I know his intent before he can attempt to lift my hand to his mouth to graze his lips over. It’s how he greeted me the first time we met and it caught me off guard, embarrassing me.
Jerking my hand from his, I chastise, “You know… men stopped kissing women’s knuckles in the late eighteen-hundreds.”
I have no clue if that’s true as history was not my major in college.
Sweeping my hand toward one of the guest chairs opposite my desk—indicating he should sit for our meeting to start—I move back around to my chair.
“Not true,” he says, and it stops me in my tracks. I look over my shoulder at him. “I often greet a woman that way and last I heard, it’s the twenty-first century.”
I roll my eyes, turning toward my chair. “Kiss a lot of women, do you, Mr. Olsson?”
“It’s Jett,” he corrects me and adds, “Why? Are you jealous?”
“Hardly.” I hope my droll tone clearly implies that I don’t find him amusing.
I settle into my chair, my spine straight, and clasp my hands on the desk as I stare at Jett. His blue eyes stare right back at me, a slight smirk on his face.
I decide to wipe it off quickly. “I appreciate you coming in to discuss your IG account, Mr. Olsson. So far, it’s the worst one I’ve seen out of all your teammates.”
It’s frustrating that his smirk doesn’t slide a millimeter, but his eyes flash with surprise. “I thought you’d be impressed with what I did.”
“Impressed?” I ask incredulously. “You didn’t do a single thing I asked you to do.”
I think back to the meeting we had to discuss the team’s new policy on player interaction on social media. I went over the rules and guidelines with him the same as I did for every other player.
“I did exactly what you said,” he repeats, pulling his phone out of his pocket. He flips through a few screens and then turns it for me to see. It’s a post I recognize. “You said to take bright pictures, close up if possible, to catch the browser’s eye.”
I grit my teeth, because yes, I said that.
And yes, the picture of a bouquet of pink tulips is perfectly eye-catching. I can’t see what he wrote from this distance, but I’ve already read it. It said something like, These are my favorite flowers to give.
“That’s not real,” I scold him. “It’s totally staged and made up.”
“Not true. I’d very much like to give tulips to someone.”
I grit my teeth again, and close my eyes for a moment, calling on myself to remain calm. He is absolutely infuriating.
When I open my eyes, I notch up my British accent, which has become Americanized over the almost fifteen years I’ve lived in the States. “Mr. Olsson… during our last meeting, you relentlessly asked me personal questions, attempting to get me to agree to a date with you. As you’ll remember, I firmly shot you down. And one of those questions you managed to get me to answer was that tulips are my favorite flower.”
He was so sly about it too. Posing the question as if he was merely asking for clarification on how to take good photos.
“So, for example,” he’d queried. “If you were to take a photo of your favorite flowers to post, how and where would you position them?”
I fell for it hook, line and sinker. “I’d tie up a bouquet of tulips with a ribbon that matched their petals and lay them on some worn wooden boards rather than a vase.”
And just like that, he learned my favorite flower.
His very first IG post was a picture of tulips with a message meant for me, not his fans.
It didn’t stop there. He continued to finagle personal information out of me under the guise of wanting to learn the mechanics of engaging social media, and I fed him a ton of information.
His account turned into a not-so-subtle attempt to charm me into a date.
I take in another breath as Jett lowers his phone, resting it against his thigh.
Encased in a pair of amazingly well-fit jeans.
Shaking my head, I clear my throat and lift my chin to show my authority over him. “Mr. Olsson—”
“Jett—”
“Mr. Olsson,” I repeat. “Your IG account should reflect who you are as a person. It has to be genuine and it has to be true to yourself.”
“I am being true to myself,” he says, and I understand his message. He’s being relentless in his pursuit and that is