Forbidden - Karla Sorensen Page 0,20

discussing it with you first. New name aside,” he added.

My heart hammered. He wasn’t required to do that. And his approach—the calm, the steady—wasn’t something I expected.

“You don’t have to do that,” I told him. “This is your place, not mine.”

A few people walked in—lawyers from a local firm—and effusively loud greetings came my way as they entered. I waved.

“You sure about that?” he asked dryly.

I hid a pleased smile. Just barely. It’d felt like my place since the first day I walked in.

“All the same.” I kept my reply even, professional. “It’s your name on the building, or it will be soon enough. You can make your mark on it without my say-so.”

After I said the words, I wanted to take them back. Or for a moment, I did. Because I’d known so many athletes, ego-driven, prideful, who preened obnoxiously under any spotlight they were given. And still, I wasn’t entirely sure how this particular former athlete would respond.

“All the same,” he responded. “I want you to trust me, Ward.”

My eyes could hardly meet his, not with the way he said my last name. If he looked hard enough, he’d see goosebumps rise along my bare arms. The impulse to smooth them down with the palm of my hand was almost impossible to ignore. Before I could react, Anya popped her head out of his office.

“Daddy, my iPad froze. Can you help me?”

With a slight lift of his chin, he walked toward his office, and I breathed out slowly, my cheeks puffing with the loaded exhale.

Back to work. It was the only way I’d survive it.

Soon enough, as I’d told him, the building would bear his name, and the thought had me wandering to the front area.

As I faced the shelves of merchandise by the desk, I thought about what the hell we were supposed to do with all the stuff labeled Wilson’s Gym when I knew Aiden had already ordered the new signage to make the switch to Hennessy’s. Fortunately, he wasn’t champing at the bit to slap his name over everything. He wanted to handle the transition publicly in a way that was smooth. Staring at the racks of T-shirts, sweatshirts, wraps, gloves, all of it, I started thinking through ways to clear the inventory as quickly as possible.

I took a seat at the front desk and yanked open the bottom right drawer.

“There you are,” I murmured, tugging on a clear container that held bright-colored round stickers. I eyed the racks of shirts and wondered if Aiden would have an opinion on starting with half off everything or maybe a BOGO sale to see how much we could move.

There it was again, the pause in my entire body when I thought about going to his office to ask him.

This was ridiculous.

I set my elbows on the desk and covered my face with a groan. While I sat in that dejected position, the gym phone rang. I picked it up, but before I could say anything, I heard Aiden’s voice coming through the handset in his office.

“Wilson’s Gym, this is Aiden.”

Gawd, his voice. I rolled my lips between my teeth and allowed, just for one moment, my eyes to fall closed so I could just … listen to him speak.

“Mr. Hennessy, this is Chandra at the Seattle Youth Sports Foundation. Thank you so much for your call. We were thrilled to receive it.”

Slowly, I started setting down the phone even though there was a nagging, naughty whisper in the back of my mind that wanted me to keep listening. Because the way he formed words, the way something simple and innocent came out of his mouth, had me picturing him behind me, whispering in my ear. Things I’d never imagined someone telling me to do.

If I were to text Amy where she was currently exploring Greece, I didn’t think this was the kind of trying she’d had in mind.

The front door opened just as I had the phone set back down on the receiver, revealing the smiling face of our newest college hire.

“Emily, how’s it going?”

When she sucked in a deep breath, I knew the answer was going to be very, very dramatic. The word vomit started immediately about her boyfriend and another girl, and I’m sure my eyes were so wide in my face that it looked like I’d just been smacked over the back of the head.

“So, you’re stressed then,” I said when she finally took a breath.

Emily plopped into the chair that I’d vacated behind