44. Ronan
M y forehead is in my palms as I stare absently at the TCIP report when a knuckle raps on the glass door.
“Yup.”
Archie plows through and sets a mug on my desk. “From Opal Reef.”
“Oh man, thanks. That stuff from the pit was pure tar. I don’t know who brewed it, but they need to be banned.”
“I think it was Mandy,” he mock whispers.
“ Ban her .” It doesn’t matter how cute she is. I have one vice left, and I’d like to revel in it to the best of my ability.
Actually, what I’d really like is my caffeine fix from a certain local coffee shop, but it’s been two days since I stepped foot in there and I don’t plan on going again until I’m sure my head is screwed on straight.
I think Sloane is a real sea witch. Whatever she is, she’s been haunting me since Saturday. I can’t get her out of my mind.
Just thinking about her hardens my dick. See? It’s happening right now.
Archie retrieves a folder from under his armpit. “Updated standards. I know Belinda is pushing for everything online, but here are hard copies. Sometimes it’s easier to … read them this way.”
I smirk. “To figure out what they mean?”
Archie looks sheepish. He knows I don’t belong here. Everyone knows it.
“Thank you.”
“No worries, man.”
Despite my foul mood, I smile as he ducks out. The awkward stiffness of the first few days is quickly fading. My assistant will be telling me to fuck off in no time, and I can’t wait.
Spreading out the new reports over my desk’s surface, I suck back my coffee—it’s not half bad—while I review each page.
They’re mostly projections—occupancy rates, revenue, budget spend.
Yeah, that all makes sense. At least some of the columns do.
I grab a pen to circle the acronyms that may as well be in Mandarin, so I can look them up and figure out why I care, and then I open my calendar to see how much time Google and I have together.
My week is already full of meetings—one-on-ones with my managers who think I’m a moron, with Belinda who treats me like an idiot, with finance so I can approve budget spends for equipment I’ve never heard of, with the golf center media planning committee to talk about a sport I hate, and with the tech department.
That last one, I can’t even guess why they need to meet with me.
Back-to-back meetings where I bring no value to anyone.
All fucking week long.
Why did I ever say yes to this move? Oh right, because Henry dangled a sheet of paper with a lot of digits and perks on it.
And because Abbi asked me to. She has faith in me.
“Ro-nan!” A familiar bellow sounds down the hall from the direction of the pit .
“Not this.” I hurry from my chair, spilling my coffee all over the hard copies Archie just gave me as I bolt out the door.
Connor’s leaning over a cubicle wall, dressed in a salmon-pink golf shirt and tan pants, flirting with Minnie.
“Hey.” My voice is clipped. I jerk my chin in the direction of my office and then march away, expecting him to follow.
He takes his sweet time, sauntering in a whole minute later, a scrap of paper with Minnie’s phone number between his fingers.
“ No .” I snatch it and tear it up.
“Dude!” His face contorts with shock.
“That’s Belinda’s assistant.”
“Damn, even better. We can play a little game of boss and assistant—ouch!” He rubs a palm against his chest where I punched him. “That hurt.”
“Good. Stay away from her. I don’t need you causing more trouble for me.” While Belinda was decent enough yesterday, I don’t doubt she’ll change direction on me as fast a cobra when I screw up.
“What the fuck is your problem lately, man? You’re gone all weekend?—”
“Here, Con. I was here .” I throw my arms out in my office.
“While you were lounging by the pool and picking up random women.” Except for that brief window when I was at Sloane’s, but he doesn’t know about that.
“And this isn’t Miami. You can’t storm into the pit yelling my name.
Dorian’s a dick. If he gets hold of you?—”
“ Dorian Dorian?” Connor chuckles. “I just left a meeting with him. Me and the other supes.”
“And how’d that go?”
“Fine. The guy loves me.”
“Why am I not surprised.” Because Connor is where he belongs.
I, on the other hand, am drowning. But it’s not fair that I take it out on him.
I inhale a deep, calming breath to try to expel some of this tension.
“Did you get your assignment yet?” Dorian was still deciding how to divide the outdoor crew as of Friday.
“Beach,” he boasts, puffing out his chest.
I chuckle. “Okay, Ken.”
“I got my list of minions already.”
I hold out a hand. “Give it here.”
He digs his phone from his pocket and pulls up the email.
I scan it. “You’ve got AJ Brooks.” He starts Wednesday. Did he even have the guts to call Sloane to officially quit?
“Yeah. Why, you know him?”
“Not really.” But I already don’t like him. “Do me a favor and break him in. He needs to earn it.” Back in Miami, when a new guy started and he looked like he might not hack it, the supervisor gave him all the shit jobs—scrubbing toilets and dumpsters in the stifling heat.
Connor grins. “With pleasure.”
My office door swings open without warning and Belinda strolls in. She stops short when she sees Connor. “Oh. You .”
His cheery mood grows exponentially. “’Morning, boss. Love the glasses. Very strong head mistress vibes today.”
To anyone else, that might seem innocuous enough, but I know Connor well and he’s playing all kinds of dirty scenarios in his mind. At least he’s smart enough to keep his big mouth shut this time.
“Ready, Ronan?” Frosty blue eyes dissect me from behind a set of pink frames, ignoring Connor.
“For what?” Rare panic erupts within as I scan my opened calendar.
“I don’t have anything for another hour.
” First, my meeting with Dorian to address this drainage issue, and then a meeting with Lena and the head office operations team about the budget.
I’m especially dreading that one because there’s no way to hide how clueless I am in a Zoom full of people who do this shit for a living.
Her smug smile is downright vicious. “To see how good your negotiating skills really are.”
The collar of my salmon-pink golf shirt clings to my neck in the heat as I steer us down the path toward the eleventh hole.
Last week the course was empty, but today there are signs of life.
Truckloads of carts are being unloaded and tested by full-timers while the first group of seasonal workers hired over the weekend get a guided tour of the grounds by a young, athletic guy Dorian tapped for supervisor of the caddies.
Hank something, the email that came across my desk said.
“Worried?” Belinda muses, her glasses swapped out for opaque black shades.
That Sloane is so pissed with the way I bolted out of there that she fucks me again, only not in a good way? Absolutely . “No.” Belinda is too smug this morning. This feels like a setup. “Why?”
“Because you’re not your usual self,” she muses. She’s perched cross-legged in the passenger seat of our cart, the split in her green pencil skirt climbing indecently high up her toned thigh.
“And what is my usual self, Belinda?” I’ve shared no more than a handful of superficial conversations with this woman over the years. That afternoon at the Wolf family cabin involved very little talking.
“Like you don’t give a fuck about anything but having a good time.” Her eyes trail over my arms, my shoulders. “You’re tense.”
She’s not wrong there. “I guess stress doesn’t become me.” I accidently veer off the path around a bend, leaving indents in the freshly watered and manicured grass. Can’t wait to hear Dorian bitch about that later.
But my focus is locked on the trees ahead.
The signs are gone.
All of them.
There’s no hint of fluorescent poster board, not a single unwelcome sign, save for the standard Private Property, No Trespassing ones.
Nothing but twisted old trees, their branches forming a tangled screen to hide the quaint paradise beyond, with its charming, colorful trailers and garden patch bursting with greens.
My body sinks into my seat. At least one thing has worked out for me.
“Well, would you look at that,” Belinda says.
“Hopefully, that’s satisfactory for you and Wolf.” Enough that Henry will let go of whatever resentment he might still hold for Sloane.
Belinda pivots in her seat to face me, her expression unreadable.
“What?” My voice is wary. Did she figure out that I fucked the one woman she demanded I not?
“Fine.”
I frown in confusion.
“I will teach you everything you need to know.”
“Because you weren’t already going to?”
She studies her manicure. “No, I was going to explain things to you with as much reluctance as possible, while making you feel like a tiny, insignificant, stupid man for wasting my time, until you quit.” She assesses me like a lioness deciding whether to mate with or kill the male in front of her.
“ But I think I’m beginning to see what Henry sees.
So, I will help. If you fail anyway, that’s on you. ”
Her offer is a lifeline—a rope tossed over the edge of a cliff with me clinging to the only jagged rock. “Thank you.” And I truly mean it.
“Don’t thank me yet. I hope you’re ready. These next two weeks are going to be painfully long and especially rough.”
Just how you like it, Belinda .
With an almost friendly pat against my shoulder, she goads, “Come on. Let’s get started.”