“My favourite. You know I love you right now?” He laughed, leaning over to kiss her on the cheek.
“Yeah, yeah, shut up and eat,” she ordered, smiling, wondering why her whole body tingled when he said it.
“Oh,” she blurted, swallowing her food. “I don’t think you are going to have a secretary when you go to work today,” Jessica informed him, secretly laughing to herself.
“What are you talking about?” Jake questioned, his brown eyes narrowing.
“Well, not only did you run off on her last night, but you left your phone on my locker.”
“And what has that got to do with anything?”
“When someone calls at 2 a.m., I don’t really open my eyes to check if I am answering my own phone. It was yours, and it was Ciara. The poor girl had a hissy fit.”
Jake laughed loudly as she explained everything to him.
“She called me a skank. I’ll show her how much of a skank I am.” Jessica raised her eyebrows, feeling the anger boil inside, which only made Jake laugh even harder. “So, yes, I don’t think you will have a secretary this morning.”
“And you expected her to believe that I just left my phone here. Get real, baby. She may look dumb, but she has some sort of brain in there.”
“It was the best I had. I wasn’t going to tell her I slept with you. She would have been around here with a gun and a shovel.”
“You always had an active imagination. But she won’t leave.”
“How do you know?”
“How could you leave this face?” He pouted. “It’s just irresistible.”
“You are so full of shit, Jake Williams.” Jessica threw a piece of toast at his face.
“Oi! Just because you’re hot doesn’t mean you can get away with throwing food at me.” He used his voice of authority; a voice Jessica could never take seriously.
“Shut up and eat, Jake!”
Later that morning, she sat in her office, sipping on her coffee as she replied to emails.
“My secretary quit,” Jake stated, suddenly appearing, leaning against her door frame.
“Hate to say it, but I told you so. She could resist the face after all.” She felt rather proud of herself for being right.
“And she left one hell of a rumour in her wake. I heard our names being mentioned at least five times on the way down here.”
“Great! That is just great. Where did I get you from?” Jessica threw her head back, hoping someone out there would give her an answer because right now, she had no idea.
Men! she thought to herself.
“I’ll just have to get a new secretary,” Jake told her, shrugging casually, knowing he could have his pick of sexy blondes. He didn’t even care about the rumours.
Jessica grunted in distaste. “You know I am being called the office slut out there and you want a new secretary.”
“You are not being called a slut, Jess. They know you’re not. They love you around this place. Believe me, they don’t think that of you. They only want something to talk about, and unfortunately, we are today’s bait, but you know how they are. It will calm down after a while.”
She knew he was right, but it still didn’t make her feel any better. Jessica didn’t want everyone to know she was sleeping with her boss. He may have been just Jake to her, but to everyone else, he wasn’t. He was the powerful man upstairs who decided exactly how far you could go in this company.
“Just relax, Jess,” he advised her, turning his gaze to the window.
He always loved Jessica’s office. He loved the view of the city, watching the people below. From his office, you were closer to God than the ground and the people below looked like ants. With him being the boss, she didn’t know why he didn’t take it from her. He could if he wanted.
“Jake,” she called after giving him his few minutes.
“Uh-huh?” he answered, turning his head to look at her.
Damn that man! She couldn’t even look at him, and her stomach started doing gymnastics.
“Do me a favour?” she asked.
“Anything your heart desires.”
“Get your ass out of my office.”
“I am your boss. I can stay here if I want.”
“No, you can’t. It’s harassment. Besides, I am also the woman you are screwing, so unless you want to keep on using that drill of yours, I would do as I say,” she demanded.
“Wow,” he breathed. “It turns me on when you’re feisty, Jess.”
“Then turn yourself off. I’m busy, Jake. Please get out,” she practically begged. Jessica knew if he sat there any longer, she would get nothing done, and she had a lot to do.
“You’ll be busy later,” he promised before he left.
“Yeah, that’s what you think,” she shouted after him.
Seriously, who was she trying to convince? She was a terrible liar, even to herself.
“Nope, I can’t leave yet,” Jake disagreed, strolling back into her office. She threw her pen on the table and looked at him with evil eyes. He was beginning to annoy her.
“Why?” she shouted her moans.
“Just because.” He shrugged, walking closer and closer until he was standing right in front of her. She eyed him up and down suspiciously, wondering why the hell he was standing in front of her like that. But then she gasped inwardly, feeling his warm hands cradle her face. When she looked up again, she could feel his cool breath on her face, and his eyes staring right into hers. He leaned in even closer and kissed her hard on the lips. Lingering there for a moment longer, she sighed like a teenage girl.
Then he straightened up and walked away, leaving a dumbfounded Jessica behind him.
Chapter Eleven
She slipped her long arms into her knee-length coat and made her way towards the coffee shop across the street. The wind that swept across her bare legs was moist and stung with a bitter chill. Winter was here. She could smell it in the air, and she loved it.
What was it about winter that instantly brought the images of flaming fires, snuggled up with a cozy blanket and a hot cup of cocoa? How could it not be people’s favourite part of the season?
“Jess!” she heard her name being called. She turned around, the wind making her loose, dangling curls stick to her face. She could feel her pulse quicken at the sight of Jake running towards her, his grey suit fitting perfectly to his toned body.
“Where are you going?” he questioned, catching up with her.
“I’m going to get coffee.”
“Mind if I come?”
“No.” A smile graced her full lips.
Taking a step inside the heated coffee shop, the warmth made her cold cheeks tingle.
“Go sit down,” he told her before making his way towards the counter.
Strange. For once, he wasn’t flirting with the girl behind the counter. She looked disappointed.
“What was that face for?”
She hadn’t realized it, but she was looking at him funny. She could feel her face tighten because of the way her eyes were narrowing and her nose wrinkled into something painful.
“Sorry, I’m off on one of my daydreams,” she lied, looking away, hiding the fact her face was turning pink.
“I thought you should know, there’s a new guy starting today,” he informed her, taking a gulp of what Jessica suspected was tea.
“Really? Who?”
“Our new publisher. He gets in at two, so I was hoping you could show him around. He transferred here from JK’s Publishing House.”
“Now that is hot. You know what they say about the men over there in JK’s Publishing House.” Jessica’s eyes sparkled.
“Claws off, tiger,” Jake warned, laughing. “It’s against company policy to sleep with a colleague.”
“It looks like you will have to handcuff me and throw away the key.”
“Any time, baby.”
Jessica just rolled her eyes and nodded her head in disgust. She should have known he was going to say something li
ke that. “There really is no stopping you, is there?”
He agreed with a smug nod.
For a long moment, they sat there in silence, both listening to the havoc surrounding them. When she thought about it, she always found it odd that she never experienced the silence between them to be awkward. It was comfortable, as if they were both content to sit in each other’s presence and not decode unspoken words.
When she turned her head to look back at him, he was staring straight at her; his dark, coffee-coloured eyes seeping through hers. She had to look away in fear she would get lost in his gaze.
“Jake?” Her voice was low, looking out onto the street where people were rushing.
“Yes, sweetheart?”
Jessica turned to look at him again, only this time he was smiling slightly.
“What do people do if time is running out?” she asked, knowing it was a risky question, but she needed his answer. “When they want to live every minute of their lives before it’s too late?”
For a minute, he searched her face for some sort of explanation. Then he rubbed his fingers over the bridge of his nose.
“You’re asking me? Were you not the very girl who told me she lived every day as it comes?”
“Yes,” Jessica agreed, nodding her head. “But I don’t think I am doing it right.”
“Jess?” His face drenched with concern as he reached over to take her hands in his.
Instead of answering him, her eyes were begging, pleading with him desperately. She didn’t know why it mattered so much to her, but she needed to know what he would do.
Jake swallowed hard, and the tension in his face eased.
“You fight every day,” he answered her honestly. “Five years ago, when Mom was dying,” he began, “I watched her fight every day she was sick. Every day was a struggle against the evil inside her. But she fought, and she kicked and screamed until she felt she had won. She fought it out until the bitter end and until she didn’t want to be a winner anymore. The doctor gave her four months. A year later she was still running around.”
Jake had always taken his mother’s death extremely hard. That was why she was so scared of letting him in. She didn’t want him to go through any of it again. It would kill him.
“When she was dying,” he continued. “I have never seen so much love come from one person in all my life. She told me to enjoy life the way I thought I should. She told me to find the woman I love.” Jake’s eyes faltered from Jessica’s face, onto the table where his features narrowed into a sudden concentration. It was like he was just realizing something for the first time.
Jessica breathed in softly as his warm hands tightened around hers.
“She told me that when I found that girl to never let her go and fight like hell until she was mine.”
But then he pulled his hands away from her sharply and looked out onto the street. “All I have to do now is find someone worth fighting for.” He shrugged coldly.
Jessica could feel her heart sink to the lowest part of her stomach, and whatever colour she had in her cheeks had totally drained. She mentally cursed herself for feeling this way. She wasn’t supposed to get attached like this. Wasn’t this everything she warned herself about, everything she told herself wouldn’t happen?
She sipped away the last drop of her coffee and looked at her watch.
“I think we should get going,” Jessica announced, standing up to put on her coat.
“Let’s go then,” Jake agreed, jumping up, smiling as if he had said nothing at all.
And why would he? He was being honest. He hadn’t found the person worth fighting for yet, and as much as it killed Jessica to admit, she needed to get over it.
*****
Later that day, Jessica blinked her heavy lids over glossy eyes and smothered back the urge to yawn as she stood limp shredding paper. It amazed her how she always became so easily amused. It was now two in the afternoon and she had been standing over the shredder for the past hour, just watching as the tiny swords inside the electrical machine sliced through the delicate paper like a lion who hadn’t hunted in weeks. Its steel claws roared to life as each white sheet merely touched the entrance.
She needed a night out on the town with alcohol, high-heels and a dance floor. That’s all she wanted in her simple life. It beat shredding paper half the afternoon.
But there was a reason she was tired and lazy. After Jake lost his last secretary - which, to be fair, was partly her fault, she had agreed to hold interviews for the new position, and she found the perfect match. She was quite pleased with her choice. They were smart, clever, and particularly good-looking.
“Good morning.”
“Speak of the devil,” she muttered.
He tilted his head to look at her with suspicious eyes. Did she look that bad?
“What are you doing shredding paper in your bare feet?”
“My carpet is really soft, Jake. You should try it. And please don’t ask about the paper shredding. There is something about the noise that calms me.”
“How long have you been standing there?” His gaze was scrutinizing her even more so now. Maybe she was mad.
“An hour,” she answered without any shame, still standing there lazily, balancing on one leg as she tried to scratch it with her other foot.
“Have you not got anything better to do than to stand there and give yourself paper cuts?”
“I have plenty to do, I just don’t want to.”
He accepted her answer without argument. How could he argue with her now? She was even too lazy to bend over and scratch her leg with her fingers. If he tried an argument, she was simply going to blink in response.
Epic!
Energy? That disappeared when her coffee from this morning drained from her system. She was now on autopilot, and the battery was slowly dying.
“You always were the definition of class, Jess, you know that?” She merely yawned in response.
“How did the interviews go? I hope you came across as more enthusiastic than you are now?”
“I found a new assistant. Great references and plenty of experience.”
“Fantastic! What is she like?”
“Blonde, blue eyes, glorious body.”
He seemed even more attentive then.
“And male,” she continued.
“Male?”
“A very gay male,” she went on.
His eyes widened and the colour in his cheeks suddenly flushed away.
“What’s wrong with you? You wanted a new assistant, not a personal stripper, and I got you a rather wonderful assistant. Don’t complain about his sex. Give him a chance. I guarantee he will do well.”
He paused for a moment, obviously contemplating whether to let her away with this one.
“Fine.” He eventually gave in.
With that, a light tap graced the open door.
Jessica watched as Jake rose from his seat, stretching out his hand to whoever was on the other side.
“Mark, good to see you again.”
Quietly, she popped her head around, nosily breathing in the scene. But her eyes did an unnatural wonder of the man standing in view.
A tall, ruggedly handsome being shaped out in a black suit smiled down towards her. Composing herself, she stood up straight, brushing down the creases in her skirt before she crept around the door to greet him.
“Jessica Connors, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” She extended her hand.
“Mark Walters. The new head of publishing. And the pleasure is all mine.”
“Jessica will show you around if you would like?” Jake offered.
“That would be great if you’re not too busy.” Mark glanced towards her.
“Believe me,” Jake butted in. “She’s not busy.”
Jessica eyed him unappreciatively. She didn’t like people answering for her, but considering she had been shredding paper for the past hour, showing Mark around would be like an adventure.
“It’s no pr
oblem. Come with me.”
She walked a few steps ahead before realizing the ground she was walking on was still incredibly soft.
“Shit,” she whispered to herself, feeling the blush rise in her cheeks, looking down at her bare feet. And turning around only made matters worse as both Jake and Mark were both staring at her, trying their best to hide the laughter.
“Maybe it’s best if I put my shoes on before I take you anywhere.” She smiled, releasing the tension for them both to chuckle.
“Yes, that may be a good idea,” Mark agreed.
As Mark and Jake shook hands and said goodbye, Jessica finally started showing the new guy around. This time with her shoes on.
“So, as you can probably tell by all the photocopying machines. This is the photocopying room.”
“Exciting place.”
“You think it’s exciting now? Come in here before a deadline when all the machines are on overdrive. The buzz just gets the adrenaline pumping,” she joked. “And word of advice if you ever want to photocopy your ass, just let people know. It’s no problem. We’re fine with that kind of stuff around here, but it’s good to let people know so we don’t walk in on you, because there is nothing more awkward than walking in on someone sitting on one of the machines.”
He laughed loudly, his broad shoulders shaking under his suit. “It’s good to know.” He grinned at her.
“So, let’s move on.” She continued walking along the corridor towards the kitchen.
“I’m guessing this is where everyone has sex.” He ran his fingers through his fair coloured hair.
“You’ve got it. Just don’t tell anyone about the sex. We don’t mind walking in on that.”
“So, you’re those kinds of people.”
“What kind of people would that be?” she questioned, her eyes narrowing.
“The perverted kind.”
She paused for a moment, her eyes wandering from him, towards the kitchen and back again.
“I prefer open-minded, but if that’s what you want to call it.”
“It’s good to know I’m working with someone with a sense of humour.”
“Oh please, you got me on a good day. I’m a complete bitch most of the time.”
“Thanks for the warning.” He nodded.
Watch Over My Life: Emotional Love Story (What Will Be Book Series) Page 9