Chapter 2 #2
"Can you let her know I'm here?" Cassidy fixes her gaze on Gianna and notices her tense at the request. So she presses just a little harder to get a response. "Mr. Barnes — senior partner — was very clear that I should introduce myself to her."
Gianna decides that if Tatiana takes even one more day to come back, she will resign.
She won't even ask for a transfer — she'll just walk out and go work for a competitor, because dealing with Diane on a daily basis isn't worth it.
The woman looks perpetually ready to take someone's head off, and Gianna can't stand the look of pure irritation she gives whenever she's interrupted.
But a partner outranks her boss, so she has no choice but to stand up and do what the girl is asking.
"One moment." She walks to the office of Whitestone's own queen and gives two firm knocks on the wood as she straightens her posture.
"Come in." Gianna shivers at the sound of her voice. Tatiana says she overreacts, but she can't help it.
"Mrs. Carter, Cassidy Collins is outside asking to see you." The assistant drops her gaze when she notices the vein standing out on her boss's neck. "She was sent by—"
"Send her in," Diane cuts her off without looking up, eyes fixed on her laptop screen.
The assistant turns quickly, takes a couple of steps toward the door, and manages something close to a polite smile as she gestures toward the office.
"Thank you." Cassidy steps past her and walks in.
The first thing the intern sees is the cold, unwelcoming expression on the flawless face of a very sophisticated woman.
Cassidy can't quite pin down the exact color of her eyes yet — as she moves closer, what she thought were blue seem to darken into something deeper.
There's an innate elegance about her, in the way she holds her chin just slightly lifted, exposing a pale, striking neck.
The perfect posture and both hands flat on the desk tell Cassidy this is a woman who controls even the way she breathes.
But what really catches both of them off guard — separately — is the electricity in the air.
That split second when the atmosphere shifts and both women lose themselves for a moment in each other's gaze, their heartbeats slowing, something warm and familiar and completely foreign washing over them at the same time.
Diane feels an uncomfortable weight in her chest that makes her blink twice.
"Mrs. Carter, I'm Cass—"
"I know who you are." Diane has no patience for hearing things she already knows. "What I don't know is what you're doing here."
Cassidy is briefly at a loss for words, though she'd love nothing more than to tell her new boss exactly where to go. She tries to stay calm — maybe Diane is having a bad day — but it's hard to manage that with such a combative stare aimed directly at her face.
"My internship starts today." The steadiness in Cassidy's voice causes a faint twitch in Diane's left eye. "Samuel Barnes asked me to come introduce myself to you."
"Samuel's little pet project," she murmurs, so low it's barely audible.
Cassidy isn't sure she heard that right. She has to be mistaken — there's no way her new boss just called her what she thinks she called her.
"I'm sorry?" The intern stops in front of the desk, brow furrowed.
The sharp line of Diane's jaw tightens in a way that looks almost painful as she begins to rise from her chair and reaches across the desk for the phone.
Before picking up the receiver, she takes a moment to scan Cassidy's face, then lets her gaze travel down to her outfit.
That floral shirt that barely contains what she can tell is a generous chest strikes her as a remarkably poor choice.
She brings her blue eyes back to meet the intern's green ones.
"Coming into my department on someone's recommendation doesn't make you untouchable.
" Diane barely moves her lips. "I don't tolerate mistakes.
I don't reward effort — that's just called doing your job.
And I don't care about your personal problems. Whatever they are, I don't want to hear them, because the day they become an issue is the day you're out. "
She picks up the receiver and dismisses Cassidy as if she's already forgotten she's there.
"Tell Thompson that Miss Collins has arrived." As she says it, she squeezes her free hand into a fist. "She'll wait outside my office — he knows what to do."
Diane ends the call, trusting her supposedly efficient assistant to follow through, and sits back down to continue reviewing the Gales project documents that now require her personal attention.
"Miss Collins, at Whitestone we don't like to waste time." Diane doesn't look up, typing something with focused precision. "Unless you're taking the day off, I'd suggest you step out of my office, wait for your direct supervisor to come get you, and get to work."
Cassidy has to make a heroic effort not to say something she'll regret to the woman in front of her.
Her expression is so arrogant it seems like common courtesy would cause her genuine physical pain.
What bothers Cassidy most, though, is that her new boss — with that infuriatingly attractive face — couldn't care less what she thinks.
She takes a breath. She can't throw this away.
She can't let Payton down, or Samuel, and least of all the nine-year-old girl still living somewhere inside her — the one she promised she'd become someone. Someone who mattered.
"Have a good day, Mrs. Carter," is all Cassidy allows herself to say, and when she gets no response, she turns and walks out of the office.
And even though neither of them would ever admit it, they both know that something in this moment — something that just happened — is going to change the course of their lives forever.