emergency appointment tonight and of course he needed to get it seen to as quickly as possible. I think Jumal said something about some oozing and all. Yuck.”
Pip had to hold the phone away from her ear at his mother’s retort.
“What was that?” she checked, gingerly returning the phone to her ear. “Oh yes of course you can speak to him, I’ll just put you through. Nice speaking to you again, Mrs Aldabbagh.”
She punched in his extension number.
“What?” Jumal growled at her.
“Your mother would like a quick word, sir,” she said as she connected him.
She leaned back in her chair, spinning it around slowly with her feet, her hands steepled together under her chin as she counted to herself. One, two, three…
“PIPPAAAAA!!”
Chapter Two
“Here you go.”
Pip yelped and jumped in surprise as the large file of papers landed squarely on her desk and scattered her yellow paper notes. She shot a glance up at Jumal’s dark eyes. “Some light bedtime reading. Enough to keep even you out of trouble.”
“What is it?” she asked, looking back briefly at the ominous large file.
“The Dubai contract. Faridah dropped it in earlier and she’ll be contacting you tomorrow to set up the meetings.”
“Joy,” she mumbled under her breath.
“Sorry, what was that?” Jumal pressed.
“Nothing,” she replied, waving her hand dismissively. “So what do you need me to do?”
He paused briefly as if considering his next words. “I want a summary of the salient points on my desk tomorrow morning.”
Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t stop her mouth from dropping open goldfish style as she discreetly tried to glance at her watch. It was already ten o’clock at night.
“Wha—” She shut her mouth—even she knew when to quit and this was clearly punishment for her earlier joke. The man obviously had no sense of humour. In fact, come to think of it, she hadn’t even seen him crack a smile with a colleague in the few months she’d been here. He was so serious—a prime candidate for a stress-induced heart attack.
“Fine,” she said, putting her hands up as she accepted defeat. “I always struggle to get to sleep. This is just the ticket.”
“Good. You ready to go home? I think we’ve worked late enough. Looks like we’re the last ones here,” he noticed, glancing around the empty office. “I’ll drop you at home on the way.”
“Oh, don’t put yourself out,” she mumbled not even trying to hide her sarcasm but then winced at his ice-cold stare.
“Okay, okay, thanks,” she conceded shutting down her laptop.
“Here.” She was startled as Jumal took hold of her jacket and held it open for her arms. She quickly grabbed her bag and the file.
“Lead on, chauffeur,” she added, mischievously.
He simply shook his head at her and headed over to the lifts to press the call button. She finally joined him, muttering under her breath about his lack of a sense of humour but trying to keep her distance and stare down at the floor. Hmm, funny she’d never really noticed the colour of the flooring before and she’d never been more grateful for the soft ping announcing the arrival of the lift.
“After you,” Jumal said, standing back and holding out his arm before following her in and pressing the button for the underground car park.
Pip huddled up against the mirrored wall at the back of the lift and took a deep breath. She hated lifts—hated being enclosed anywhere she couldn’t easily get out of but especially when said enclosed coffin was fifty floors up.
“Are you okay?”
She looked up at Jumal’s question, momentarily surprised by his concern.
“Yeah. I just don’t like small, enclosed places. Childhood trauma caused entirely by your friend aka my brother.” She dropped her head to stare again at the floor.
“Why, what—?” Jumal’s query was suddenly interrupted by the lift plunging into darkness and coming to an abrupt halt.
“Jumal!?” She couldn’t hide the distress from her voice as she fumbled in the dark and dropped her bag and the file to the floor; her hands reached out desperately towards him.
She suddenly felt his hand clasp hers and pull her body towards him.
“Hey, it’s okay. We’re fine. The emergency lighting will—ah, there you go. See?” he assured her as the dim overhead emergency lighting came on.
“Look at me,” he demanded, still holding one of her hands and reaching for her chin with his other, gently raising it to meet his eyes.
“Really, we’re fine. They’ll have us out of here in no time,” he said, clearly trying to calm his hysterical employee