Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
LOLA
"What's that?" a deep voice says behind me. A fuse to hot dreams voice. One I don't want to react to.
And yet...
A shiver races through me, right down to my toes as Enzo leans over me, probably breaking all manner of HR work rules.
Mind you, I'm probably the only one in the entire building on his staff that thinks Enzo's close proximity is HR-worthy. It might be doctor-worthy, my heart is racing, my pussy aching, and my skin is both hot and cold. And God, how can he smell even better?
Today, I swear there is a twist to that hidden dark rose among the unsmoked tobacco, fruit, leather, and...rum? Heady. That is the word. Heady.
It makes something in me want to sigh and then to breathe in deep, savoring.
And he needs to back the fuck off and go away.
Of course, I picture the other staff lining the hall outside HR to complain he isn't invading their space, his breath isn't disturbing the hair at the back of their necks.
"What's what?"
He leans in and points a finger at my screen.
I somehow manage not to slap it away.
It is like he is sliding his hands over me, his skin brushing against mine, flesh to flesh with nothing separating us. Not clothes, not even air.
He is not touching me. He is not attempting to, and I have had others stand closer to see something on my screen when we have been discussing work.
It never bothered me before, so why does it bother me now?
I lick my suddenly dry lips and repeat my question. "What's what?"
"That number. It isn't right."
I take a risk and turn my head, flicking a glance at him.
Enzo is frowning, gaze locked on the screen. "I mean, look at it."
I am. And I get his point. It is just like the other one I found.
"That's what I thought," I mutter.
"What do you mean?"
Something occurs to me at the irritation in his tone. Like I'm not doing my job and I'm avoiding alerting him to things.
I'm not.
This is a different report, and I also saw it right before he came up. In fact, I was checking it when he appeared.
I'm irked that his tone clearly states he hasn't looked at the other one he demanded yesterday.
But hey, that is my fault.
Thank fuck, it is Friday.
"I mean, I have seen this kind of discrepancy before. A—"
"And what?" He takes the back of my chair and spins it so now he is leaning in, close, face right near mine, like we are about to kiss.
Which we are not.
And I wouldn't want to, anyway.
"You didn't think to tell me?" he asks.
I glare at him.
"It was in the report you apparently didn't read. I left a note—a Post-it right there, at the issue. On the file that I took the time to print up and leave on your desk."
"I don't always read the hard copy."
I offer him the tightest, most sarcastic smile I have. "And I highlighted it and left a comment in the document I emailed to you—of the same file." I pause. "You weren't interested in reading that either, clearly."
His dark brown eyes glitter, and I can see the tiny spot where he cut himself shaving, right on the edge of his jaw.
It makes my stomach flip-flop to think he is one of those guys who uses a razor to shave. I bet he has the whole expensive kit: the brush, the foaming soap, the strop to sharpen the blade on.
I almost groan, the idea is so sexy I don't know what to do with it.
Especially when it is about Enzo, a man I despise.
"Do you like playing with fire, Lola?" His voice is low, and it makes my insides twitch.
I veer around that question. "Can you back up and give me space?"
"You had the info on your screen all minuscule. Did you steal your eyes from an eagle?"
"No." I stare up at him, contemplating kneeing him in the balls, but that would definitely end in my firing and possibly a lawsuit. He is probably that kind of man. "But I got my claws from a tiger."
"House cat."
"Their claws still hurt."
His mouth twitches. "And your tongue?"
"Never you mind."
"And here I thought you might say a harridan."
"Is yours from a sexual predator?" I ask sweetly.
He laughs softly. "A predator, definitely."
But he straightens and steps back. "Send that to me, please. And since you're so pleasant, I will give you the rest of the afternoon off."
I open my mouth to respond, but he shakes his head.
"I wouldn't. Any word from you just might change my mind. Take the damned afternoon off."
I should feel like I won the lottery, but I don't.
The dampened mood clings to me faintly all through Friday night and into Saturday.
It is not Enzo, I tell myself. It is Alex.
He hasn't texted me in so long, and his number is not in the cloud. I'm not sure why I didn't program it in, but I didn't.
And now...
Now I can't reach him.
Normally, I would have heard from him, even given his telling me he is busy. He is not going to be busy forever.
I didn't even think of checking in with him after the phone smashing. Enzo took up too much time with his demands, his annoying bossiness, his Enzoness.
And the guilt is now bone-deep.
Guilt I didn't think of him. Guilt that maybe Alex texted when I had no phone and thinks I'm ignoring him.
I didn't even get the new phone up and running for a number of hours—plenty of time for Alex to have texted multiple times. Shit.
Why didn't I program it in? All I have is the photo of me. Not even the one of him.
And I'm ashamed to admit I want that photo. Desperately. I want to gaze at it to cheer me up. I don't care that I wouldn't see his face, he couldn't see mine, but that hot, hot body did things to me and my fantasies...
And now it is gone.
The panic bites deep. Shouldn't the photo be there? And the texts? I have texts from other random shit I don't have numbers for, so... A glitch? Or something to do with the phone?
I'm not technical in that way, so I don't know.
My eyes burn as I blink back the hot blur of tears I refuse to shed.
There must be a way to find him. That app. The dating app. Whatever it is called...
I spend the next few hours setting up a profile and looking for him that way, but all I get are creeps asking me to show them my tits, or asking if I'm good in bed, or...to send them some nudes.
I put the phone down.
The thing I liked most about our relationship was that it was anonymous, and I knew we would never meet. But never meeting and not talking are two different things.
And what if I want to meet him? Not now, obviously. But one day...soon?
I swallow the lump in my throat.
I might never hear from him again. He might have tried, got nothing back, and left the ball in a court I'm locked out of. It makes me sick to my stomach that he could think I'm not interested.
But I blink hard. "Grow up, Lola. You don't even know him. Take it as a sign."
There are plenty of things I can do this weekend.
When I moved in here, I put all the boxes of papers and books and knickknacks Dad and probably Mom had into the spare room.
It is all junk, but I want to go through it because, as with any pile of junk, there might be a gem somewhere in there. A photo, a letter, that sort of thing.
I could get started on that.
Every time I plan to do it, I never do, so maybe this weekend is the time.
I open the door to the spare room that is no bigger than a closet when my phone pings.
I race for it, heart beating like a maniac as I scoop it up.
But the number isn't unknown. I wish I had left it as WN. I had deleted the WN. I was going to type in Alex and save the number as that, but I didn't, and I'm kicking myself.
The number is Ruby.
With a sigh, I answer. "Hey."
"Do you want to go shopping tomorrow?"
"Do I look made of money?"
"No, but you got a pay raise."
"Not yet."
She lets out a groan.
And I crumble. I can window shop. "Fine. I will tag along, distract myself."
"You don't sound so excited," Ruby mutters with an audible sniff. "I have other friends."
"I know. And I'm sorry. I would love to go window shopping."
"Why do you need to be distracted, anyway?"
I go to my sofa and flop down. "When I smashed my phone, I lost Alex's number."
"The cloud?"
"I didn't program it in. Because I'm an idiot."
"No, because it is the smart thing to do. Though, the smartest thing would be to jump Enzo's bones. I mean, you're up there, all day, alone with him."
"Alone." Because even though it doesn't feel like it, it is true.
Enzo is often down on other floors, and he has meetings that aren't listed on anything I'm allowed to see on the reception computer.
It is just when he is there, it is like a thousand suns beating down on me with light. And pressure. And magnetism.
Ugh.
"Not alone with him."
"What. Ever. There is something brewing there, simmering away, the little pressure gauges hiking higher and higher—"
"Stop that."
"He bought you the latest iPhone, Lola."
"He's the boss. He would do it for anyone."
"Then where's mine?"
I roll my eyes. "You didn't break yours, and—"
"I'd blow Enzo for a new iPhone. Actually, scratch that, I'd blow him for free, but that's not the point."
"No, because the point is he didn't buy me a phone as a gift. He got me a replacement that I have to pay for."
"What? Well, I would still—"
"And he's so stupidly rich, he didn't let me get my own that I could afford, he got top of the range."
"So he could reach you, day or night. Do you think he likes filthy, dirty, hot phone sex? I could do it in person without the phone."
I bite down on a laugh. "Probably, he got it so he could call me at lunch to yell at me for not being back three minutes early. Or so he could yell at me from his office without leaving it."
"He could do that now."
"What if Enzo's at lunch? Anyway, enough of that boring brute in a suit, what about my real crisis?"
"You have a crisis that isn't about sexy times with the boss?"
"Stop that. And yes. Alex."
"What about him? He's one step from being imaginary."
"What if there's a chance for something? And I ruined it by missing his texts? What if he thinks I don't want to talk to him?"
"Good lord, you'd think you don't date."
I don't say a word.