Chapter 6
Nico
“I—I’m, sorry,” the cute little thing in front of me says, stepping backward and pushing her hair out of her face, eyes still locked on mine. “I’m Lucy Sullivan.”
Lucy Sullivan is short—much shorter than me, anyway—and sporting a mass of blonde waves a bit lighter than my own. They have the appearance of having been pinned up until recently, like she let her hair down after a long day of work.
Work. That’s what it looks like… like this woman works here, despite the fact that I’ve never seen her before. I’m sure I would have seen her before, would have noticed her, around the office.
So Dane must have hired her while I was on my trip. The bastard.
“Lucy Sullivan,” I muse, running my gaze over her again and enjoying the way she seems to flutter under it, like she’s not really sure what to do with the attention.
She’s wearing some sort of designer dress that hugs her curves nicely, following the line of her hips and chest in an almost modest way, but it doesn’t look quite right on her.
Lucy might be wearing Chanel, but she doesn’t smell like money.
I’d know—I grew up around new money, on the California coast, driving with the top down along the PCH, ocean glittering in the distance, the car filled with Hollywood brats. Girls whose fathers were directors, producers, or even actors. Money dripped off of them like it dripped from all of us.
At least, until it was suddenly pulled out from under me.
Clearing my throat, I tug casually at the cuffs of my shirt and shift my weight, appraising her. Lucy doesn’t seem like the kind of girl who could afford a dress like that. So what is she doing wearing it? How did she get it?
My eyes lock onto her lips as she parts them, sucking in a quick breath, just about to say something, but at that moment, the elevator dings gently and slides open, and Dane is stepping into the hall.
I don’t have to turn around to know it’s him. My friend makes an impression on the atoms in the oxygen around us, refracting the light like he’s fucking Darth Vader or something.
Plus, Lucy’s gaze shifts over my shoulder, and her cheeks instantly go scarlet.
Interesting.
“Dane,” I hum, turning around, flashing him a winning smile. “Who is this young lady?”
Not looking at me, he fixes his gaze on her and says, “You shouldn’t be here this late, Lucy. Do you need a ride home?”
“No,” she chokes, looking down, “I—I’m going with Julian. He’s waiting downstairs.”
“Ju-lian,” I repeat, glancing at Dane with raised eyebrows. “Sounds like a fun night.”
Dane just stares after Lucy, who, still flushing, slips into the elevator and says a hurried “Good night,” before the doors swish shut, and it’s just me and Rourke left in the red-hued lobby.
“Did you buy her that dress?” I ask, turning on him the moment she’s gone. “And where the hell did you find her? She looks corn-fed, in the best way.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Dane growls, stalking past me to his office, and I can’t help it—I’ve always loved to poke at the bear, and Dane is the grouchiest I’ve ever met. “We have other things to focus on.”
“Such as?” I ask, following behind him lazily.
Dane stops and turns to face me next to the assistant’s desk.
From the day we first started at Ember, it’s been manned by a young Dane look-alike.
He hires these kids, thinking they’ll be perfect for the job, before he’s eventually annoyed at looking in the mirror.
“We’re going to the convention in Amsterdam,” he says.
“Yeah,” I laugh, “right.”
But when Dane doesn’t laugh, doesn’t even lift a corner of his mouth, I realize he’s serious.
“Oh,” I say, as he turns away from me and toward his office. “Yeah, I’m not doing that. And you know there’s no way in hell Cole is going,” I pause. “He’s not even back yet from that thing, right?”
“From his trip to source new materials?” Dane asks, raising an eyebrow at me as he waves his hand near his door to open it. The glass shifts from being clouded over to clear, and he keeps talking as the lights come on, and he steps inside. “Doing actual work?”
“My trip was actual work,” I shrug, following after him, leaning on the door jamb. “At least, enough to justify to the IRS.”
Dane shoots me a glare before bending slightly to open a drawer in his desk and pull out whatever it was he must have forgotten.
Or purposefully left behind, with the intention of coming back. Either so he could have berated the poor assistant, or to punish her in another, more exciting way for staying here too late.
The thought makes my cock twitch, but I’m not going to explore that at the moment. Instead, I let a meandering grin take over my face and get back to needling him, “Is hiring a new assistant real work?”
“We need an assistant. And someone had to vet them.”
“I’m just saying,” I tease, raising an eyebrow at him as he shuts the drawer and straightens up, walking toward me. “Did you even look at her resume? Or were you too busy looking at—”
“Enough, Nico, I’m not joking,” Dane says, and his voice is more frigid than usual. Stopping just even with me, he gives me a meaningful look. “She is half our age, our employee, and completely off limits. You understand that, right?”
“Hey,” I say, putting my hands up, “I’m not the one buying her designer clothing.”
Dane doesn’t look back, just continues his brisk pace toward the elevator.
As he moves, the adaptive lighting shifts with him, reminding me of an aquarium.
I’d loved working in that company, loved the process of selling people on lighting, showing them how it could improve their lives and their businesses.
I’d worked with marketing to develop a campaign based on selfies and social media stories, demonstrating how the well-lit images actually captured the moment. It sold over a thousand units a week.
It was my idea to adjust our standard consumer, to target hospitals and public spaces as well. I’ve always had a broader perspective than Cole and Dane.
“Our assistant has to look the part,” he argues, shifting back to meet my eye as he waves his hand over the key card reader for the elevator. “She was wearing a horrible dress the first day she showed up here.”
“So why did you hire her?” I counter again, and I know I’ve won when his face clouds over, going stormy like it always does when he wants to deny what I’m implying.
“Just keep your hands to yourself,” he growls, though he and I both know he’s not just talking about my hands.
“You didn’t answer my quest-ion,” I counter, just as the elevator doors close, and he glares at me through the crack, unable to get the last word as it seals shut.
The moment he’s gone, the lights return to that deep red, flushing me into what feels like a horror movie scene. I could change them with a single voice command, but I like the low lighting. Having worked around Cole’s tech for so long, it feels like home.
More like home than my giant mansion in the suburbs. At least here, there’s not such an echo.
Swallowing down my own self-pity, I turn and walk into my own office, smiling at the decor that Dane hates, and Cole doesn’t even notice. Grabbing a drink from the fridge, I crack it open, fall back onto my office couch, and take a sip, staring out at the city through my floor-to-ceiling windows.
“Cheers.” I raise the can to nobody, already halfway asleep.