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She paused, evident surprise washing over her features. She glanced up the sidewalk, as if plotting a grand escape route. Meanwhile, I averted my gaze to the floor, finding the prolonged eye contact difficult.
“Do you have respect forme?” she asked.
Her blunt statement caught me off guard and rendered me speechless for a moment.
“As far as I’m concerned, respect is earned,” she continued. “When you were rude to me in that meeting, I didn’t feel respected. When you interrupted me and didn’t let me speak, I didn’t feel respected. And when you insinuated Will held my job title simply because he was a man, I didn’t feel respected. And the fact that you’re standing here, questioning why I don’t just grin and go along with every one of your subpar ideas certainly doesn’t make me feel respected.”
I took in her face without meeting her eyes. Her cheeks flushed as she finished her speech and judging from the shakiness in her voice, her heart was likely beating rapidly. No one ever had the guts to say anything like that to my face, although I’m sure many said it behind my back.
“You’re right,” I said.
She blinked a few times. “I am?”
“Respect is a two-way street. I won’t make those mistakes again.”
“Oh, well—thank you?”
“Goodnight, Charlie.”
“Goodnight,” she said, confusion still in her voice.
As I walked away, I turned one last time. “It was just the name,” I said.
“Huh?” she called, whipping her head back up.
“It wasn’t because he was a man. It was just the name. I’ve never met a woman named Charlie before.”
Recognition flashed across her face as she nodded. “Okay.”
Chapter Six
CHARLIE
“Oh my god, I’m screwed,”I hissed as Lila finally emerged through the tall glass doors.
It was our ritual. Every Tuesday and Thursday we went to a coffee shop after work to do housekeeping stuff for our business. Except lately, those semi-weekly meetings had turned into nightly occurrences. Membership had picked up, and we hardly had enough time to plan events.
“What happened?” she asked as we walked down the block.
“I just basically chewed outNathan Shawto his face.”
Her face scrunched up in confusion. “Nathan? Why? Didn’t you have like one meeting with him?”
“One meeting where he was ridiculously rude to me,” I said defensively.
“I’d let him be rude to me with a face like that. I can’t believe how attractive that man is. Even that hard, cold glare he’s got going on kind of does it for me.”
“Lila—”
“What? You don’t find him attractive? You’d have to claim blindness because that is one tall drink of water.”
“Lila, I’m serious. We didnotget off to a good start.”
She took in my sullen expression. “Shit, you’re serious, aren’t you? It couldn’t have been that bad. I know you can get passionate about things but you’re always professional.”
“Nope.” I smacked my forehead. “Professionalism flew out the door this time. I called him out for how he treated me in the meeting and basically told him I didn’t respect him.”
She snorted.
