7. Chapter Seven
Rachel
A rchie’s soft fur brushes against my chin, the tingling sensation bringing me back from the land of dreams.
“You didn’t have to do that, Archie. I am work-free today. No alarms!”
Meow.
He placed his front paws on top of my chest, nudging me.
“Oh, I understand now. You’re hungry, aren’t you?”
Meow.
My fingers curl around Archie’s body as I am sitting on my bed.
My bedroom window is wide open, and with the light flooding through my blinds comes the nerve-numbing heat of a hot summer Tuesday afternoon.
I definitely shouldn’t be here.
It’s a Tuesday. I should be at the office working for Vaughn, but I couldn’t bring myself to do so. Vaughn is an asshole—that’s as evident as the sky is blue and the sun is a hot burning ball of fire. But he’s never scared me like he did two days ago when I called him about the mistake I made.
He was pissed beyond words, and I could imagine the veins on his forehead bulging in frustration, and that’s putting it lightly. If he managed to scare me that much over a phone call, he would probably make me piss my pants off if I went anywhere near him.
So I am avoiding work—for now. But not after calling Carmen to tell Vaughn that I am sick because, of course, I can’t bring myself to tell him that, even though Carmen is unbearable. Of course, the Vaughn I know won’t buy that lie, and I am surprised he hasn’t called me yet to tell me to haul my ass over to work.
Even after two days.
Two whole days!
That’s hella suspicious, and it provokes a level of panic that I would have had if I didn’t think to avoid him. With Vaughn Graham, you can never tell what he’s planning. Is he waiting patiently to see how far I will go? Is he waiting to give me the ax upon resumption?
Two whole days.
For someone who wouldn’t hesitate to call me for help tying his shoelaces, that’s an accomplishment. But at the back of my mind, I can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong. It also doesn’t seem fair to avoid work when the mistake was mine to begin with.
I should call him and apologize. No, I have already done that. I should go to his home and apologize.
“Should I go to him and apologize?” I ask Archie, who is snuggled in the crook of my arms. His pupils narrow into a slit- like aperture as he gives me a blank look. I stand up from my bed and head to the kitchen to prepare some cat food.
I open the kitchen cupboard and pull the can containing Archie’s food. It is empty!
“Shit!” I mutter. The crunchy bits of the leftover cat food swirl, making sonorous sounds as I wave it in Archie’s face in regret.
“I’m sorry, honey. I had no idea.”
He hops down from my arms onto the tiled kitchen floor and turns to face me, and I think he is disappointed, the corner of his mouth drawn.
I retrieve a bottle of milk from the kitchen counter and pour it into his pan, and after a few sniffs and a little hesitation, he licks it.
“Thanks, honey, for understanding.” I pat him on the head.
The faint sound of my phone ringing drifts into the kitchen, and my chest heaves against my sleeveless tee.
Is it Vaughn?
My throat suddenly goes dry as I rush to my bedroom, where my phone lies on the bed. The name on the screen sends my heart racing, threatening to burst out of my ribcage.
“H-hello?” I stammer. It’s from the rival company with which I signed the contract on Vaughn’s behalf.
“Ms. Rachel, it’s been two days since we called you. But it seems Vaughn Graham had yet to turn up. In case what I said escaped your memory, let me repeat it: once you sign a contract, you are under a legal obligation to honor it. If we don’t hear from you in three days, we really are going to sue.”
“But I already told you guys that it was a mistake. Mistakes like this happen sometimes—”
The phone from the other end clicks dead before I can say anything else.
“No, wait!” I desperately say into the dead phone.
What an asshole!
I toss my phone angrily on the bed and watch it bounce as a sober thought hits me: this isn’t about Vaughn being mad at me anymore; this is about his career, his reputation.
I know I have to do something, but what exactly? Call Vaughn’s lawyer. That’s an option, but I will have to speak with Vaughn about it first.
Without thinking twice, I flip the doors of my wardrobe open and select a chambray shirt and Capri pants. My hair is a mess, but I can’t care less. I have to get to Vaughn, even though every muscle in my body doesn’t feel like it.
My hand swipes over the bedside table for my purse and keys. I check my purse to confirm that my credit card is still there because I plan to do some grocery shopping and get some cat food on the way. With a quick kiss on Archie’s head, I storm out of my apartment and into my car.
“It’s past 4 p.m., so Vaughn should be home by now, probably training,” I think, taking the road that leads to his Hudson Valley mansion instead of the office.
I replay the moment that led up to the contract debacle. It was a silly mistake, one that I hadn’t realized I had even made until they called. I had been granted power of attorney when it comes to signing some minor contracts, as long as they aren’t high profile.
A day before, I was informed that the shoot for Novaspire Technologies was to be held in the UK, whose contract I had totally forgotten about; some documents were shipped to the office for signing. I proceeded to sign them without thinking much because I had seen “mobile technology,” and I had thought it was from Novaspire. I had been too tired to re-read the terms since Vaughn and the company’s executives had already had a meeting via Zoom.
I turn into the road leading to Vaughn’s sprawling mansion, and I can see it looming ahead of me. Eventually, my car pulls up outside the wrought iron gate of the house, and I honk. The immaculate, well-mowed lawn spreads ahead of me as I ease my way in, but the magnificent view does nothing to calm me.
I knock on the front door, and as I wait for it to open, I notice how the glimmering sunlight reflects off the windows, casting long shadows onto the manicured lawn.
The door clicks open, startling me despite that being what I am waiting for. Vaughn’s maid, Elena, steps out with a flowing flowery dress, a friendly smile etched on her face.
“Good evening, Miss Rachel. Welcome. I didn’t know you were coming in today.”
I smile nervously. “Yeah, I thought I’d surprise you guys. Is Vaughn around?”
“Sure. Please come in.” She steps aside to let me in.
“I’m sure he’s in his study. I heard footsteps toward there when I was in the kitchen.”
I nod my thanks and walk through the foyer, take a turn to my left, where the study is located, and make a few taps on the door.
Silence. A heavy silence that only makes my heartbeat faster greets me, and for a moment, it feels like I am the only one in the mansion.
I tap again, and this time, heavy footsteps sound from the other end, and the door pulls open.
Vaughn stands in the doorway, his hand still on the doorknob as he rests his shoulder against the half-open door.
My breath catches in my throat, and I freeze, my eyes reluctantly drifting from his half-naked body to his expressionless face, which surprises me because I expected him to be pissed. For a moment, he just stands there looking at me, and I think he isn’t going to let me in. Eventually, he swings his weight to the other side.
“Come in, Rachel. I’m sure you have a lot of explaining to do, don’t you?” he says in an intimidating tone.
He swaggers past me and settles on a desk, picks up a book from his side, and begins toying with it absent-mindedly, his shoulders hunched and his gaze piercing.
“I can’t describe how sorry I am about what happened, Mr. Vaughn. It was a faux pas, I admit.”
I pause, gauging his reaction, but none comes except for the disdainful sneer that spread across his face. This only increases my nervousness, and I step closer in an attempt to conceal it.
“I have tried all I can to rectify it, but all have proved futile. However, I will keep doing all I can to rectify the issue, so please, give me some—”
“And I suppose your proof that you’ve been doing something to ‘rectify’ the issue is the fact that you missed work for the past two days, huh?” he snaps, violently banging the book on the desk. “It took you two days to have the guts to face me for your silly mistake! Two whole days only to do what? Tell me that you haven’t succeeded in rectifying the issue?”
The room is already dim, which emphasizes the darkness that has crept into his eyes. He looks exactly like I have envisaged when I called to inform him the first time. Sweat glistens on his delineated pectorals, and the delicate sprinkling of hair on his chest scatters even around his nipples. I just stand there, frozen, more out of shock than actual fear.
My hoarse voice betrays my emotions when I finally open my mouth. “The managers of the company wouldn’t listen to me when I tried to reason with them. I am thinking we should—”
“We? You did this! You messed everything up just like always!”
Did he really just say that?
Furious, he hops down from the desk and strides toward me until we come to stand face to face.
“You know what I was doing in my study before you came? Sitting back and wondering at how dumb I must have been when I hired a dumbass like you who isn’t good for anything as my secretary!”
His words drive sharp stakes into my heart as he keeps berating me with more hurtful, heartbreaking words that I can’t remember. All that stays with me is the heat of his anger, his furious breaths brushing against my face as I cringe, my feelings hurt beyond words.
But I said I was sorry. That’s the thought I cling to, repeating it over and over in my mind as I stand there, enduring everything he throws at me.
Yes, this was my mistake, but do I really deserve to be treated like this? Is this fair in any way?
While lost in a pool of thoughts, I zone out and can only see his mouth move. I snap out of my thoughts to catch him saying something.
“The other day, you came thirty minutes late to work, leaving me to—”
I have had enough. I am his employee, not his slave.
“And when was the last time I came to work late aside from that day, you arrogant, entitled, conceited son of a bitch?”
My eyes sting with tears, and my chest rises and falls with heavy breath. I feel an overpowering urge to slap him hard across the face, and I think I might have if a vase hadn’t caught my blurry vision instead. I storm to the table, pick up the vase, and smash it against the floor, shattering it into tiny, irregular shards.
“I slave for you. I almost don’t have a life aside from working for you, but where has that gotten me apart from being treated like a subhuman? I am sick of you!”
Vaughn’s angry expression slowly takes on a calm and sober form. His lips part like he is about to say something, but then they close again.
What an asshole! He can’t even bring himself to apologize.
I march toward the door, angry as ever.
“Wait . . .” He reaches for my shoulder, attempting to stop me.
“Don’t you dare touch me!” I bark, pulling my shoulder away from him.
He literally sprints and blocks the exit door before me.
“Get out of my way, Vaughn.”
“You’re crying,” he says, and I have no idea why he said that.
Slightly embarrassed, I wipe my tears with the back of my sleeve. His eyes soften, but he still doesn’t apologize.
“Have a seat. Let’s talk, Rachel. Apparently, there’s a lot for us to talk about.” His voice has a hint of desperation in it, a deep frown carved on his forehead.
“Just let me go, Vaughn.” I motion toward the door, attempting to step around him.
Before I can reach the door, a firm hand grips my arm and spins me around.
“No, we’ve got to talk about this.”
“Let me go!”
Before I can put up a physical resistance, he pulls me into the heat of his naked chest and seals my lips with a kiss.
A knot of shock and fear twists in the pit of my stomach, and I stand there dumbfounded, his lips on mine. He backs away a bit to look at my face, his shocked expression mirroring mine, but in place of fear, I see something else in his eyes.
Desire.
He claims my lips once again, this time with more intensity than the first kiss. This time, I kiss him back. Reasonable Rachel screams for me to back away, but horny Rachel won’t allow me to move a muscle. My earlier outburst left me with a vulnerable feeling, and my biggest wish is for Vaughn to take me right here in his study.