by Zee Monodee
That’s it. Griff is a dead man today.
Logan thumped the steering wheel as he pulled into the courtyard of his residential complex, about half a mile from the Flic en Flac beach. After stopping the engine, he stepped out of the car, ripped the wet towel from the front seat, and stalked towards his terraced villa as the door slammed closed behind him. Once inside, he headed straight for the shower, to wash the grainy salt crystals from his body.
She had guts. Most people wouldn’t dream of stepping in front of him unless forced, yet, she’d come to him of her own free will. Had she been brave, or stupid?
Wouldn’t be the first time a woman thought him an egg. A mass of muscle and flesh, all right, but which could be reduced to mush by a woman’s pleading and tears.
Jessica, his ex-girlfriend, had made the mistake, trying to control him and draw whatever she wanted of him. She’d played on the little softness he’d had left in him, using her fragile, ethereal beauty and faked innocence to trap him in her wiles. As young as he’d been, why wouldn’t he have fallen for her? How could a street kid not fly high when a lady from the upper class fell head over heels for him?
He cursed as he got out from under the water spray and dried himself then changed into jeans and a short-sleeved shirt. Why was he thinking of her? Jessica had earned the good riddance in his book. She’d been born into privilege and had expected it at every turn, not stopping to think twice about hurting others or twisting everything to get what she wished for.
Jessica had shown him the bad side of the coin. And here, Neha Hemant thought she could twist her way to get what she wanted.
If Logan hated one thing more than anything, it was to be taken for granted. People with money and background and a ‘name’ always did so, irrespective of location in the world.
The walls of the house closed on him, making him suffocate with the need to be out and about. Bloody hell. Why did he have to think of the past? He banged his fist into a wall and didn’t wince when another knuckle tore open. Some would think boxers had strong hands, but they’d be surprised how a little insignificant action could injure hands rendered fragile by too many punches.
Not bothering with the blood seeping down his finger and drying into an ugly scab, he stormed out of the villa and headed for his car. After sliding behind the wheel, he started the engine and set out on the road towards the cyber village of Ebène and the cyber tower housing the station.
He’d planned to work from home today, but the prospect had turned to custard. Being in the station’s setting would ease his mind, and hopefully, make him forget New Zealand.
The memories refused to clear, though, and he gave in to their tug with reluctance.
Privilege. He chuckled with bitterness. Privilege had lured his mother and saddled her with two sons, before dumping her back unmarried and on her own in a shack in Newtown, the poorest working-class suburb of Wellington back in the days when he’d been young.
Anne Warrington had carried to her grave the name of the man who had fathered her children. Logan had never been able to extract anything about him out of her.
The only time she’d spoken about him had been when Logan had come home flanked by two police officers, at fourteen, after having been involved in a fight in the rowdiest pub in the area.
After one glance at his bloodied fists and bruised face, she had asked him if he preferred to be feared or respected. Fear proved easy to stir, but respect wasn’t easy to earn. Privilege won’t earn you respect, she’d added. A wistful sadness had tinged her words, and he’d known she was thinking back to her own life. Seeing an opening, he’d prompted if his father came from that world, getting an affirmative reply.
To this day, Logan still carried those words in his mind. They’d been the ones to forge his character, to make him strive for more when he could have settled into one of the racist, bullying gangs in the neighbourhood.
The sight of a bright yellow car on the side of the road caught this attention. The driver seemed to be replacing a flat tyre at the back, sunlight reflecting off shiny black hair.
A woman? Should he go help? She appeared alone, pulling the heavy spare out of the boot herself.
As he parked a few feet behind the Citroën, his stomach lurched when he glimpsed the driver from up close. Neha Hemant. Bugger. Why her? He wouldn’t take the easy way out, however. She could probably use a hand.
He stepped out of the SUV and walked towards her. She glanced up and brushed the hair from her face, leaving a small trace of dark grease on her flawless cheek. Her eyes widened when they locked on him, and she muttered something he couldn’t quite hear.
His gut told him she’d sworn.
“Need a hand?” he asked.
She fixed him with a dark, even glare and went about her task of dragging the spare next to the punctured one. “No. Thanks. I can manage.”
She carried on with changing the flat, and her lack of further conversation or glance in his direction made him think she was ignoring him completely. However, when the time came to pull the tyre from the chassis, she visibly struggled.
He knelt by her side and settled his hands on the black Michelin rubber surface to tug it out for her.
Logan received the surprise of his life when she slapped his hand away.
“Don’t you dare,” she said in a low growl.
Too stunned to react, for even his temper had been dumbstruck, he sat there in a squat as she huffed and wrestled with the tyre, finally wrenching it free.
The weight and the sudden give knocked her off balance, and she fell back. He shot an arm out to catch her before she hit the hard asphalt.
She shrugged away from his touch and continued with her task.
“Let me help,” he again said.
She bowed her head, and her hair fanned about like a curtain at the sides of her face to block the sight of her features. After a few seconds, her body started shaking.
Bugger, no. She was crying?
At a loss, Logan reasoned he could at least finish the task for her, since she was in no fit state to continue. She’d probably inflict some injury upon herself.
He put the spare tyre in place and had started to screw it back in when she snatched the spanner from his hand and proceeded to secure the bolts.
“I said I could do it. I don’t like accepting favours.” She turned to face him, her huge eyes glistening with tears, yet her voice had an incredible hardness when she calmly said, “It’s a question of principle.”
Touché. He didn’t know what to say, his wit having deserted him.
“What is it with everyone?” she rambled without looking at him. “Why do you all think I’m not up to par to achieving anything on my own? Why take me out of the comfy little cotton box, right?” She snorted. “Does your mother drive you insane, Logan?”
She continued before he could answer.
“No, I bet not. She wouldn’t dare, would she? Mine would drive anyone over the edge. Because I’m looking for a job, she’s got it in her head I’m out looking for a man to warm my bed.” She snorted. “Everyone’s conspiring to drive me crazy. Why can’t anyone accept how some people have more dignity than to accept favours? All I’m doing is trying to look after my kids in an honest way. How will I have respect for myself if all I do is give in to favours?”
She stopped and stared straight at him.
“Why am I telling you all this? You’ve already put me in a box and labelled it as ‘cheap and worthless’, innit?”
Logan’s skin crawled with shame. Heat burnt his dignity. Had he done that? Bloody hell, where would his respect for himself go if that was the case?
Processing all this in his mind, he startled when Neha got up and pulled all the tools around them in her hands. She stepped up and around to the boot of her car, placing the metal objects in a corner at the back.
He heaved the flat tyre and dropped it into the stow, under her angry glare.
“I said I can—”
“I know.
You can do it. I wanted to help, that’s all.”
“Thanks.”
She muttered the word while closing the hatchback door. She then rushed to the front without another glance, for all intents dismissing him as if he were nothing more than a speck of dust in the air around her.
Why didn’t such a callous treatment make him fly into a temper?
Her previous words rang in his head.
What sort of woman did it take to attempt a tyre switch when she could simply call for help or hail someone to do it for her?
A woman who doesn’t ask for favours.
He’d been an arse.
He strolled over to the driver’s window and bent forward until his face had drawn level with hers.
“Two weeks’ trial. You start Monday.”
Once back at his car, he stopped by the door. Closing his eyes, he prayed he’d taken the right decision.
Something told him he had. The same something that made him realize Neha had remarkable similarities with a woman he respected more than anything.
His mother.
Chapter Three
Neha shook her head as she gathered the papers strewn over her large desk in the newsroom. Two weeks had gone by, time during which she’d been working at the station in the capacity of news editor. On a trial basis.
The make-or-break day would come on Monday—what would the big boss have in store for her? In all this time she’d worked for and with him, he’d never given her an inkling as to where she stood with him. Never a compliment, nor an acknowledgement. Just this completely silent and overwhelming presence of his looming everywhere when she didn’t need to interact with him for work.
What was she doing thinking of Logan? She’d taken great pains to keep him out of her thoughts unless in a professional capacity since that fateful day in Flic en Flac. Not the time to slip into fantasyland and start weaving his breath-taking, virile image into her conscious thoughts. He was the boss. Full stop.
Claps and cheers erupted around her. The Saturday midday news broadcast had gone without any hitch, and now, her team was celebrating. They’d fine-tuned the most important weekend radio programme. She breathed a sigh of relief.
Electronic sounds of Depeche Mode’s eighties tracks flooded through the closed-circuit loudspeaker system running along the ceiling beams of the rooms. Whatever was being aired also played in the office. As the rhythm flew over her, Neha found herself humming to the tune and lip-synching the words to ‘Enjoy The Silence.’ She loved eighties music and knew nearly all the songs of the decade by heart.
“We’re going down for a bite, Neha. You want something?”
A small group stood near the newsroom’s door.
“No, thanks. I’m fine. You run ahead.”
Lord knew they deserved the break. Her staff all worked like crazy to ensure the proper running of the newsroom.
Left alone, she turned her attention back to clearing her desk, losing herself in the sudden, unusual quiet in the room.
“Enjoying the silence?”
She froze, and her hand fisted on the A4 sheet she held.
Logan.
What was he doing here? In all the time she’d been at the station, he seemed to have gone out of his way to not cross her path, their only encounter when they needed to brainstorm the evening TV news bulletin and she occasionally had to step in as his mock co-host. Then, too, he’d been abrupt, concise, and barely conversational.
“Just … clearing some stuff,” she said.
She turned towards the door, where the big man blocked the path with his sheer size. Dressed in jeans and a white, short-sleeved shirt, his muscular body radiated power and strength. She drifted her focus to his right arm, where the pointed, snaking edges of his tattoo peeked below the hem of the woven cotton.
In a suit and tie or a long-sleeved garment, no one would know the dark-blue design rested there, painted into his skin. But the knowledge lingered inside her, having seen it so up close, and whenever she glimpsed him, she had to remind herself she did not have X-ray vision to see through his clothing and get to the intricate drawing.
If she closed her eyes, she would be able to make out every line and curve of the tattoo under his sleeve—
With a start, she forced her attention away from the visual. What was she doing thinking about his body?
And she was a married woman, for goodness’ sake.
You’re widowed, a little voice whispered. What more do you need to acknowledge the fact?
She shook off the disturbing murmur and focused on the matter at hand. Her boss being here bade nothing good.
He wasn’t smiling. Definitely a bad sign.
But, then again, Logan never smiled, as if his face had frozen in a perpetual frown. She would have maintained this for certain had she not seen him on the screen when he reported the evening news. There, his face took on a whole different dimension. His dark eyes didn’t exactly twinkle, but a spark glittered in them, nevertheless. Very far from the smouldering fire she encountered every time she happened to catch his gaze inadvertently. She had also witnessed the slight curve of his mouth, the one bound to draw viewers in and make them think he shared some private joke with them and them alone. And his voice—it lost most of its drawling quality and took on a crisper note, his accent almost gone when he addressed the camera.
“Done for now?” he asked.
She drew her spine straighter to meet with him. “About done, yes.”
What did he want?
He crossed the wide room in a few strides and came to stand next to her desk, to her left. With his large hands on the wooden surface, the muscles in his forearms tensed as he leaned forward.
Her whole attention locked on those hands, and she travelled her gaze up, where the powerful strength of him disappeared under the sleeve stretched tight over his bulging arm and covering the dark lines of his tattoo. She parted her lips, needing to breathe, to break the oppressive quiet between them.
But no word escaped her. Only a soft, tiny, plaintive moan. Had he heard her?
His features appeared impassive, nothing betraying the cool mask of detachment he always wore.
Yet, as she encountered his eyes, the fire always blazing in their dark depths struck her. The words died on her lips, evaporating under the intensity of his gaze.
Why, and how, could he do this to her? Her mind grew alert, yet, the control she needed over her frozen body and vocal chords failed to materialize.
When Logan broke eye contact with her, Neha found herself able to breathe again.
He leaned over and pulled the sheaf of papers she’d stacked, his long fingers quick and nimble as he browsed through the pile.
“Since you’re done here, you may leave.” He didn’t glance up while delivering the words.
“But—”
She started to protest then quelled the objection. She never left the office before five o’clock, so Logan telling her to leave at one meant only one thing.
He was throwing her out.
“Fine.” She straightened and grabbed the sling of her handbag, closing her other hand on the blazer flung on the back of her chair. Anger snapped like a high-strung elastic band being released in her mind, the lashes hurtful and obliterating every rational thought.
How could she have thought he would be fair to her? He’d granted her this trial, yet, she should’ve bet it would only be a way for him to further humiliate her. He’d always known he’d lure her with the prospect of a permanent job before he snatched all her hopes at the last minute.
Finally with all her belongings in her hands, she started towards the door. Tears burned her eyes, spurred on by the utter sense of inadequacy scorching its way inside her. But she wouldn’t cry, and she blinked a few times to dry the tears. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her cry.
“You sure are eager to leave, aren’t you?”
His voice held a tiny hint of mocking laughter. She didn’t pause in her step, plodding forw
ard as fast as her tightly wound body would allow her.
“If only you’d be this keen Monday morning to report back to work, I’d be one happy boss.”
Neha stopped in her tracks.
She whirled around to face him, her eyes growing wide at the casual way he had sat one buttock on the edge of the desk and the small hint of a smile tugging at his lips. If she hadn’t been so surprised, she would’ve said he appeared amused. And that he was sharing something private and utterly personal with her and her alone right then.
“What did you say?”
Her words came out in a croak.
He remained in his stance and crossed his arms in front of his barrel chest. “The news editor’s job ends at one on Saturdays. Didn’t you know this?”
She swallowed past the elation wanting to burst out of her. She didn’t know if this was real or not. With Logan, she could never be certain. Better heed caution.
“I’m not your news editor. I’m on trial.”
The smile didn’t leave his mouth. “Trial ends day after tomorrow. Figured I could tell you already you’re confirmed.”
So that’s why he’d come here. She’d won her job, and she must’ve won him over, too, in some small way.
A rush of relief washed over her, making her weak. She snaked a hand out from under the blazer on her arm to grip the back of a nearby chair.
“I’ve got the job?” she asked softly.
Logan stood to his full height and walked towards her. “These two weeks have proved rather intense. I needed to make you jump through fiery hoops to know what you were capable of.” He paused. “From now, you have new work conditions. You will be responsible for most of the job, but the task will lay more on your team. You’ll need to coordinate it all, like in an executive capacity.”
She nodded, unable to say anything as the realization worked its way into her. She had been so worried and high-strung lately. The tension leaving her almost felt painful.
“Do you have good Internet at your house?”
“Yes. Why?”