Chapter Six
Janene
Someone knocked on my door and I looked up to find Misty leaning against the doorframe to my office. She was looking like her usually pleased self. I was sure I could go the rest of the day not knowing what she was about to tell me.
I was supposed to be in a partner’s meeting with Madeline, but she’d cancelled at the last minute. She said something had come up and I knew that it had to be personal which also meant I shouldn’t pry.
“You’re going to get yourself killed one of these days,” Misty said. “Chasing after two young things that work in the same office? You have some balls.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked, assuming that she’d already dropped off the interns with Ted.
I turned back to the paperwork on my desk. Having one intern was a pain in the ass, three of them was going to require a great deal more patience and organization, two things I had lacked all my life.
“I don’t believe Madeline has ever hired such beautiful interns before,” Misty continued. “Was this your idea? Did you have a say in the matter?”
“I hadn’t even noticed,” I said. Even I wasn’t convinced of my words.
“Please, you can’t tell me you didn’t notice the tall blonde that was practically hanging on you a few minutes ago. And the one with the raven hair, she’s got your type written all over her. I can’t believe she wasn’t the one you took to lunch.”
“They have names, Misty. The blonde, as you call her, is Anabelle and the other one is Harlyn. They’re interns, babies practically, I have no interest in them like that.”
“If you say so,” she said. “It’s probably for the best anyway, because even though I know exactly what makes you go weak in the knees, I’m pretty sure if you mess with Ms. green eyes, she’ll eat you alive. She was plenty pissed at you.”
“She was not,” I said rolling my eyes. “And even if she was, it wasn’t my fault. The deli had a ton of customers today.”
“I’m just saying, be careful. You don’t want to get yourself in trouble and trust me, she looks like trouble.”
I wanted to argue that Harlyn was not my type or the type to cause trouble but I knew Misty, in a number of ways, as a matter of fact most recently in the way she was implying that I wanted to know the interns. More importantly though, I knew that if I even hinted at knowing Harlyn outside of this internship, it would be all over the office and the building before the day was over. Any misstep, any crumb of information that I divulged, she’d run with it, so I did not respond.
“What time should I expect them back?” I asked instead.
“Ted said it shouldn’t take him more than an hour.”
“Is there anything else, then?” I asked.
Misty laughed. “So, it’s going to be like that?”
I didn’t respond again.
“Too bad neither one of them is my type. I’d have a field day.”
I looked up at that statement. She was messing with me. Even as big of a gossip as she was, I knew she’d never again get involved with someone she worked with. Our very brief fling had ended amicably as they say because Misty was uncomfortable with the situation continuing. But still, her words did something to me. The thought of her hitting on Harlyn made my mouth go dry.
Anabelle was a natural flirt and I was sure she didn’t even know she was flirting most of the time. She was young and unaware of the way she came across to people. If Misty gave her even the smallest amount of attention, she’d respond accordingly, but Harlyn? The idea of someone like Misty trying to get into her pants was almost laughable. There was something about Harlyn that said she didn’t like to be toyed with. Something that bordered on a challenge.
“I’ll let you know when they get back,” Misty added before she turned and walked away.
I rubbed at my eyes. What the hell was wrong with me? I sat back in my chair and closed my eyes. I needed to take a moment to reset. That was a term my therapist used all the time. Whenever things got overwhelming or frustrating or worse, she said I should close my eyes and take a moment to reset. There in the darkness though were those emerald green eyes, sparkling at me.
Harlyn really was gorgeous. Misty had that part right. But she was also almost like a daughter to me and it had to be some kind of sin to think of her in that way. Of course, I hardly knew her anymore. Seeing her sitting in that conference room looking so grown up had really messed with my head. She was a complete stranger and yet she wasn’t. I knew that as a kid her favorite color was purple and her favorite treat was a bag of Haribo gummy bears. A treat I used to sneak to her whenever I visited because Renee didn’t like to keep candy in the house.
Once she’d become a teenager, I saw less and less of her. Her teenage years coincided with a terrible PTSD relapse that I suffered ten years ago. It had taken so much of me to deal with the demons of my past. Demons I thought I’d laid to rest when I buried Coreen but had somehow crept their way back to the surface. I wouldn’t have had much time to even notice what Harlyn was up to. Especially because she had her own social life by then so she was rarely around when I visited with Renee.
Distancing myself from the military, finding a job with RedPrint, and finding a friend in Madeline had been my saving grace. By the time I put my life back together, Harlyn was moving away for school. I truly didn’t know anything about this person other than the fact that she was Renee’s daughter. I took a deep breath. That realization was enough to keep my wandering thoughts in check.
In another time, and if Harlyn was ten years older, she would have been a challenge I was willing to take on, but not with the history that we shared. Her age alone was enough to make things awkward. I’d never been with anyone more than ten years younger than me and I was not ready to try. I couldn’t even imagine being with someone as young as she was.
My desk phone buzzed and Misty’s voice came over the speaker. The interns were back. I looked down at my paperwork. I’d gotten absolutely nothing done.
I rubbed at my eyes again. Fuck, this was ridiculous. How had I just wasted an entire hour thinking about nothing. There was another knock at my door.
“I said I’d be right there,” I grunted, expecting to see Misty in the doorway.
It wasn’t Misty. Instead, there were those deep green eyes looking down on me. Arms crossed; one eyebrow lifted as if to say: excuse me? The top two buttons to her shirt were undone and the slight lift her crossed arms gave to her breasts was a delightful sight.
My throat tightened at the sight of her. She was definitely gorgeous and that authoritative stance was doing so much for me.
“Sorry,” I managed to say. “I thought—”
“You thought what?” she asked. “That you could speak to me like that and I would be okay with it?”
“I’m sorry,” I said again.
She started toward me and the pulse point between my legs started to throb. Fuck, she was hot.
“I’m not sure sorry, is enough.”
I nodded.
“How do you think we should rectify this situation?” she asked.
Without any hesitation or semblance of consciousness, I looked down at the belt around her waist and thought of several ways in which we could rectify the situation. None of which I was willing to tell Harlyn about. She smirked and I knew she’d understood exactly what I was thinking. I was partly thrilled to know where her mind was and partly stunned to think that this well put together woman had just shared that thought with me.
“So, you want to be punished? I have to say, I never expected that from you, and yet, I can very easily imagine just how wet you are right now.” she said.
She reached down for her belt buckle and began to undo it. I couldn’t move. I was frozen by her words and her actions. She removed the belt with one flick of her wrist, the end caught the edge of my desk. The pop of the belt made me jump and suddenly I was soaked. I definitely wanted to be punished if she was going to be the one to do it.
“Janene,” she said. Her voice broke. She said it again. “Janene.” This time there was static followed by a beeping sound.
My eyes snapped open. It wasn’t Harlyn calling my name, it was Misty. What the fuck had just happened?
I sat up in my chair, straightened my shirt, and ran a hand through my hair as if Misty could see me. “Yeah,” I said into the intercom.
“Did you fall asleep?” she asked.
“What do you need?” I replied.
“The interns are back. I sent them to the small conference room.”
“Okay.”
I couldn’t think of anything else to say. I was still in shock over the dream I’d just woken up from. What the fuck?
I closed my eyes for a brief moment, taking stock of the fact that I was not as soaked as I had felt in my dream, but I was aroused. How the fuck had I allowed myself to go there with Harlyn of all people?
I stood and shook off my thoughts. I had to walk into that conference room and face her now. How the hell was I going to do that?
I closed my eyes and tried to reset. I could put all those images out of my head for just a few more hours. My last task of the day was to assign each intern to a mentor and then send them on their way. I hadn’t decided which intern I was going to work with but I knew for sure it was not going to be Harlyn.
I walked into the conference room and my eyes went straight to her. She was standing near the window looking out of it as if she wanted to jump through it. I looked down at her waist. She wasn’t wearing a belt. That was disappointing, until she turned around and looked at me. I saw for a brief moment the look she used to give her mom when she was a kid. The one that said she was tired and needed to go home and go to sleep but she didn’t want to give in. I quickly looked away. I was sure I needed to set an emergency appointment with my therapist. This had to be some sort of breakdown. Maybe I was relapsing again and it was manifesting itself through some kind of dirty grandpa brainwaves.
“Please take your seats,” I said to the group. “I want to finish up with this horrible HR stuff and then move on to assigning you to a mentor. I’m sure you’re all anxious to get your hands on a project.”
The interns took their seats around the table and I finished going through the boring new employee handbook. Every time I looked up to see if anyone had any questions, I found Harlyn’s eyes focused on me. I had complained about her lack of enthusiasm earlier that morning, but now I wanted her to look away, to daydream as she watched out the window, anything else.
I counted on Anabelle’s flirty smile and tried to focus all of my attention on her. It was easy enough because she was always eager to engage in conversation or offer her opinion on whatever we were reviewing.
“I’m guessing you all would like to start your weekend sooner rather than later,” I said when I’d gone through the entire binder.
I glanced at my phone and saw that it was only three o’clock but I wasn’t sure that I could handle two more hours in the same room as Harlyn. Her stare had grown more and more intense as the day went by and I was appalled to admit that I really liked that look on her. It was stern, like I was in trouble, but I couldn’t think of a single thing that I had done to warrant that reaction from her.
“I am going to pair each of you up with an architect and you will work with that person exclusively,” I made sure to throw in the exclusively to reduce my interactions with Harlyn to as few as possible. “You will work with them on whatever project they are currently handling. We’ll reassess in a few weeks and depending on how things are going, I will either reassign you to another project or you’ll continue where you’re at. Any questions?”
I looked around the room and got a peppy shake of the head from Anabelle, a noncommittal shake from Colby and a glare from Harlyn.
I cleared my throat before I continued. I wanted to run back to my office and hide.
“Colby, I’m going to have you work with Madeline first. She’s of course, the owner of this firm and the one with the most experience being as how her father was an architect as well. I think you two will get along great and you’ll learn a lot from her.”
I turned to Harlyn who was still watching me like she wanted to rip my head off, and I continued. “Harlyn,” my voice cracked.
“Do you need some water?” Anabelle squeaked. “Here, let me get you some.” She bounced out of her chair and made her way to the small table near the window that held a few bottles of water and some sort of granola snack that Misty kept out.
She started to hand me the bottle and then pulled it back and opened it for me. I smiled politely at her, unsure what to do other than say, “Thank you.”
I took a sip of water and then cleared my throat again. “So, Harlyn, I am going to pair you up with Armande. He is our junior associate, probably soon to make partner because he is really good at his job. It wouldn’t surprise me if Madeline didn’t make him my boss someday soon.” I tried the joke to lighten the tension but she barely cracked a smile.
I turned back to Anabelle. “That means you’re stuck with me,” I said.
She practically yelped with excitement. I wasn’t sure I was doing myself any favors by taking on this giddy young intern, but it sure did beat the alternative.
“I’m so excited,” Anabelle said. “I can’t wait to see what great new things you’ll teach me. I’m thinking the sky’s the limit.”
I put on my best smile even though I was already regretting my decision. I should have given her to Madeline and taken on Colby instead.
“Is that everything?” Harlyn asked. “I’d like to go introduce myself to Armande if you don’t mind.”
“No, of course, go right ahead.” I thought to ask her if she knew the way but I didn’t want to risk a single moment alone with her. I wasn’t sure I could trust myself. “I’ll walk you over to see Madeline, if you’d like,” I said to Colby.
“I’m good,” he said. “I remember where her office is.”
“Of course, I guess you would all know the office where you interviewed,” I said.
Colby nodded and then quickly gathered his belongings and walked out.
“You’re not going to offer to show me where Armande’s office is?” Harlyn asked. She was packing up her bag.
“Sorry—”
“I’m kidding,” she said cutting me off. “I’m a big girl, I can find my way around.”
She looked up at me. She was smiling but her eyes said something completely different. They were just like in my dream. An intense green that made me believe she could see right through me. “I’m sure you two have lots to talk about.” She gave a quick glance at Anabelle. “I’ll get out of your hair.”
She shouldered her bag and walked away without another word.