Contents
Trusting The Boss
Copyright
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Trusting The Boss
By
Mallory Crowe
Trusting The Boss
by Mallory Crowe
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Fonts used with permission from Microsoft.
Copyright © 2015 by Mallory Crowe
Mallory Crowe (2015-06-19). Trusting The Boss (Billionaires In The City Book Four) Kindle Edition.
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CHAPTER ONE
Emma knew she’d made a mistake the second the elevator doors opened. The clean, crisp reception area she looked out at seemed so calm and peaceful and quiet. In her mind, she saw herself confidently striding up to the receptionist and giving her a cool stare. “I’m here for Victoria Green.” The receptionist would stutter and Emma would calmly brush off her protests and insist that she bring the CEO out. From there, she and Victoria could finally sit down and talk….
The elevator doors started to close and Emma quickly stumbled out into the lobby. The receptionist was now full-on staring at Emma and she knew she couldn’t wimp out. She clutched her purse even tighter to her side as if it were a shield as she approached the desk.
“Hi there. How can I help you?” asked the friendly woman behind the desk. Instead of the hot, twenty-something woman Emma thought she’d be facing off with, the receptionist was a woman in her late fifties or early sixties whose hair was dotted with bits of gray and whose smile lit up her entire face.
“Um, I’m here to talk to Victoria Green.”
“I’m sorry, but Ms. Green isn’t in the office today. Is there someone else I can get for you or can I take a message?”
Emma’s mouth dropped open before she abruptly closed it. This wasn’t part of the plan! “I can wait. Will she be back soon?”
“Unfortunately, she’s not scheduled to be back today.”
Great. This entire stupid trip over to Hunt Tower was for nothing. “I’ll probably just go then.” Emma tried to look as though she didn’t just make a fool of herself. Who walked into a billion-dollar corporation and asked for the CEO with no appointment set? But for some reason she’d been so sure that Victoria would be there and she could get the answers to her questions.
She mumbled a thanks before she turned and retreated back to the elevator she’d just come from. Once she got in and the doors closed, she was confronted with her reflection.
“Way to go,” she said to the door. “You’ve been in the city all of twelve hours and you’ve already made an ass of yourself.” Of course, it wasn’t really as bad as she made it out to be. It wasn’t as if the receptionist pointed and laughed at the silly woman who thought she could just waltz in and talk to Victoria Green.
If Emma wanted to find out the truth about what happened between Victoria Green and her sister, she’d have to take a different approach. Emma adjusted the scarf around her neck, trying to get used to the feel of the excess fabric around her neck. She hardly ever wore scarves back home in Georgia, but she wanted to fit into the stylish crowd of the city.
But the fact that it was suddenly bothering her now was probably more to do with her embarrassment considering the itchy material hadn’t bothered her before. Emma untied the delicate white and blue floral patterned fabric and let it hang loosely around her shoulders. She took a few deep breaths. It wasn’t as though she was out of options. She still hadn’t visited Joslyn’s apartment to look for clues about what she was up to in the city. And it was possible that Victoria would agree to a meeting. Not a good chance, but Emma might be able to appeal to her sense of family.
Though Emma couldn’t promise how she would react had their places been reversed. If Victoria’s sister tried to kill Emma, Emma wouldn’t want to be within a ten-mile radius of any of Victoria’s family members. That was why she wanted to surprise Victoria. Just a few quick questions about the circumstances that led up to Joslyn’s apparent psychotic break.
The elevator doors opened on the first floor and Emma adjusted her scarf once more. Her cousins were big-time city businessmen. Maybe they could finagle a meeting with Victoria.
With every step she took in the lobby and then out the door, she felt like more and more of an outsider. All these normal people around her with normal lives and normal jobs. Whereas Emma had a psycho for a sister and extended family that could compete with any of the reigning reality show casts out there.
But she wasn’t back home in Georgia now. This was New York, where no one knew who she was. So one receptionist thought she was crazy. No big deal. She could still play the part of the rich, sophisticated heiress. Two of the three were true anyway.
With her head held high, Emma passed through the revolving door into the busy city streets. But instead of strutting to the waiting cabs as though she owned the city, the wind promptly caught her scarf and blew it clean off her neck.
“Damn it!” Abandoning all hope of looking dignified, she ran after the rapidly retreating scarf.
###
Jace leaned back against the doorjamb and looked over the wall of monitors and computer screens that covered the security office of Green & Sons.
He might actually miss this little job. He’d thought playing babysitter to the head of a hardware store chain would be boring, but Victoria had been interesting as hell and her schedule was anything but dull. Not to mention the fact that she wasn’t just some paranoid lady with too much money. Someone really had tried to kill her.
But now that Joslyn Devereaux was locked up tight, he wasn’t going to stick around. As soon as Gordon and one of the HR reps got back with his exit paperwork, he’d be gone.
The phone on the desk rang and Jace looked over his shoulder. It didn’t look as though Gordon would be back any time soon and the other guy who worked security was out for the day.
As the phone rang for a fifth time, Jace leaned forward and snatched up the headset. “Jace here.”
“Oh, I thought this was your last day,” said Denise in her trademark cheery voice.
“I’m heading out any minute now. What’s up?”
“Well, it’s probably nothing. There was just the oddest woman in here asking for Ms. Green. She left, but I still wanted to let you guys know.”
Jace pulled the chair out to sit down and keyed his password into the system. “When was this?”
“Not thirty seconds ago. She just stepped onto the elevator.”
Jace’s fingers flew across the keyboard and he brought up the monitor from the reception area. The woman didn’t look all that threatening. From what he could see through the black-and-white monitor, she was tiny and not exactly the dangerous type.
But she did seem anxious. Her wide eyes and hesitant walk definitely told him something was up. Something about her seemed familiar to
o, but he couldn’t put a finger on it. “Did she leave a name?”
“No, nothing. As soon as she heard Ms. Green wasn’t in, she bolted.”
“I’ll check it out and make sure she leaves the building,” he assured her.
“It’s probably nothing, but I appreciate it, Jace.” Denise hung up.
Jace twisted off the chair and rushed out of the security office and down the hall to the service elevator. The woman was probably in the lobby already, but the service elevator was much faster and less crowded than the main elevator bank.
When the doors opened, he scanned the lobby of Hunt Tower. It would’ve been easy enough to spot one tiny woman wearing an oversized scarf. But he didn’t know what color her hair or clothes were, so it wasn’t as easy as he would’ve hoped.
Jace crossed through the lobby, keeping his eye out. Even if he found her, he didn’t know what he’d do. It wasn’t as if he could pull her back in and interrogate her. He just couldn’t drop the nagging feeling that he should know her.
Which never happened to him. When he saw a face, he remembered it. That memory had saved his life more than once.
After he decided she wasn’t in the lobby, he crossed through the revolving door and into the cool November breeze. By now she was probably in a cab and long gone.
Oh well. Like Denise said, it was undoubtedly nothing. Maybe if he took another look at the surveillance footage, he could figure out what bothered him about her.
Something slammed into the back of his legs and he stumbled forward a few feet before he caught his normally stellar balance. His gaze jerked down and he saw a familiar looking scarf wrapped around his legs.
“Oh my goodness, this is so embarrassing,” said a feminine voice.
At his feet was the woman he was chasing after. She was crouched low and looking up at him with dark brown eyes and cheeks blushing the deepest red possible. The woman snatched up the scarf and stood, taking a step back. “I didn’t mean to run into you like that. The stupid wind caught my scarf and I’ve been chasing it like a fool for the last few minutes and I wasn’t thinking and—”
“Don’t worry about it,” he interjected. He smiled at her, trying his best to make her feel more at ease. “No harm done and if I weren’t here, you might never have caught it, right?”
She let out a small laugh and the pink slowly faded from her cheeks. “Right. I’m glad you’re so understanding. You hear horror stories about how upset city folk can get when their routines are interrupted.”
Interesting. Her voice held just a hint of a Southern accent and she admitted she was visiting. “I’m Jace.” He held a hand out. “I’m glad I made a good impression on behalf of New Yorkers everywhere.”
She studied his outstretched hand for a fraction of a second before she reached out to meet his handshake. He could tell from her relaxed, hesitant grip that she probably didn’t work in the corporate world. So why the hell did she seem so familiar?
“Emmaline Devereaux,” she said. “It’s nice to see a friendly face.”
Devereaux! He made sure the recognition didn’t show in his face. That explained everything. Why she looked so familiar but he couldn’t quite place where he knew her from. This must be Joslyn’s younger sister. The one who inherited the family fortune while Joslyn got nothing.
There was a strong resemblance between the two. Both were petite framed and had pale skin to go with their red hair. But where Joslyn was curvy with fiery red curls, Emmaline was smaller and her hair took on more of a brownish red. Emmaline also spoke with much less of an accent, he noted to himself. Maybe she didn’t live in the family home she’d inherited… Either way, it didn’t matter to him. Now that he wasn’t working with Victoria, all he could do was tell Gordon that Joslyn’s sister was poking around.
Even so, his curiosity got the better of him. “So what brings you to the city?”
A fleeting shot of panic crossed her face and Jace felt a bit more comfortable with her snooping around. Whatever Emmaline’s motives, her face was an open book. If she wanted to cause trouble, Gordon could handle her easily enough.
As soon as she regained her composure, she was right back to smiling. “Oh, just family stuff. I have a few cousins in town I’m visiting.”
Jace thought back to what he’d read about Joslyn’s cousins. Michael and Luke Devereaux, who both ran DevX Enterprises. As soon as word got out about Joslyn’s arrest, they’d done everything possible to distance themselves from the newly minted black sheep of the family. Jace wondered how open they’d be to Emmaline showing up in the city.
“I hope you have a great time while you’re here then. Did you want me to hail you a cab?”
“I don’t think that’s necessary.” She secured the scarf around her neck and gave it a tight yank to make sure it was firmly knotted in place.
Jace glanced over to the long line of cabs. He’d rather she was far away from Hunt Tower before he went back upstairs to tell Gordon about the strange visitor. “Are you sure? Rush hour is coming, and traffic is only going to get worse from here on out today.”
“My cousins won’t be home from work for a few hours, so I figured I’d wander around the city.”
A laugh escaped him. “Wander around? It’s a big city.”
Her eyes brightened. “Michael showed me this app thing where you can input what city you’re in and the GPS will lead you to all the best things to see.”
“Michael?” Jace already knew she was talking about her cousin, but it would be interesting to see how much she’d tell him about her family.
“Oh, one of my cousins I’m staying with. They’re both very techy. Well, I should probably be going. It was nice meeting you, Jace.”
He stepped away. He supposed he didn’t need any information from her and he didn’t think she’d be a threat to his soon-to-be former employer. “Nice meeting you too, Emmaline.”
“Emma,” she corrected. “No one really calls me Emmaline. I don’t really know why I said it. One of those days, you know?”
Jace nodded in sympathy. If she was in town because of the scandal caused by her sister, he could only imagine how flustered she was. “You know what, it would be a shame for you to go exploring by yourself. There’s this great little bus tour a few blocks away. It’s not that expensive and it will give you a good idea of what you’ll want to see while you’re in town.”
“A bus tour. Aren’t those a little corny?”
Damn it. Why would she want to do a stupid bus tour? She probably had enough money in her trust fund to buy half the city. For all he knew, she’d never set foot in a bus. “It was just a thought. Don’t worry about it. I really should be getting back anyway.”
“I’ve kept you too long, haven’t I? Have I broken city etiquette by stopping to talk to someone I ran into? I bet I was supposed to keep going. Well, I don’t want you to be late for anything on my behalf. I will find my way from here.”
“I’m not going to be late. It’s my last day on the job.”
“Your choice or theirs?”
“Mine. My contract is up and I’m taking a bit of time off until I find another one that interests me.”
“It must be so nice to have that sort of freedom. What kind of work do you do?”
Jace weighed his options, but didn’t see any reason to lie to her. “I work in security and investigations mostly.”
“Really? Do you have a card?”
He frowned at the strange turn of conversation. “My card?”
“I’m in town handling a little family matter. I might need help looking into it and I don’t know the first thing about investigating anything. So if you need a job and I need help, why don’t you give me your contact info and we can work with each other. I can pay you very well, promise.”
He stared at the debutante in front of him and tried to get a read on what she was thinking. He had no doubt she could pay well, but he had enough padding in his savings account that he could go awhile between jobs. But how would s
he feel when she found out just what part he’d played in the “family matter” she was looking into? “What makes you think I’m actually good at what I do?”
She tilted her head and smiled at him. “Well, I didn’t hire you, did I? That’s why I only asked for a card.”
“Fair enough.” He fished his wallet out of his back pocket. He never actually used the cards because his clients found him mostly through word of mouth, but he always had one or two on hand to keep up appearances.
She took the card from him and studied it, glancing between Jace and the tiny piece of paper. “Jace Lance,” she murmured. “Is Jace your real name? I’ve never heard it before.”
It wasn’t his real name, but he wasn’t about to fess up to her. “Emmaline isn’t exactly common either.”
“Point taken. But most people call me Emma. A bit more modern.”
He took in her decidedly not modern outfit. Her skirt was a feminine, frilly material with blue flowers spotting the material. Emma shifted her weight and he had the distinct impression that this city would swallow her whole.
“Well, um, Emma, I should be getting back.” He stepped away.
She pushed his card into her purse and gave him one last smile. “It was nice meeting you, Jace. Thanks again for everything.”
As she walked down the street, Jace couldn’t take his eyes off her. He’d come down mostly because he needed to figure out who she was. Now that he knew, he didn’t feel any more reassured. Well, he didn’t think she posed a threat to Victoria, which meant he was still done with his job. But the thought of that fish out of water digging through her crazy sister’s life set off every inner alarm bell he had.
As she disappeared into the crowd, he shook off any lingering thoughts of the heiress. As soon as he went upstairs and found Gordon, this job would be behind him. People came to this city every day and found themselves in over their heads. It wasn’t his responsibility to save them all. Besides, if she knew what part he played in Joslyn’s arrest, she wouldn’t want his help anyway.
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