Heartbreaker - Julie Kriss Page 0,23

an ass and she didn’t. She finally stepped back.

“Your clothes need to be a little more conservative for Morgan Financial,” she said.

I glanced down at myself. I was wearing a black skirt with white polka dots and a white blouse. I was covered to the chin, all the way down to my wrists, and the skirt fell below my knees. “I’m sorry?” I asked.

Hellion pointed to my skirt. “The polka dots are a little vibrant,” she said. “Smaller dots are more in order. Or no dots at all.”

“I’ll keep it in mind.” I slid past her, nearly breathing down her neck in the tiny space before she backed off. What had gotten into her today? The better question was, what had gotten into her at birth and had made her like this every day since?

“Gotta go get that toner,” I said. I walked toward my favorite place, the storage room.

“I’ll see you later,” Helen said. “I’m going to my running club.”

It was three forty-five. Of course she was leaving. I didn’t bother answering, but turned the corner into the storage room.

At Mr. Morgan’s office, Eliza looked relieved to see me. “Do you have the toner?”

I held up the box. “Got it.”

“Okay, great.” To my alarm, she picked up her purse and stood up. “I have to run an errand. After you put the toner in, just sit at the desk until I get back.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you.” She shrugged. “It’s easy. He’s in there with some woman he’s having a fling with. My guess is they might be a while.”

I thought my eyes might air-dry, they were so wide at this news. “He’s in there with a girlfriend?”

“I wouldn’t say that. She’s fucking him, or so she says. He came out and told me that she never needs an appointment when she shows up, so I guess she was telling the truth.”

She came from behind her desk, and since I hadn’t moved, she took me gently but firmly by the shoulders and steered me toward her chair. “I’m not an executive assistant,” I argued.

“Neither am I. I’m just the latest victim sent by the temp agency. It isn’t that hard, I swear. He won’t even notice that it’s you here and not me, if he even comes out of the office.”

“And what do I do when he comes out of the office?”

“He’ll yell at you about something, then forget about it a minute later. Today is a really bad day, because one of his business rivals just died. Just nod and get yelled at. It’s what we all do.” Her hands pressed down on my shoulders, and I sat in the chair. “This is important,” she said. “I’ll be right back. I promise.”

She hurried out, and I was left in silence. I was still holding the box of toner in my lap. “This is bad,” I said out loud under my breath. “This is very, very bad.”

From behind Mr. Morgan’s office door came a low moan—whether from a man or a woman, I couldn’t tell.

I squeezed my eyes shut, as if that could block my hearing. Oh, no. Were they doing something in there? I guessed the CEO got to have sex in his office if he felt like it. I wondered how well he knew this woman. I wondered if he did this all the time. He probably had tons of opportunities, as hot as he was. But he’d also seemed pretty stuck-up to me, not the kind of man who had sex in his office all the time at all. Maybe what was going on behind that door was a one-time thing.

A one-time thing I got to be witness to. That was great.

If Mr. Morgan knew I knew what was happening, I was fired.

If Helen saw me sitting behind this desk, where I had no business being, I was fired.

If I got up and fled, leaving the desk unattended, I was fired.

I could see no outcome in which I wasn’t fired.

I realized I still had my sweaty hands on the toner box, so to kill time I opened it and changed the toner in Eliza’s printer, counting the seconds in my head. Where was she going that was so important, anyway? Mr. Morgan himself had told me that some of his assistants just walked out and quit without notice. Please, please let that not be happening here.

I had finished with the printer and was clicking through Eliza’s computer—hey, if she wanted me to sit here, she took her chances—when Mr.