Chapter 6 Tell Me Now
Tell Me Now
JAMIE
The chime for the front door sounded a half hour later. I scowled, checking the clock on my office wall. I’d been trying to get some paperwork done before the day got eaten up by interviews.
“She’s early,” I called to Seamus, who was in the next office over.
“What’s that you always say?” he called. “Early’s on time and on time is late, right?”
Fine. She got a point for timing.
I sighed, getting to my feet. “I’ll go get her.” Seamus knew I liked being the first to see potential hires. To see how they reacted when they weren’t warmed up by someone else.
I downed the last of my coffee and headed up to reception, fixing a neutral expression on my face. I wasn’t a smiler, but my resting scowl face tended to scare people, and I didn’t want to go that far.
But when I pushed through the door, my sorry excuse for a non-frown froze on my face.
I could see only the top of the woman’s head, because she was squatting down. Her panty-hosed knee stuck out between the sides of a trench coat pooled on the floor.
In front of her was a very wet, very small, very muddy dog.
My brain misfired. But it wasn’t because of the dog, which didn’t make sense. It was because for a moment, I thought it was her. The angel. The stranger I’d spent more than a little time wondering if I’d made up.
But when she tilted her face so I could see the full scope of her profile, my stomach plunged.
It was her. There was no fucking doubt. That face was branded into my fucking soul.
She looked different than she had on Friday, of course.
Her coat was open, and under it she was wearing a neat suit, the white blouse under the blazer buttoned primly all the way up to the collar, so different from that soft gray sweatshirt.
Her face wasn’t split in a grin, dried tear-tracks still visible on her cheeks.
It was professional and measured, if not slightly apologetic.
She still hadn’t fully turned to me, since the dog was wriggling, trying to leap up and lick her face.
Then she did.
And her face was drained of color. She rose, though she stayed bent over, still holding the dog’s collar. Her knuckles were white.
“I… uh…” she stammered.
I felt the exact same way.
Because this did not compute. The angel who fell to earth and fucked me up, before supposedly drifting back up to heaven, was in my office, here to interview for a fucking job.
Cora cleared her throat. “Jamie, this is Sarah Cooper, your nine o’clock. And Slick, the dog.”
Sarah looked over at Cora with a polite smile. Then back to me. “I know this is a little strange,” she said to me.
“You think?” I bit out.
Cora sucked in a breath at my rudeness. I shouldn’t have snapped like that. But I was choked.
The woman’s throat bobbed as she swallowed, though I didn’t miss the lick of fire in her eyes.
“Jamie,” Cora said quickly. “The dog is lost. She was running around scaring people outside, and Ms. Cooper kindly caught her. I invited her inside.”
I looked over at my receptionist, who’d straightened her shoulders and was looking at me in a way eerily reminiscent of the woman who’d trained her. Like I better shut the hell up if I knew what was good for me.
She was right, of course.
I took a breath, willing myself to calm down. I glanced back in the woman—Sarah’s—direction.
But that was a mistake. It gave me the opportunity to catalogue all the things I hadn’t properly seen in the dark.
Things some might call imperfections. Her nose, which pointed up almost too sharply, and was dusted with freckles.
Her eyebrows, thick and just a shade darker than the dark blonde waves hanging neatly around her shoulders.
The sharp, slightly square jaw that might have been severe if it weren’t for the softness of those lips…
Unfortunately, she was just as fucking beautiful as I remembered.
I had no idea what to say.
It took the small dog bounding toward me to break up whatever was happening.
Sarah was wincing, holding her hand, which evidently the dog had hurt breaking free so suddenly.
Even as the dog flew through the air like a hairy little missile, I wanted to snap at it for hurting her.
But then muddy paws hit my dress shirt, nearly knocking me off my feet despite the creature’s tiny size.
The dog stuck its wet, odorous snout in my face, yapping a raspy series of non-barks and then dragging its tongue up my lips in a sloppy kiss.
“What the hell—” I managed, finally finding my words. I gripped the furry creature around the ribs with one hand and wiped my mouth with the back of my sleeve, fighting a gag reflex.
I wasn’t not a dog person. But I was a cat man now. And I was at fucking work.
Sarah grimaced. “I’m so sorry. I’ll pay for your dry-cleaning.”
“No,” I snapped.
“It’s okay,” Cora said. “I’ll get something to clean that up. Hang on, I’ll be right back.”
Cora practically sprinted for the back, leaving us alone.
I knew she’d be back any moment. So I didn’t waste any time. “I thought you were ‘just passing through’.”
Sarah grimaced, closing her eyes briefly. “It was easier that way.”
“And now you’re here, wanting a job.”
Hurt flashed across her expression.
The fuck was wrong with me?
The hurt was gone quickly enough. “I’ll leave. Just give me the dog.”
I was still holding the trembling animal. Slick, they said.
But I didn’t let go. I refused. My brain screamed at me to let go, to agree and watch her walk out the door.
The rest of me wasn’t listening. “No.”
“No?”
“No, don’t leave.”
Sarah blinked.
“You didn’t…” I hesitated. “You didn’t do anything wrong.” Except lie to me.
But that was understandable too, wasn’t it? I’d told a thousand little white lies just like this. I’ve got a lot going on. Work’s busy right now. Instead of I don’t want to start anything or I’m incapable of a relationship anymore.
“Let’s just pretend we never met. Because we didn’t, did we?”
I didn’t mean to make that come out that way. But my feelings were still apparently at fucking play.
She looked like I’d dumped cold water on her.
I wanted to hit myself. Like form a fist and knock myself in the fucking jaw.
Cora came back then, a wet cloth in her hand. “I can take Slick,” she said. But I couldn’t let go. I held the dog to my chest, where it nuzzled against my neck, suddenly my new best friend. Or else it could smell Stu.
Cora hesitated. “Do you want me to tell Seamus you’ll be a minute?”
But my eyes were physically unable to leave Sarah’s. Her eyes were brown, I noticed asininely. Like caramel or coffee with the tiniest drop of cream.
The only way out of this, my arms already knew, was physically removing myself from her presence.
I tore my gaze away, looking at Cora. “I’ll deal with the dog.”
Sarah looked suddenly panicked. “It’s okay. I can do it.”
I didn’t think I could feel more right now, but I did. My chest physically hurt seeing her so worried for this goofy dog. And her thinking I might just let him go outside or something.
“I’ll find his owner,” I said, my tone gentler. “I promise.”
“He’s good with animals,” Cora said. “They seem to like him. Shockingly.” She said that last part under her breath.
The dog wriggled in my arms, licking my face as if to concur.
I grimaced. But Sarah seemed to relax, at least a tiny bit.
I dragged my eyes from her, still unable to fully comprehend that she was here. Still unable to stay in her presence a moment longer.
To Cora, I said, “Seamus will do the interview on his own.”
My receptionist blinked. I’d never abandoned my son like this.
But I had to get myself out of Sarah’s proximity before I did something truly insane.
I’d take the dog home, where I’d left my phone.
Stu would freak out, but it would give me a minute to breathe.
I’d make some calls. Then, by the time I got back to the office, she’d be gone.
I headed for the door. “Let him know, please,” I told Cora over my shoulder. I didn’t wait for an answer. As I passed Sarah, I held my breath. I could only smell dog, but if I smelled her too, I’d do something I regretted. I wasn’t sure what.
I didn’t anticipate her shooting her hand out though, touching my forearm to stop me.
I didn’t want to stop, but that contact shot lightning straight through me, as if the thin fabric between us wasn’t even there.
Frozen in my lobby, Sarah’s hand on my arm, I remembered, unwillingly, the sensation of her bare hip under my hand.
The way it felt illicit for my calloused palm to know something so soft and perfect.
But that was then. This was now, and everything had changed.
When I looked down, Sarah dropped her hand like she’d been burned. But she didn’t back away. Instead, she tilted her chin up, meeting my eye with an intense, demanding gaze. “If I’m going to be wasting my time,” she said quietly, so only I could hear, “tell me now.”
When I met her eyes, her expression was hard. There was the shark we’d seen on the resume. The woman who dried her tears and laughed, pure and free under the stars, with a resilience I wanted to study.
For a moment, I said nothing. I wanted so badly to tell her she needed to leave simply because I’d never survive working with her. But I also wanted to demand she stay, because I couldn’t let her slip away again, even if all I ever got to do was stare at her from afar.
But I was too fucked for either, and neither were fair to her.
I shook my head. “I’m going to leave this up to my son.”
I walked out the door and didn’t look back.