Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
When we walked back into the office, I felt uneasy. Or rather, self-conscious. People were looking at us.
No, they were looking at me.
Kaitlyn Lafferty was on our floor and looked me up and down in a more snake-like way than usual. I looked over at Grant, who avoided eye contact with me and walked straight ahead with his hands in his pockets.
I took the first detour into the bathroom.
As I rounded the corner, the mirror revealed that not only had my shirt become untucked from my bending down in Maggie’s parking garage, but I also must have acquired a pair of brown leaves in my hair when I’d reached down for the keys.
The left side of my hair had them tangled in, and it took several minutes to clear them out as they crumbled between my fingers into smaller pieces.
To think that Grant saw me, sat next to me in the car for several minutes without saying anything, and then let me walk into the building looking like that in front of our coworkers!
Oh. My. God. It looked like I’d been ravished behind a dumpster.
I closed my eyes, taking a few deep breaths until the rage passed.
Fucking Grant.
He was seated and waiting for me with a self-assured grin back in our office corner. I forced my lips to widen into a smile, opened my top desk drawer, dropped Maggie’s keys inside, and slammed the drawer. I vowed to ignore him for the rest of the day.
Ten minutes later, Grant asked, “Hey, why don’t we go give those keys a try in her office?”
I ignored him. What if someone important had seen me like that?
Half an hour later he said, “You know, K, giving me the silent treatment isn’t serving you. You’re dying to find out what’s in there just as much as I am.”
An hour later, I was deep into a problem for a client when I heard, “I’m going into her office.” He began pulling at drawers in Maggie’s office, but I tried to focus on my work.
He came back out, stood next to me, and said, “There’s a drawer in her desk that should open with a little key exactly like the one you’re keeping from me.”
I paid him no mind and stared straight at the numbers on my screen, though they weren’t making sense right at that moment. I moved the mouse in circles.
“Come on,” he said. “I didn’t do anything.”
“That’s right!” I hissed, finally turning to him. “You didn’t tell me I looked like a mess. You let everyone think you and I had a romp in the hay!”
He snorted. “What hay?”
I rolled my eyes. “You know what I mean.”
“It was funny. You’re always so put together and uptight. It was nice to see you look a little less than perfect.”
I was speechless. I looked “put together,” “uptight,” and “perfect”? There was a strange contrast between his words and how I thought of myself. I wasn’t sure if he was giving me some sort of backhanded compliment.
I blinked a few times and said, “Why didn’t you warn me before we walked in? You could have laughed at me in that garage and gotten your kicks in private, but you wanted people to think that we’d hooked up.”
He shrugged. “I could only be so lucky.”
His eyes sparkled, and I knew I would get nowhere with him.
He had not only gotten me to abandon ignoring him, he’d also managed to get me so frustrated that I was ready to give him the keys to shut him up.
I held them tighter in defiance, stood up, and walked past him, my shoulder crashing into his.
Grant leaned over me as I tried the small, locked file cabinet. The key didn’t fit. I walked over to the larger ones that took up half the wall. Grant followed like an excited child. The key entered, and my heart pounded.
It didn’t budge the inner workings of the lock.
“Let me try,” he said as he pushed my hand out of the way.
“It doesn’t work,” I said. He tried over and over. He moved along the wall of cabinets, trying the key for each one, even if they were not locked. I sat in Maggie’s chair, watching him get more and more frustrated.
“What are these good for?” He tried the last cabinet and threw the keys on the floor.
“What if…,” I ventured, “what if it’s a cabinet in another office? What if it’s in Kirkman’s office?”
Grant faced the window with the blinds half-open, the same way Maggie had left them. “It’s Slade’s office now.”
“Exactly. Maggie disappeared around the same time her boss left. If there’s something locked in there, he couldn’t get to it before leaving if Maggie had the keys.”
Grant turned to me and grinned. “Why are you so obsessed with Maggie, K?” His voice was high-pitched and mocking me, but I ignored the bait.
I pursed my lips, walked out of the office, and sat at my desk. There was no way we were getting into Colin Slade’s office without anyone noticing, and there was a meeting tomorrow for which I was severely under-prepared for. I needed to concentrate.
“I’m going to report her missing since no one else is doing it,” Grant said.
“Fine.” I didn’t want to argue because things weren’t looking so good. And because I had no time to argue. Maggie or no Maggie, I’d still have to answer for my job tomorrow.
Grant walked away, and I tried my hardest to keep my attention on the new accounts. Still, every few minutes I stuck my head out to look down the aisle of cubicles, but there was no sign of Grant.
My phone vibrating broke the silence.
Mom: Don’t forget to bring me the medium pot with the glass cover on Friday. The ones I have here are too small or too big.
I quickly replied: I’ll take it.
Mom: Bring a different bathing suit this time. Everyone has seen you in that blue one.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.
Me: Yes, will do.
Mom: We might hike, so bring your sneakers.
Me: OK. I’m working. Make a list. Love you.
Mom: OK! Love you tons.
My computer screen taunted me with my unfinished work when Grant returned.
“Well?” I asked, my patience wearing thin as he simply sat there in silence.
“They took my statement.”
“That’s it?” I shook my head.
He nodded. “They said they’ll call me if they need anything else from me and to try reaching out to friends and family.”
“Will you?” I asked. I grabbed my phone and looked up Maggie’s Instagram. Nothing for several days. I looked at the comments. Most looked like they were from admirers, but it was impossible to tell from the comments whether any were real-life friends.
“What about the last guy she dated—the one in those celebrity magazines? Didn’t you bring it in one day?” He started reaching over to my drawer, and I shut it.
“Excuse me. I don’t read those. But I remember that Monica showed me a picture of Maggie and a football player, whatever his name is.”
Grant sat at his computer and typed in a name. I recognized the football player but pointed out that a different picture dated a week ago on his socials showed him engaged to another socialite.
“I doubt he’ll know where she is,” I said.
“Unless he’s up to something.”
“We can’t suspect everybody,” I thought out loud, “but I think Kirkman is a solid lead. Any chance you can get back into that HR computer?”
He stared at me, eyebrow arched. “You want me to risk my job?”
My eyes widened. “You already did that!”
“If I get fired, what will you do? You’d miss me too much.”
I pushed his chair. “I’ll survive.”
As everyone began to leave for the day, I’d somehow finished enough actual work to have greater confidence in my presentation the next day. An hour later, I decided it was late enough.
The floor was mostly empty as I walked out. There were only a couple of heads sticking out from the tops of their cubicles. The elevator's ding broke the welcoming silence as the doors slid open for me.
I froze on the spot as a pair of blue eyes greeted me. My feet were heavy, like anvils I was trying to lift off the ground.
Thankfully, my brain kick-started. I walked into the elevator and stood next to Colin Slade.
The air around me was electric. It was as if I were part of a circuit that included both of us in that elevator, and a charge was bouncing between us. I hazily wondered if it was because I was humiliated by how I’d conducted myself when we first met.
The trance I’d fallen into was broken when he spoke.
“Katelynn, right?” His voice was smooth, deliberate. “I look forward to tomorrow, Ms. Donovan.”
My mouth was clamped shut, and I had the same sensation as being at the top of a roller coaster looking down on an impossibly steep fall. The rapid beat of my heart filled my ears.
“Mmm-hmm. Me too,” I squeezed out.
Did I sound as unsure of myself as I felt standing next to this man, who was almost an entire head taller than me and wearing a suit that probably cost more than I made in a month? Not that I cared about that kind of thing, but I was very aware of the vast differences between us.
“I was going to bring this up tomorrow, but I might as well do it now rather than in front of ten other people,” he said, pausing at the end as if waiting for me to say something. Or maybe he was waiting for me to look at him, which I’d avoided doing so far.
I turned my head to the right, finally meeting his eyes. It was the first time I was really able to study his features up close—his sharp jawline, prominent cheekbones, and focused eyes framed by dark lashes.
“I’ve heard wonderful things about your department.
Of Ms. Flame, of course, but of how instrumental you’ve been to her success and that of the agency,” he started.
I was sure I was blushing, and I looked away, trying to stop my lips from growing into a grin.
The elevator reached the bottom floor, and we walked out into the lobby.
“Kaitlin…my assistant—though I know you are the Katelynn—” His emphasis on my name, paired with a raised eyebrow, drew an involuntary giggle from me as I sheepishly recalled how boldly I’d spoken to him the day before. What a stark contrast to how tongue-tied I felt now.
He continued, “She’s been unable to reach Ms. Flame, and I’d like to plan for contingencies for this weekend’s client meeting in Chicago.
Would you be willing to step in? Of course, the agency pays for your flight, hotel, and transportation.
You’d get a meal stipend plus dinner at one of the finest restaurants in the city. ”
I took a deep breath in and held it. All my fears of speaking in front of this magnetic man were replaced with overwhelming anxiety at being responsible for closing a deal which Maggie had been working on for the last month.
He must have seen the panic on my face because he said, “I figure this is new for you, but from everything I’ve heard, it sounds like you’re very capable. How about we reconvene after the meeting tomorrow, to let you sleep on it?”
I finally released my long-held breath. “Yes,” I said, “I’ll give it all the consideration it deserves.”
“Great. And listen, I’m not new to reeling in new clients, but I’m new to working here, so we’d be going at this together as newbies, if that makes you feel better.”
I laughed. “I’m not sure it does. I’d rely heavily on your expertise at closing the sale.”
“No problem there,” he said, extending his hand. I was caught off guard for a second, but quickly met his hand with mine. The warmth of it reassured me that this was an actual flesh and blood person like me and not the Greek god he looked like.
“See you tomorrow,” he said, then nodded and walked toward the exit. A sleek black car was waiting for him right outside the lobby. He stepped inside and disappeared into the night.
The elevator opened again behind me, and I realized I was still standing where Colin Slade had left me bewildered by his presence and his offer.
I wasn’t sure exactly what had changed, but something had.