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“Why don’t I show you around?”
“I’d love that.”
Chase led me around the room, which was deceptively large. He showed me how no desk belonged to any particular person. All the computers were connected to the same cloud and the documents were all shared. A pretty young woman in a black dress with red hair came up a few minutes into Chase showing me around.
“Oh, is this Lola?” she asked.
“Hi,” I said, reaching to shake her hand.
The girl smiled and then looked to Chase with a glint of warning in her eyes. “Mr. Stone just emailed and asked me to take over the tour.”
Chase’s expression fell. He looked to me, then his eyes shifted up toward the ceiling. I followed his gaze and noticed one of many cameras there. Was Christian watching us?
“Uh, right,” Chase pursed his lips at me and stepped back suddenly, as if I might bite. “I’ve got to get back to what I was working on. Thanks, Paisley.”
The girl flashed a tight smile and then shook my hand. “Sorry,” she said. “Where did he leave off?”
After the tour, I sat down with Paisley and another woman named Cassie. Paisley was red haired, pretty, and girlish. Cassie had her blonde hair cut short and her build was muscular. I imagined she probably could’ve picked me up and snapped me in half if she really wanted, but her smile was friendly and she had kind eyes, so I tried not to picture that happening.
“So Mr. Stone said he has other assistants?” I said. “How will I know what to assist him with if there’s already a small army of people doing the same job?”
“Think of it like this,” Paisley said. “We’re like a factory down here. The tasks roll in and the next man or woman up jumps on it. Sometimes it’s scheduling meetings, other times it’s more involved like pulling legal documents or dealing with contractors. It might even just be to go grab Mr. Stone a coffee. But you are his executive assistant. That means you’re going to be the one every task gets filtered through. You’ll decide where to send it. Maybe it should go to HR, maybe to us, maybe to legal, and so on.”
I frowned. “Wait. I will be doing all that?”
Cassie smiled. “Don’t worry. The last executive assistant made it like two weeks before she cracked. And the one before that made it like one week.”
“How is that a good thing?” Paisley asked through narrowed eyes.
“Because statistically,” Cassie said cheerily. “That means she at least has a week or so before shit hits the fan.”
I blinked. “What? Why did they have breakdowns?”
Paisley shrugged. “Having to survive close proximity to Mr. Stone would be my guess.”
“Why are you whispering?” I asked.
She looked up toward the cameras, and I felt my skin prickle. “Is he watching us?”
“Didn’t you see how he had me jump in to take over your tour?” Paisley asked. “How would he know Chase was giving the tour if he wasn’t watching?”
“But why did he want you to take over?”
Paisley looked thoughtful. “I’m not sure, actually. I figured Chase was just doing a bad job.”
“Maybe he’s got the hots for her,” Cassie said.
They both laughed immediately like that was a grand joke.
My expression fell a bit. “What’s so funny about that?”
Paisley saw the look on my face and gave my hand a squeeze. She glanced up at the cameras again and lowered her voice to a hoarse whisper. “Sorry, Lola. You’re gorgeous and any normal guy probably would have a thing for you. It’s just funny because Mr. Stone has the emotional range of… well, a stone. Nobody has ever heard of him leaving this tower unless it’s in his helicopter. And even then, he’s just flying back and forth to the other Stone Financial buildings. The guy is happiest by himself. I don’t know if he’s even interested in women at all. Or men.”
I thought back to our interactions. He hadn’t seemed that aloof. And what about the way his face had hardened when he touched my back in the elevator? I definitely thought I’d seen some sort of reaction there.
“I see,” I said slowly.
“Yeah, no offense,” Cassie said. “But he’s more likely to suddenly grow a pair of horns than he is to hit on you. I know he’s smoking hot, but if any part of you was hoping for some kind of secret, steamy office relationship, I’m afraid it’s just not going to happen. Not with him, at least. I mean, if it was possible to hook up with Mr. Stone, one of us would’ve managed by now.”
Paisley gave a grim nod. “I wore my sexiest blouse and gave him a full shot of cleavage my first week here. He didn’t even notice. The man is fucking immune.”
“Well,” I said. “The good news is I’m just looking for a steady job. The last thing on my mind right now is a relationship.”
