Office Grump An Enemies to Lovers Romance - Nicole Snow Page 0,21
4 a.m. Be ready.
Ruby will show you to the file room, so you can get this project done, stat. She should also be able to give you the passcode to my office to hang my dry cleaning.
Yours,
Magnus Heron
CEO of HeronComm Inc.
“Hey, bossman, I can hear you hitting the screen up here. Having a rough day?” Armstrong asks, throwing back the same easy smile in the rearview mirror he always does.
“Not really. Just too much to do and not enough time in the world. I hired a new EA this morning and I have to get her broken in. I’m sending her the usual shitpile.” I pause. Technically, I’m sending her stuff to do right this second because I can’t get her out of my mind. “You’ll meet her tomorrow. You need to pick her up at four o’clock.”
“I need a raise to be up at that time,” Armstrong grumbles.
“Don’t we all.”
We share a chuckle.
Honestly, the problem isn’t that this girl has brunette hair like silk, mocha eyes designed to get lost in, and a body so tight she’d be like a cloud crashing against my mountain. I want to devour her, no question.
The real agony is the fact that I’ve worked at least seventy hours a week for so long I don’t recall the last time I had a good lay. I rack my brain, remembering the last time I bothered with a high-end lounge hookup well over a year ago.
I’ve been so busy it’s kept me living like a monk ever since. And that last conquest was mediocre at best.
Dammit, I need a good fuck. That’s all. A memorable sheet-ripping romp to reset my system.
It’s no wonder this pretty stranger makes me dwell on things I’d rather not.
Her stunt in the park made her the only woman I’ve noticed recently who doesn’t work for me—and no, the usual crop of seasonal interns who churn through HeronComm with a goal to seduce me don’t count. I’ve never let a single one of them get off the ground, no matter how short their skirts get or how many excuses they dredge up to barge into my office.
I’m not going anywhere near that ugly minefield with Miss Bristol, either. She works with me now—for me—and I won’t put her in that position.
Maybe Ruby was right, though. I should’ve let her pick another miserable, short-lived EA and found a way to bed Sabrina without bringing her into my company.
Bah.
Too late now.
I need a competent assistant more than I do a night of sweltering, bed-breaking passion.
Hopefully, my sacrifice pays dividends. Hell, if she’s good enough, I might be able to take a day off and remedy my hormones. It’s not like I have a hard time finding dates.
“So, what do you have this woman doing for you at four a.m.?” Armstrong asks.
“The usual. Picking up my coffee, my dry cleaning, and cat food.”
“Cat food? Aw, hell, something tells me I’m going to hear about this one, aren’t I?” Armstrong laughs.
“Call it Plan B. If all goes well with the Stedfaust account, we won’t have to resort to a demonstration,” I say.
“Man, are you trying to see how fast you can get rid of her with your antics?” Armstrong’s eyes flash up in the mirror.
I frown. Why would he assume that?
I’m not that much of a raging hard-ass purely for the sport of it.
Or maybe I am.
Sure, I told her to get her shit done before tomorrow knowing there’s virtually no way she can finish it. Then again, when you tell people they have four days, they take all four. You tell them two, they’ll take two. And if Sabrina Bristol has the backbone I think—I hope—she has, then she needs a real test of her mettle.
“Of course not, Armstrong,” I finally answer.
He laughs again. “You can’t pick up your own coffee for once?”
“Well. I could, but if I’m going to do that, what’s the point in having an assistant?” I ask. “Besides, Kona coffee makes the office run. I bought that farm and invested in the Bean Bar for a reason. How much further?”
“About forty minutes in this traffic.”
I hold in a groan. Somehow, a man never fully gets over the sluggish crawl of Chicagoland traffic.
With more time to pass, I scroll through my emails, flipping through performance reports for a dozen ad campaigns, and then look for anything else I can send my new EA to get it off my plate.