Piece of Work

by Staci Hart

  I found myself smiling with the slightest tilt of my lips.

  “Glad I caught you,” I said, setting her to rights, loathe to let her go. “I’ve been looking for you all morning.”

  Her cheeks flamed brighter as she toyed with her waistband, adjusting her bag strap and avoiding my eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Lyons,” she said to her shoes.

  “Don’t be, Miss Van de Meer.”

  “Please, call me Rin.”

  Rin. The word sat on my tongue, the shape of it enticing.

  “Would you mind coming to my office for a moment?”

  “Not at all,” she said with authority I’d yet to see in her before she walked into the building with the confidence of Cleopatra taking on the Empire.

  Rin.

  What had happened to her since yesterday? Where was the girl who couldn’t share an elevator with me? The one whose shoulders sloped and voice wavered when she had the courage to use it?

  I couldn’t see her at all in the girl under that lipstick and those clothes. The metamorphosis was astonishing, the air around her affected by her confidence. And that, I found, was more appealing than the finery—it was the way she stood, the way she carried herself, the way she met my eyes without hesitation.

  I’d never subscribed to the belief that clothes made the man, but I’d be damned if the clothes hadn’t turned Rin into a version of herself I wouldn’t have believed if I hadn’t seen it for myself.

  She sat in one of the chairs across from my desk, crossing those magnificent legs and waiting expectantly for me to speak.

  I smoothed my tie as I sat. “I wanted to thank you for your research on Medici.”

  Confusion flickered across her brows. “But I…”

  “Bianca sent me your work, and it gave me the idea for a piece I want to put together for the exhibition. In fact, I was so impressed with your research, I was hoping you could provide a little more. That is, if Bianca doesn’t have you too busy.”

  She sat up a little straighter, her face surprised and eager. “No, I have time. What do you need?”

  So sure of herself, her chin high, her voice steady. How in the hell is this the same girl who ran away from me twenty-four hours ago?

  I relayed the details of the Medici family I wanted citations for and invited her to send along anything else she felt was relevant—she had studiously retrieved a small notebook from her bag and jotted down instructions while I spoke. And then I dismissed her, watching her walk out of my office, my eyes unwittingly on her tight ass until it was out of sight.

  When she was out of proximity, my head began to clear from the buzz of the encounter, and cold clarity crept into its place, settling in right next to my disappointment.

  There wasn’t a universe that existed wherein I was allowed to be attracted to the intern. Not only for my career, but for myself. I’d lost that freedom two years ago.

  Everyone had a price, even those I chose to trust.

  And I would never, ever be so blind again.

  Rin

  I did my best to strut out of the room with jellified insides and shaky knees, feeling his eyes on me every step of the way.

  I’d impressed him.

  He wanted my help.

  The curator, the man who just a few days ago had all but sentenced me to death, had asked me for help. Because he was impressed. With me.

  Even after I’d tripped and fallen into his arms.

  My cheeks flamed, replaying my epic flail in slow motion in my mind from the moment I’d toppled forward to the moment I was in his arms. God, his body was insane, hard and curved and big, his biceps so wide, my hands didn’t span them, and my hands were huge. And God, he was handsome. And my God, he smelled good.

  And I’d impressed him. Me!

  I could have sprouted wings and flown around the building.

  Even Bianca couldn’t get me down. When I walked into her office and she glanced up, she was so shocked by the sight of me, her face shot open. Of course, it immediately shut down again, her eyes narrowing as they dragged up and down the length of me.

  “You’re too tall for heels.”

  I shrugged. “That’s not a thing,” I said and believed it, although I was glad she was sitting down where I could forget I was a full foot taller than her. “I’m heading up to the library. Do you need anything?”

  “Just for you to stay there all day.”

  “Gladly,” I said cheerily and turned on my fancy-ass heel, sweeping out of the room and twirling on those haters like Beyoncé.

  And my smile, which threatened to take over my face, didn’t quit all day.

  9

  Never Will I Ever

  Rin

  The second they saw me, Val and Katherine hopped off their barstools, clapping and cheering. Amelia clapped from her seat so gently, I wasn’t even sure she made noise, but Katherine made enough for the both of them, splitting her fingers in her lips to rip a whistle that made me cringe.

  “Oh my God,” I mumbled as I looked down at my feet, hurrying over so they’d stop it. The entire bar had turned to look, and despite being completely mortified, I was smiling. “Shh!” I hissed as I approached. “Stop!”

  Val giggled as we took our seats. “Look at you! You survived! You didn’t break a heel or cave and put on flats. I am so proud of you!”

  “Thanks,” I said, still smiling as I hung my bag on the back of my chair.

  Our waitress—the same waitress we always had, the gorgeous one with the gorgeous red lips and the gorgeous smile who had convinced us to try the lipstick in the first place—appeared next to me with a whoosh, her eyes big and round as they scanned me, her red lips gaping.

  “No. Fucking. Way. You did it. You actually did it.”

  My lips were together, the apples of my cheeks tight and happy.

  “I cannot even believe this!” she crowed. “I’m sorry, but you’ve got to stand up for me.”

  I slid off the stool and stepped into the aisle, and she shook her head, her eyes dragging up and down my body.

  “God, I remember when I got my first red lipstick, how I felt. I immediately decided I needed a leather jacket, and the rest was history. A pair of combat boots, six piercings, and a handful of tattoos later, and here I am.” She held up one hand, palm up, in display.

  I looked her over, imagining what she could have looked like before. Her hair was up in a perfectly messy bun, her black eyeliner winged, piercings glittering in her nostril and septum and even her lip. I wondered, as I always did, how the hell she’d gotten that lipstick on without the ring in the middle of her bottom lip interfering.

  “But you went and got yourself some heels, and damn, girl—you look like a million fucking dollars. But that’s nothing compared to how you look like you feel. You’re shining. Like, you’re actually shining.”

  “Thank you,” I said, glancing down, embarrassed.

  “No, none of that. Hold your head high like the lady you are. What can I get you to drink? It’s on the house. All you have to do is tell me I was right.”

  I laughed. “Rum and Coke, and you were so, so right.”

  “Thank you.” She curtsied. “And as for you three,” she continued, waving her index finger across them, “you’re next.”

  She disappeared behind the bar, leaving us in our little island.

  “So, what happened?” Amelia asked, her blue eyes bright and wide. “What did Bianca say?”

  “She almost fell out of her chair when I walked into her office,” I said on a laugh, recalling the look on her face. “She didn’t really say much though, just sent me to the library to work on my proposal. But I decided to leave the library, and I ate lunch in the café today like a grown-up.”

  Val shook her head in wonder. “Who even are you?”

  “I honestly have no idea,” I answered, laughing, “but I like it.”

  “You look like you do.” She watched me for a second before asking, “Did anything embarrassing happen?”
r />   My cheeks flamed. “When I was walking in, Dr. Lyons was in the hallway, and I was so…I don’t know…overwhelmed that my ankle buckled, and I nearly went down like a pile of bricks.”

  “Nearly?” Katherine asked.

  The flame turned into a burn. “He caught me.” I could still feel the heat of his gaze, from the moment I’d first seen him standing in front of me until the second he let me go. That shifting, molten shadow behind his stormy eyes that had felt like a warning and a welcome.

  Val’s eyes bugged. “No, he didn’t.”

  “Oh, he definitely did. So embarrassing. And then he took me into his office and asked me to help him research a project for him. He said he was impressed. With me!” I felt drunk, and our waitress hadn’t even brought the drinks yet.

  “Rin, this is incredible,” Amelia said, smiling so wide.

  “I…I just feel so crazy.”

  “Good crazy?” Katherine asked.

  “Definitely good crazy. I can’t believe how it felt to have people look at me like…like I was important. Men held doors for me. A lady in the café told me she loved my outfit and said she could never wear heels like mine. I told her I hadn’t known I could either, until today.” I sighed, thanking the waitress when my drink landed on the table and she left again. “In one shocking day, I’ve gone from wishing I were invisible to standing out on purpose. People looked, but today, it was different. I mean, it’s weird for people to stare—oh, and at least seven people commented on my height today. But I didn’t mind because I felt so good.”

  “Have you noticed the guys in the bar? They’ve been staring at you since you walked in,” Val said.

  I lowered my head, shielding my face with my hair as I picked up my drink. “Well, you might as well have blown a bullhorn when I walked in.”

  “That was ten minutes ago,” Katherine insisted. “I’m pretty sure a guy at the bar is hyping himself up to come over here.”

  I felt the blood rush out of my face in a tingle. “We should go. Now.”

  “You’re out of his league anyway,” Val said.

  “I have no league. I’m league-less.”

  “Maybe yesterday but not today, sister,” she volleyed.

  Katherine picked up her gin and tonic. “If he does come over, say no to whatever he wants. He has a mustache.”

  Val laughed. “It’s true, you can’t. It’s on the Never Will I Ever list between Butt Stuff and Sex with Food.”

  Katherine’s nose wrinkled. “I can’t imagine how disgusting it’d be to be sticky. And the sheets! What about the sheets?”

  “The sheets wouldn’t bother me,” Amelia mused, “but if you got it down there?” She shuddered. “That freaks me out. I feel like you’re just asking for a yeast infection.”

  The list had been created in college after watching Love Actually one Christmas and being stymied by the conflicting emotions the movie had evoked. We had been both fluttery at the sugary sweetness and annoyed by the vast majority of the heroes (Come on, Alan Rickman!). Val had grabbed a marker, going to work on the list as we laughed and added in our Nevers, including everything from Dating an Asshole and Sex on a First Date to Guys Who Wear Suspenders and Guys Who Cheat (ALAN RICKMAN) with a host of things in between. It was silly—not only because it was, on certain points, a touch unreasonable, but because we had no prospects to hold up to the list.

  Except mustache guy, who waggled his brows at me when I chanced a look.

  “Shit,” I hissed.

  “He’s coming over here,” Amelia whispered before locking her lips, clutching a Moscow mule like it was mace.

  “Oh my God,” Val said, “he has an ironic mullet.”

  “Shit. What do I do?” My eyes darted to their faces, frantic.

  Val had a plastic smile on her face and said through her teeth, “Wing it.”

  “Hello, ladies.”

  I turned to the voice and tried to smile. He really wasn’t that bad looking, but the mustache-slash-mullet combo made him look like a porn star from the eighties.

  “I couldn’t help but notice you when you walked in,” he said, his attention focused solely on me. “How come I’ve never seen you in here before?”

  “I’m here every week.”

  He frowned. “Seriously?”

  I nodded, my face saying, Yup.

  “Here? Every week?”

  “At this exact table.”

  He blinked. “No one ever sits here, except…oh,” he breathed, astonished as he looked me over with a confused and mildly sour expression. “What happened to you?”

  My lips flattened as a flush climbed up my neck at the slight, my newfangled sass rising with it. “It’s okay. I never noticed you either.”

  He scoffed. “God, you don’t have to be so touchy. I was just saying—”

  I slid off my stool and stood next to him, towering over him by a solid six inches, and he watched me rise like a siren out of stormy water. “Sorry, I don’t date guys shorter than me.” I patted his arm and strutted off in the direction of the bathroom, leaving him gaping at my back.

  My hands trembled a little as I pushed into the bathroom and stepped to the sink to wash my hands, figuring I should do something to accompany my dramatic exit.

  Val burst in behind me, grinning ear to ear. “Seriously, who the fuck are you? And can we keep you?”

  And I laughed, hoping for just the same thing.

  10

  Thirsty

  Court

  I couldn’t stop staring at her legs.

  Rin sat in one of the chairs in front of my desk, as she had every day for the last week, awaiting instruction on the extended Medici research I’d assigned her. And her legs—those fucking legs—scissored as she recrossed them, their porcelain white length drawing every bit of my attention.

  I forced myself to meet her eyes, but they were turned down to her notebook.

  “I want to get into some of the artists Medici bankrolled, so work on a list of five or six prolific artists to use as examples.”

  “Any preference on who?”

  “Dealer’s choice.”

  “Got it,” she said, eyes still down, pausing to tuck her dark hair behind her ear.

  I tried not to watch her long fingers slip into her inky-black strands. I tried not to notice the way her full bottom lip occasionally slipped between her teeth. And I really, really tried not to look at her legs, but it was damn near impossible.

  “Anything else?” she asked, finally looking up.

  You. With those legs around my waist. “No, that will be all for today.”

  Rin smiled, closing her notebook. “I’ll have it for you by the end of the day.”

  I nodded. “Don’t let it interfere with whatever Bianca has you working on.”

  Her smile flattened by the smallest degree. “Oh, I won’t. Thanks, Dr. Lyons,” she said, grabbing her bag before standing to leave.

  I scrambled for something else to say to keep her there but shut the impulse down, allowing instead for her to walk out of my office and disappear for the library. The truth was, the project should have been finished by last Friday, but I’d stretched it to Monday and then gave her an emergency project on Tuesday. And when she’d finished that, I’d devised more work to keep her in my space, which brought her all the way to today—Wednesday.

  I wouldn’t even be able to use it all. But that hadn’t stopped me from assigning more for her to deliver.

  What a masochist I was to indulge myself in her company, knowing I couldn’t have her. To endure her presence when every word, every motion, every mundane part of her body was sensual. Yesterday, she had worn a shirt with capped sleeves, and the sight of the snowy crease of her elbow had had me salivating.

  You cannot touch her fucking elbow. You cannot touch any part of her. Not her neck. Not her wrist. Not her little fucking finger.

  I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. But I’d fantasize. I’d imagine. There was no harm in that.

  But I really needed to co
me up with a new project for her before I caved under the stack of useless Medici facts I’d accrued in my pursuit of torment.

  Uselessness aside, I had discovered that every day, I found myself curious as to what she could come back with. We’d talk briefly before she left, and I’d spend an hour or two every night reading over what she’d sent. And then each morning, like clockwork, we would discuss all my thoughts that had been triggered by her notes. Which I’d then use to fuel more research.

  It had become my favorite parts of every day. Topics would coalesce in my mind on my way to work, expressed to and returned by her. And when she walked out of my office every morning, I would wish she’d stayed.

  It’s not healthy. Cut her loose.

  Aversion twisted through me at the thought. I had one rule: no employees. And yet I found myself displaying my temptation, welcoming it to sit with me, to talk to me, to grow. I reassured myself that I could maintain the boundaries between us and my position over her, the position that barred me from the position I really wanted to be in.

  But the stimulation of my mind was more dangerous than the one of my body.

  Bodies could be satisfied easily.

  Minds couldn’t.

  And hearts were impossible to slake.

  11

  Same Old

  Rin

  I hummed as I picked up a stack of books the next day, making my way around the library to put them away.

  The last week had been utterly, absolutely, completely perfect.

  The clothes had been a catalyst for change that seeped into every aspect of my life, from walking to work to my job itself. I mean, Bianca still hated me—I was beyond believing I could single-handedly bridge a gap the size of the Royal Gorge—but Dr. Lyons had tapped me to help him, and that satisfied me, giving me a sense of purpose and a job to do well.

  My favorite parts of the day were chatting with him in the morning and saying goodbye in the afternoon. Don’t get me wrong. He was still cold and distant, dismissive and borderline rude, but when we talked about topics we both loved, the conversation was rousing. Refreshing. A meeting of minds, and his mind was as beautiful as the rest of him.