Chapter 11
Noah
I catch the exact moment she feels my rage zeroing in on her. Her smile falters for a heartbeat before she snaps it back on, straightening her posture and bracing for a hit.
Her black skirt hugging her hips and white shirt buttoned up to her throat are completely HR-compliant but damn sinful. Her hair’s twisted into a low ponytail, loose strands framing her face, softening the fire in her eyes currently directed at me. No red-blooded man would be able to look away.
“No fucking way!” I snap. I just fired my assistant for messing with my permit, and now they want to give me a spoiled princess who hasn’t worked a day in her life and just wants to slum it by working in an office. And she just had to choose mine for that.
Martin’s grin falters, the offense turning genuine, which is rich after I’ve just been thrown into a fire pit, and he doesn’t seem to be very surprised by her arrival.
“Excuse me, Mr. King, but,” the temp manager’s back straightens while his gaze darts to Martin, “Ms. Wrong’s prior jobs were highly placed and very successful,” he continues in a steady voice while the princess shoots him a surprised look.
Why is she surprised? That he’s defending her? I did that too. Once. I got a soft smile and surprised eyes too. And almost a kiss. And then I fucked it up.
“I don’t care if she organized the Pope’s calendar,” I say, locking my eyes on Bea. Remembering the balcony just reignites my anger. Good. That’s what I need. “She’s not mine.” The words slip out before I realize my mistake. “Not my assistant, I mean, and she’ll never be.”
Martin’s right brow rises slightly, subtly letting me know he noticed my slipup.
“Noah. We need help. You need help. This project is sucking our souls, and if you don’t finish that drawing and start production, the board—and your father—still win,” he adds the last parts quieter, only for my ears to hear.
A printer jams in the hallway, its screech punctuates the silence, reminding me that I have a decision to make. No one moves. Even the fucking printer stopped working.
“Why did you take this job?” I ask her in a flat voice despite the hammering pulse in my ears, ignoring curious stares of every single person who can see our interaction. “Tired of living on your daddy’s money?”
Her lips purse while her little nostrils flare. The same spark I saw in her eyes a year ago returns, and it goes straight into my pants, reigniting the fire that took months to put out. Then her spine straightens while she’s clearly battling for self-control.
“I took this job because I am qualified for it.” Her tone is clipped but firm.
“Not enough.” I shake my head.
“Noah, listen.” Martin steps in front of me, demanding my attention. “You just complained to me how your current assistant—”
“Ex-ass-sistant,” I correct, because I fired her ass ten minutes ago for being a dumb worker who only wants to bat her damn eyelashes at me.
“Ex-ass-sistant,” he repeats with a stupid smile, “wasn’t qualified enough. So you fired her. And now you don’t have an assistant anymore. Amiright?”
I purse my lips because we both know he is.
“Great. And Beatrice here,” he points at the most infuriating woman on the planet, currently standing by Julian’s side and sending me poisonous daggers with her eyes, “has the needed experience.”
“I’m sure she does,” I snort, making her lips turn into one thin line.
“I do have the experience, Mr. King.”
My cock twitches. Fuck. If she keeps talking in that defiant way, I’ll have a situation on my hands. Or between my legs to be precise. And then I can add another broken code to my already-long list of HR problems.
“And let me assure you that working here is not my first option either. But considering we both have been put into this not ideal situation,” her tone is pure professionalism, “we can at least make it work temporarily because we are both adults. Or am I wrong?”
Her gaze drags down my body with obvious disdain, and I return the favor. My eyes linger on her skirt’s curve and then on her lace bra outline, just to piss her off.
Big mistake.
The oxygen evaporates in an instant, the previous unresolved tension thickens, but this time, her eyes are filled with hatred.
Pure, raw, unhinged hatred. It’s rare that I get such a strong response from a female; most women usually fall over themselves for me and become eager and pliant.
Exactly what I like, especially in the past year. Easy and quick has been my motto.
But Bea and her open defiance? It’s something new and more potent than anything I’ve ever been given.
“Your day starts when mine does,” I nearly growl at her, daring her to flinch. I want her to flinch and run away screaming, saving us both the disaster that will happen for sure if she stays here.
Every eye in the room—Martin, Julian, the office workers down the hall—flicks between us, waiting for her to crack. Because that’s what everyone else does.
“When is that?” she asks, pulling a spiraled notebook out of her purse. That’s when I know it’s not happening. She will fight for her win.
Then I shall deliver her a good fight. “When I feel like it.”
“Got it.” She scribbles something in her pad.
“I take my coffee black,” I continue snapping.
“No wonder,” she mumbles under her breath, but we all hear it because Martin coughs into his fist and places his ass back into his chair.
“You start now.” I stride away after saying that, not waiting to see if she follows. She’d better.
A clicking of her heels behind my back says she’s following. I know I walk fast, I also know she’s short, and running in those hooker heels must not be comfortable, but I’m not planning on slowing down. She’d better know what she’s in for right from the start.
When we reach my office, I point at the desk in front of it. “That’s yours. Stay there.”
She drops her bag on the corner, slides into the chair, and squares up to the monitor with her fingers poised like she’s ready to pounce.
“Yes, sir.” Her tone is laced with just enough mockery to make my jaw tick. Among other things.
Even though I know her words are nothing but a joke, my poor dick doesn’t get the memo. The fucker twitches again—I should text one of my hookups and see if one of them would be up for dinner. Or preferably just skipping dinner and going straight to the good part.
As I plant myself on my chair in my office, I think I’ve made a mistake by agreeing to hire her.
We hate each other, that’s true. But I also want to fuck her.
Have been wanting to for eleven months and twenty days.
To be fair, I usually want to fuck anyone in a skirt, but her specifically.
There’s a certain, short, blue-eyed reason I became extra active this year.
It’s the same reason why all my dates are blondes.
But she’s Maeve’s sister—my fuckin’ sister-in-law’s sister. Ezra would skin me alive if I went anywhere near her. He knows me; he knows I don’t do relationships, and by now Maeve knows it too. She’d get upset, meaning Ezra would get mad, and we would be in an even worse state than we already are.
Also, Beatrice doesn’t look like a very competent person.
I mean, she’s Maeve’s sister, and that girl managed to mess up my brother’s coffee for many months.
I’m still not sure if she has learned how to make it right.
Of course, I can make my own damn coffee, but one of the perks of being at the head of a company is that you don’t have to.
So when—when, not if—she messes up, I’ll lose it.
It doesn’t take much these days with all this fucking pressure and the family situation.
Why did she really take the job? She had to know whom she’d be working for, and judging by the disgust on her face when she looked at me, I doubt her feelings toward me have changed. She’s a Wrong, born into wealth, yet here she is, slumming it for a paycheck.
She needed something from the marriage with Ezra, something Maeve has taken, and now she is here. I doubt it’s to get work experience. She is desperate for something, and I can use that to my advantage.