all his muscle, his bulk. All his mind-melting physical perfection. It’s not just the body either, though it is pretty distracting. It’s the smile. The deep brown eyes. The way he gazes right at me, like I’m the only person in the entire fucking world. It was just the same in Morocco.
But look how that turned out. I wasn’t special to him at all. It’s obviously just a trick. Like the vampires in my belovedTrue Bloodbooks, who can charm and glamor people by staring deep into their eyes.
Today, on top of everything else, he’d obviously been to the man-salon. He smelled divine, of cypress and cedar. His beard was freshly trimmed, his hair still damp. He looked amazing as he stood there, nose buried in my herb garden. A phrase that makes me blush even thinking it.
While I, of course, look like a car wreck. I was working late on a new project, getting carried away with my research, and I barely noticed it was three a.m before I went to bed. I forced myself to the gym for my reformer Pilates class, but it left me like a zombie the whole morning. My hair’s a mess, I have no makeup on, and my ass looks enormous in this skirt. It was the first clean thing I shoved into my gym bag. Why, for once, can’t I bump into him when I look good?
