“Listen, Anna, I’m sure you’re a great girl. I just really need to focus on rebuilding this company and I can’t have any pegs out of place,” I offer as an explanation.
“I’m an out of place peg now?” She questions, before pursing her lips.
I groan. “No, no. That’s not what I mean.”
She blinks at me like an innocent animal. “Then what? You don’t really know anything about me, other than the three lines I got out at the interview yesterday.”
“I think you might be a distraction,” I say, instantly regretting my honest answer.
Mr. Cool was kind of my game, so this admission is totally off my normal groove.
“A distraction to you?” She looks like she’s holding back a smile.
I need to recover some balance here. “No, to the other staff members that will be responsible to train you. It’s a very busy time. I don’t think we have the manpower to train and build a whole new department. That’s what I meant. Why would you be a distraction to me?”
Her contained smile falls and she looks more confused than anything. “I’m a fast learner. I promise I won’t be a burden to anyone.”
With that, she shuts her beautiful lips into a pout and makes a point to look everywhere but at me.
Luckily, Kelly knocks on the door and breaks the awkward tension between us. “Good morning, Adam.”
“Morning Kelly. I have good news for you. Anna here has agreed to the position and we have squared away the HR details. If you can show her to her office and help get her started, that would be helpful,” I direct.
Kelly nods and gestures for Anna to follow after her—which Anna seems all too happy to do.
I watch the two ladies retreat—forcing my eyes away from the delicate swing of Anna’s hips as she goes—and decide that I made the right call. Kelly will make a suitable babysitter for Anna. She has been with the company forever and knows everything inside and out. Plus, she had pitched pretty hard in Anna’s favor at the meeting. So, good, now she would be her problem. All I need Anna to do is stay focused on the social media project and stay far away from me before I do something really stupid.
After our stilted meeting, it’s unlikely she would give me a second glance in future meetings. Deep down I know is for the best, but I can’t help the stirring in my slacks that wishes she seemed more interested.
“Ugh,” I groan and run my hands through my thick brown hair. “One and a half billion. One and a half billion.”
I need to keep my eyes on the prize, and in this case, that means cold, hard cash—not Anna’s firm ass, sexy as sin mouth, or her perky breasts.
Banging models in my office is one thing—yes, a thing my father would still not approve of—but at the end of the day, it isn’t going to hurt the business. Having a lusty session with a new staff member in my office…well, that would open an entirely different can of worms. If that happened, I could pretty much bet I’d be saying sayonara to my trust fund.
It simply can’t happen. So that means Anna and her sexy designer clothing wrapped body needs to stay far, far away from me.
Shit.
My cock throbs at me impatiently and I start to search around for the card the blonde model left on my desk a few days before. I have to do something to get Anna out of my mind—and fast.
Sure, she’s hot as hell—but a fling with her just won’t be worth the wrath of my father.
Chapter 7
Anna
“I don’t think he likes me very much,” I say to Kelly as we leave Adam’s office.
She laughs. “Don’t stress too much. He won’t be here long enough to make much of a difference.”
I glance at her as we continue walking. “What do you mean? Isn’t he the owner?”
“Owner’s son,” she corrects me. “Trust me, there’s a big difference.”
She doesn’t offer any further details and I stay silent until we get to a small office that’s hardly bigger than my walk-in closet. Still, it beats a cubicle.
“This is you,” Kelly announces, waving her arms at the entrance like a game show model. “I know it’s not much, but you can jazz it up however you like. Trust me, it’s way better than a cube up on the admin floor.”
I step inside and flick on a light. “No, this is great. I didn’t expect an actual office coming out of the gate. It’s perfect.”
In truth, the office is dark and smelled musty. It’s in such stark contrast to the rest of the chic office space that I wonder why it hasn’t been included in the remodel the rest of the building has so obviously undergone.
This is what starting at the bottom looks like.
Kelly smiles at me as though she can read my mind. “When I started here, I had to share a desk with someone. It was like being in high school all over again. You know, sharing lockers.”
I nod along, acting like I know what she’s talking about. I had gone to a very exclusive private school and never had to share a locker. “How awful.”
“Anyways, my office is just down this hall. Your phone should have my extension labeled. Feel free to call anytime. I’ve emailed you all the info we have on our current social media practices, but this is your baby now, so feel free to tweak as you need. I would just run any major structure changes by someone first.”
“Like Adam?” I ask, wanting to get her back on that topic. The man has left so many question marks in my mind that I’m practically begging for information.
Kelly laughs at the suggestion. “No, not Adam. He wouldn’t be much help.”
“Isn’t he the boss?”
“Yes, for about a week now,” Kelly answers.
“Really?” I can practically feel my eyes bugging out.
“Listen,” she says, leaning in close. “I don’t mean to be such a gossip, especially on your first day, but there are a few things you should probably know. You’ve probably seen the gossip sites and know that Adam has a certain bad boy reputation.”
I nod along, aching for more details.
Kelly glances down the hall before continuing. “Now, I don’t know all the details, but it seems that his placement here is some sort of detention handed down from daddy dearest.” Kelly flipped her long blonde hair over her shoulder.
“Oh, wow. I wouldn’t have guessed.” The new information permeates my brain and suddenly everything makes more sense.
“Yes. Word on the street is that Wilhelm got fed up with Adam’s playboy antics and sent him here to keep him out of trouble. Not that I think it’s working, so far.”
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“Let’s just say, I think Adam is more interested in fucking models than he is in fashion publishing a magazine with photos of them.”
I nod. Adam’s playboy exploits have been published for years all over tabloid magazines and internet gossip sites—another guilty pleasure of mine.
He is always photographed out with a new girl or multiple girls on his arm, and has even been linked to more nefarious instances of drug use and drinking binges. Of course, I don’t trust the gossip magazines one hundred percent, but the sheer volume of pictures released over the years are hard to refute.
Needless to say, Kelly’s claim that he was here for the women and parties wasn’t a stretch to believe.
“This stays between us girls of course,” Kelly says, “but I would suggest you stay away from him as much as possible. I’ve seen the way he looks at you. I like you Anna, I think you can have a great future here. I would hate to see you fail before you get started by getting tangled up with someone like Adam.”
I know she’s right, and yet, all I can think about is the fact that she has caught him eyeing me. I’m used to turning heads and getting the occasional wolf whistle, but never from someone like Adam. A guy like that can and actually does have his pick of any woman on the planet. Why would he been ogling me?
“Thanks Kelly. Trust me, he’s not my type.”
Kelly smiles. “Glad to hear it. Okay, I should get back to
work. Lord knows the whole place will burn down if I’m away from my desk for more than half an hour. But please, remember to give me a call if you get stuck!”
“Will do. Thanks again, for everything,” I say.
She offers a short finger twinkle wave and then dashes back down the hall in her flawless Jimmy Choo pumps.
Alone, I explore the office further and start brainstorming how on earth I will be able to transform the room into anything other than a glorified janitorial supply closet.
Eventually, I give up, deciding it will be easier and less agonizing to just work my ass off and hope a new office is included in my first promotion. I sink down into the rolling chair behind the desk and quickly realize it’s missing a wheel.
“Fantastic,” I groan, rolling back and forth in the deep trenches on the laminate flooring.
I ignore my irritation and turn on the computer screen. It flickers to life quickly and I immediately log into the email account on a sheet of paper on my desk. I review the documents Kelly sent over to my brand spanking new email address. I like the way [email protected] looks on the screen.
It all sinks in.
I have a job! With Trendsetter Magazine, no less.
Within minutes, I determine the magazine’s so called social media presence is abysmal at best. I mean really, my grandmother has more followers.
The last post was some God-awful pair of pink sandals that I’m pretty sure were never in fashion. Maybe it was a mislabel. Where it said “hot” it meant “not”, right? Surely it was a typo.
“Christ,” I groan, scrolling back further and further as I begin to reverse engineer the train wreck.
By noon, my stomach was growling and my to-do list was longer than Santa’s naughty list.
“Knock, knock.” Kelly appeared in the doorway.
“Hey!” My voice is too chipper, but I am just excited to see another person. Over the past few hours, I decided that my office was not, in fact, an old janitor closet. It was actually some sort of renovated isolation chamber. Hardly a soul had passed by all morning, and since less than ten people even knew who I was, no one came looking for me either.
Kelly is a very welcome break from it all.
“I was going to go get some lunch. Do you want to come with? I can show you all the good places,” she offers with a smile.
“Oh my God, yes!” I jump up and scramble to grab my purse.
Kelly leads me to the central elevator bank and we ride down to the street level. She takes me on another miniature tour of the surrounding blocks, pointing out the good, bad, and ugly in all things food and coffee. We decide to go to her highly recommended cafe that mostly does salads and wraps.
“How long do we usually get for lunch?” I ask as we settle into a table. The cafe is stuffed wall to wall with people in suits talking frantically on cell phones, and I start to worry that there is no way we will make it out on time.
“Oh, don’t worry about it. As long as the work gets done, it doesn’t really matter. It’s not like you’re punching a time clock,” she answers breezily.
“Great. So what’s good here?”
We dissect the menu and put in our orders with the waitress, who handles the chaos like a seasoned professional. I had never done food service before, but the sheer sight of so many impatient-looking power players was making me antsy and I’m not even the one they’re counting on. I can’t imagine being in her shoes. As I study her, I am silently thankful for the millionth time that I got this job, because serving coffee was going to be the next place I’d have to try if things didn’t pan out.
“How are things going so far?” Kelly asks, before taking a sip of the glass of sparkling water she had ordered.
“Good. I’m getting organized. Making a game plan, I guess you could say.”
“Excellent. You’ll do well here. The hiring committee was very impressed. We all expect great things.”
I nod and take a sip of my iced tea. “All except Adam, from what I was told,” I add.
Kelly’s brows knit together. “Who told you that?”
“Adam.”
Her lips form a little “oh” and I wonder what she’s thinking.
“I know, I know. He’s a newbie. Trust me, I’m not taking it personally,” I say. In reality, his critique of me, especially the mouthy part, was still grating on a nerve in the back of my mind, but I was trying to ignore it as best as I could. I’m just happy I got the job is what I keep telling myself. Besides, if what Kelly told me was true, he wouldn’t be around long enough for me to prove his suspicions wrong anyways, so why stress about it?
“Glad to hear it,” Kelly replies.
“I feel like you know my story, what about you?” I ask. “How long have you been at Trendsetter?”
Kelly laughs nervously. “Long enough that it’s embarrassing to give a number. I wouldn’t want to give away my age,” she says.
I wait, thinking she is kidding, but that’s all she has to say about it. I study her as she fishes in her purse for something. If I were to guess, I would say she is in her late thirties, but her answer makes me think it might be closer to early forties in reality. I had spent enough time with my mother and her friends to spot plastic surgery—even really good work—and it was safe to say that Kelly had indulged in a few nip tucks over the years to preserve her youth. Her hair was not naturally blonde, but looked flawless with just the right blend of colors. Her lips were superficially plumped, but not to an overly obvious degree. Her skin was blemish free and tight, probably thanks to Botox or something in that family. And I would put money on the table if I had to bet that her breasts were fake. Again, understated, but enough to give her petite frame a boost.
“I wouldn’t say I know your story. I only know who your parents are and where you went to school. What about now? Boyfriend? Girlfriend? Pets?” Kelly asks, effortlessly shifting the conversation away from herself.
“Well, sometimes it seems like those two things are my entire life. I just got out of school and for the past four years it’s really been the only thing I could think about or focus on. No boyfriend. No pets. I guess, in some way, the start of my life is now. I just moved into a new apartment and that’s been a lot of fun. I’ve been doing some light remodeling.” I try to scrape up something else to add, feeling like the picture I painted was so bland it was painful to look at.
It was hard living in the shadow of my parents who were each so vibrant and full of life. I often found myself boring in comparison. Now, with my new job in New York with a huge fashion publisher, things were starting to look up.
Like way, way up.
The waitress appears and serves us our lunches. I thank her, making a mental note to tip well.
Kelly digs into her bland-looking garden salad as though it’s a juicy steak. I stare down at my burger, feeling a little self-conscious about my choice. Apparently fashion editors don’t eat burgers. They eat salad. Mental note made.
Kelly and I chat through the meal, comparing notes on life in the city, the behind the scenes of the fashion industry and life at Trendsetter, and she tells me all about her cat, Whiskey. We laugh and talk for well over an hour. I marvel again at how lucky I was to bump into Kelly in the elevator on the day of my interview.
* * *
Half an hour later, Kelly deposits me back at my office, but before she can scurry back to wherever she needs to be, we are interrupted by none other than Adam himself.
Luckily for us, we weren’t talking about him at the time.
“Afternoon ladies,” he says with a smile at both of us. “Anna, I was wondering if we could have a word.”
Kelly glances between me and Adam and then bows out, hustling down the hall without so much as a backward glance.
My heart races as I invite Adam into my office—not entirely sure two people can even fit—and take my seat at my desk. “How can I help?”
Adam sidesteps to be able to close the door and then sits in the chair across from me. “
I feel like we got off on the wrong foot, Anna,” he says, leaning into my desk as though sharing a secret.
His cologne quickly permeates the room and my body seems to react to him on instinct. He really is too damn good-looking, and right now he’s too close—way too close to allow my mind to think straight.
“It’s all good. I understand you’re under a lot of pressure,” I answer.
“Mmmm. That’s true. Look, I want to make it up to you. What would you say to going out for a drink?”
Alarm bells start firing in my head. “Uhh, I—I don’t think that would be a good idea. For me, I mean. Not for you. You can obviously do what—” I let my sentence break off before I further embarrass myself.
Adam smiles. “Oh, no, not like that. It’s a work thing and I need someone to go with me.”
Relief floods in, but I also detect a hint of disappointment in his voice as he corrects me.
“Oh!” I laugh nervously. “Right. Well then, yes, sure. Of course.”
“Great. I’ll email you the details.”
I nod and he sweeps out of my office as gracefully as possible given the sardine-can size of my office.
* * *
I spend the remainder of the afternoon and early evening tackling my to-do list, and in between doing that it seems that my mind is only up for one task. Thinking—actually, make that obsessing—about Adam. Ever since his impromptu appearance and invite, I haven’t been able to think about much else. He emailed me the details as promised. It was an after work event for the following day.
By the time I power off my computer and leave for the evening, I checked off most of the items, and I knew which dress to wear to work that could easily be styled to make the day-to-night switch with a few key pieces that would all fit in my Chanel handbag.
I feel lazy as I leave the office, so I skip the gym and hit up a local Chinese place. I moved into my apartment a week before, so I was able to scope out the local eateries in the name of research when in reality, it was because I didn’t bother to unpack my pots and pans yet.
The Billionaire's Seduction Page 13