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But Luca Moretti wasn’t through surprising me.
He looked at me, totally unaffected by my words. “I told you before, Scarlett, this is business. This is how it works all over the world.”
“You get to decide what your business looks like, Luca,” I argued, getting to my feet. “You don’t have to do what everyone else does just because…”
He scoffed at me, wearing a smirk that I wished I could slap from his face. “Look what happens to businesses that do it differently. You don’t get to sit where I’m sitting, have the money that I make—”
“That’s all you care about,” I interrupted him. “The money. When there are actual lives hanging in the balance, all you care about is what’s in your bank account.”
“My bank account has saved thousands of lives,” he said firmly, finally starting to show some agitation with me.
Good. That’s what I wanted. I wanted to know if there was something inside that chiseled chest that could feel. I just hoped it would be something good and felt a heaving swell of disappointment to find the opposite to be true.
“The more I get to know you, the more I hate you and everything you stand for.”
I let my icy words thaw in the air where I left them and stormed out.
Chapter 11
Luca
Ibarelysleptawink, and so, although I was usually the first one at the office every day, I was even earlier than usual. Dexter, the janitor, gave me the side-eye when security let him in around 5 a.m., and he came up to find me already pacing my office floor.
“Everything okay, Mr. Moretti, sir?” he asked, stalled with his cleaning cart in my doorway.
“Fine, Dexter. You can skip my office this morning.” I waved him off and turned to look out my window just as the lights of the city skyline started flickering out in series.
“Mr. Moretti, sir?” Dexter’s voice came from my doorway.
I looked around to find him still standing there. This time he had a bottle of polish in his hand, holding it up as though he were doing a private infomercial. His eyes moved from the bottle to my desk and then to me, a clear question mark in his aging features.
I shook my head. “No polish today. You can move on to the others.”
He nodded curtly and replaced the bottle of polish to his cart before moving along. I remembered Scarlett’s words, heard them ringing in my ears as though she were right there beside me, still yelling.
“Thank you!” I called out, but Dexter had already gone, and my office door was closed.
Her accusations held no water, obviously. She had no idea what she was talking about, and everything she said came from a place of hurt. And yet, I’d never been that unsettled by someone’s opinion of me. I just couldn’t shake it.
“I’d like to see her run a billion-dollar empire,” I said to the telemarketing skyscraper towering on the horizon. “What does she know about my management?”
The skyscraper’s only response was random lights on the floors blinking off in stages as daylight started to push out the night. I sighed heavily and went to sit at my desk. I’d never lost a member of staff due to dissatisfaction. I’d never gotten a bad review from any individual or client. But Scarlett stood in front of me and called me out for ruining lives.
“I’m the one who makes people’s lives,” I mumbled to myself. “Anyone would kill to be a part of my corporation.”
My heart sank. Because I knew that Scarlett’s argument wasn’t about anyone and everyone. It was specifically about just over twenty people with whom she’d shared over four years of her life at Daze. They were her colleagues and friends, and she cared about them.
My phone lit up. It was Angelique’s direct line.
“You’re in early,” her voice drifted over the speaker. “Have you had your morning coffee yet?”
“Yes, but I’ll take another. Double espresso,” I said.
There was a pause, and when she next spoke, I detected a hint of hesitation in her tone. “Is… everything okay, sir? Do you need anything else from me?”
“No. Yes,” I course-corrected. “Get Hank from HR down here the second he comes in. And Miranda West.”
“Head of the Prior account?” she asked.
