Chapter 21
Juliet
I woke up to the blare of my alarm, giving me its third and final warning to get the hell out of bed.
I groaned as I rolled over and hit it with a good whack of my hand, silencing it.
I had snoozed long enough. Even though I would have loved to stay in bed for another solid four hours, I had to go to work.
Not usually a place I would want to be after maybe four full hours of sleep, but the thought of Chester being there gave me a little more incentive.
I could not believe we had sex in his office last night. Twice.
It was just as good as I had built it up to be in my head, if not better.
The risk was worth the reward, even though I had been slightly paranoid the cleaners would somehow catch an earful over the loud humming of their vacuums. We had kept it quiet.
I could still feel Chester’s finger against my lips, moving as he moved, his hips rocking into mine.
I stretched out in bed and let out a satisfied sigh, then peeled the sheets off me and set my feet on the shag rug below my bed, the softness tickling my toes.
I glanced one more time at that devil of a clock and determined I had just enough time for a shower, a coffee to go from my own kitchen, and a swipe of lip gloss.
With my travel mug in hand, I hailed down a cab down on the curb, while attempting to button my blazer with the other hand.
Quite a feat for being slightly hungover and exhausted…
and sore in all the best ways. The ride to work was thankfully quick and I was surprised to have arrived five minutes early.
I truthfully could have just slept there, but with no extra clothes, it would have raised some questions.
As I strode for my office, I saw Chester’s door was closed, but the light was on.
I pursed my lips slightly. His door was never closed this early in the day, as his meetings started later, and we liked to exchange a little flirty greeting when either of us arrived.
In my own office, I took a long sip of coffee and checked my lip gloss, the only makeup I had time for, before grabbing my iPad.
Every morning, we went over his schedule for the day, and the butterflies in my stomach were quick with anticipation to see him.
I knocked on his door softly.
“Come in,” his muffled voice came through the door.
“Good morning,” I said in a sing-song voice as I walked into his office, where we had just been ravaging hours before. I looked out the window to the morning view of Manhattan, looking for any trace of us and what we did against it last night.
“Morning,” said Chester gruffly, not looking up from the papers in his hands.
Not quite the greeting I was expecting. Maybe something had happened with the government deal he had told me about last night. I brushed off his cool greeting and took a seat across from his desk.
“I have your schedule for the day,” I said, sliding over the iPad, making sure to give him a good view of the new lace bra I had bought last week.
He barely looked up before putting a hand up. “I’ve already looked it over,” he said.
“O-Oh. Okay.” I nodded.
Never has this man ever gone over his own schedule for the day. It was like he needed someone to hold his hand through it. Up until this point, I thought it was an excuse for us to have more time together, be it all of five minutes.
“Will that be all?” he asked coolly.
“Um…yes. I guess that’s all,” I said, hating how my voice shook with the hurt that was constricting my heart.
Chester’s eyes were cold and had barely graced my own for more than .5 seconds until they were back on the paperwork in his hands.
“Is everything okay? Did something happen with the deal?” I asked, sliding the iPad back toward me before clutching it against my blazer. I felt foolish for trying to get his attention with a new bra and an extra button undone.
“The deal is fine,” he said, now looking at his computer, his tone dismissive.
I stood from the chair, desperate to get out of there, but also desperate to shake him and ask what the hell was going on.
I went with the former and slipped out of his office with tears burning the backs of my eyes, closing his door behind me.
I shut myself in my office, drawing the shades, not wanting anyone to see the tears stream down my cheeks.
The thoughts that swarmed my head pierced into me like daggers…
You are a fool.
You are a tramp.
You are nothing.
I internally batted each insulting, intrusive thought away, before trying to piece together what went wrong from 2 a.m., when we left each other, to now, six hours later.
It wasn’t like I expected him to take me in his arms or kiss me, but I wasn’t expecting that.
I didn’t even know that man in there. That was the Chester Brandfield everyone else knew, but not me. He always treated me different.
He got what he wanted and now he’s done.
I shut my eyes tight at the thought. Maybe this whole job transfer had been for a chance to sleep with me again. Now that he’d had me, he was bored. The chase was over and it was no longer fun for him. It made sense, but it didn’t hurt any less.
I didn’t know what I was expecting out of all of this.
An intense office affair? A relationship?
A flirty friendship? As much as I tried to pretend I hadn’t seen this going anywhere, last night changed something for me.
The way he looked at me almost made the sex seem meaningful, especially the last time.
The way we moved together. His deep kiss. The intensity of his gaze.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
The next few days were mostly spent out of office on a wild goose chase trying to accomplish the lengthy to-do lists Chester had set out for me.
He would email me early each morning a list of bulleted items I needed to complete by end of day, and none of them had anything to do with seeing him or speaking to him.
I was officially his errand girl, running around town picking up dry cleaning or hand-delivering contracts that could have been emailed or looking at event spaces for potential charity events that weren’t even on the calendar yet.
They were things to keep me far away from him, and each one hurt more and more.
Three days after we had slept together, I arrived early to the office, no longer hurt, but angry that I had given up my job in accounting to be bossed around like a petulant teenager.
I knocked on his office door in the most modest suit I had in my closet, my hair pulled back into a slick ponytail, and my lips pressed into a tight smile. I was done with whatever this was.
“Come in,” he said through the closed door.
“Good morning,” I said coolly.
“Did you not receive my email?” he asked, raising a brow.
“Oh, yes. I did receive it.”
“Then you know what you need to do for the day.”
“I’m just wondering when I will start being a personal assistant again and not your errand girl.” I crossed my arms and narrowed my gaze.
“This job entails a lot of tasks. If you’re not up for it…”
“I’m more than capable,” I interrupted.
“Good. Because I’m going on a business trip this evening, and I need you to finish everything I assigned you by the time my flight takes off.”
He was leaving. As much as I had hated the past few days, I hated the idea of him not being here even more. I had hoped I would get some answers, but now I just felt like a little kid in a suit too big.
Not wanting to cry, I nodded without a word and strode out of his office, closing the door firmly behind me.
Whatever we had was over. He had made that much clear.
I suddenly regretted ever taking this job, not only as Chester’s personal assistant, but coming to work at Brandfield Enterprises at all.
The next morning, Chester was gone. According to his digital calendar, he was in Vegas meeting with a client.
Vegas was already far, but right now, it felt like it was across the world.
I looked over at his closed office door, the light off and his desk empty through the window.
Surprisingly, he had hardly left me anything to do, just proving that he had been keeping me away from him these past few days.
I wondered if I hadn’t slept with him again that night, if I would be in Vegas with him.
The thought made my stomach hollow out. It also made me feel like a fool for even entertaining the idea that if I had just kept playing games, he would still be interested in me.
That wasn’t healthy. That was a walking damn red flag.
I had never been this girl. I really hated her.
The first day he was gone, I tried to find things to do, even asking the junior associates if they needed help, which left them scratching their heads.
When that didn’t pan out, I decided to be proactive in getting my life back on track, starting with finding another job.
I sat down at my desk and opened up the search bar, typing in accounting jobs in Manhattan.
I scrolled through them, hating the idea of starting over with cover letters and résumés and interviews.
I also hated the idea of asking Chester to be a point of reference.
I sighed and put my head in my hands as the computer screen glared back at me harshly. Maybe I could move back to accounting. I had only been there a day, but maybe I could transfer back. I picked up my phone and dialed Sarah’s extension to the downstairs accounting office.
“Brandfield Enterprises. You’ve reached accounting.”
“Sarah. It’s me, Juliet.”
“Hey, girl! How is it on the top floor?”
I frowned. “Not so great, honestly.”
“Uh oh…”
“Transferring here was a mistake.”
“Did something happen with…” She lowered her voice, but didn’t finish her sentence, knowing that people could be listening.
“I don’t know. I just don’t think being a personal assistant is for me,” I said, leaving out the fact that the guy I had been sleeping with had a sudden change of heart. “It’s not all it’s cracked up to be…”
“Aww, girl. I’m sorry,” she said.
“It’s fine. I think I want to come back to accounting, though.”
“Well, good. Because I miss you!”
I smiled for what felt like the first time in a while.
“I miss you, too.” I didn’t realize how much I needed a friend.
“Let me see if I can soften Mike to the idea of you coming back to accounting. Okay?”
“Thank you, Sarah,” I said gratefully.
“Of course. Talk soon!”
I hung up and leaned back in my chair, staring at the ceiling. Maybe things would work out and I could forget anything had ever happened with Chester. If he could pretend, then so could I.
The next morning, I arrived at the office later than usual because I didn’t see a point in being there any longer than I needed to be.
With Chester gone, and my email void of any to-do list from him, what was the point?
I also had spent most of the morning lying next to the toilet or crouching over it, throwing up.
I assumed it was from the sushi I had ordered in the night before, but when I thought about it, I had been sick the past couple mornings.
I arrived at the office just past 9:30 on an overload of mouthwash and bronzer to bring some color back to my face.
No one even batted an eye at my late arrival.
I looked toward Chester’s office, so used to him being there, but he wasn’t.
He was still on his business trip. I ignored the overwhelming feeling of him being gone and walked into my office, closing the door behind me.
When I sat down at my desk, my eyes landed on a picture sitting on the wooden surface.
I looked around for any sign of life outside my office windows for any clue of who might have come in here before looking back to my desk.
I tilted my head in confusion as I picked it up to look at the dark, glossy image.
It looked to be a picture from a surveillance camera and when I squinted, trying to see it better, I let out a gasp as my heart plummeted to my stomach.
It was a picture of Chester and me in his office from the other night. His hands were covering my bare breasts and we were pressed against his office window. It was taken from far away, as if from the building across the way, but our faces were clear. And it was clear what we are doing.
I flipped over the picture to see a sticky note stuck to the back.
In black, bold marker, it read, If you thought you went viral before…