Billionaire Under the Mistletoe

by Hannah Jo Abbott

  “Hmm, I think that might be a good thing.” His eyes sparkled as he teased her and when she met his gaze, she burst out with a laugh.

  “Alright, I’ll try to tone it done for the rest of the day.” She pulled off her pom pom hat and shook out her curls. Stewart watched as her long locks cascaded down her shoulders. Bits of snow fell from the hat and her hair onto the carpet. “I’ll get started on the list you sent me last night. Just let me know if you need anything else.” With that she left his office and closed the door with a thud.

  Simultaneously, Stewart felt a thud deep in his chest. Who was this woman who had waltzed into his office bringing Christmas music and snow day hot cocoa? He didn’t consider himself someone who was surprised often. But she surprised him every day, if not every time she opened her mouth.

  Stewart sat back in his chair and sipped the hot cocoa. He imagined that Abi was out front in her office, sipping hot cocoa, probably humming along to the Christmas music. Just then his phone beeped to show a text message. It was Abi. Department Heads Budget meeting. Conference Room. 15 Minutes.

  Stewart knew he had to get his head in the game before that meeting. No snow day hot cocoa to steal his attention. But he knew there would still be a distraction in the meeting. And she would be sitting right next to him.

  ***

  By the end of the week Abi felt like she was getting the hang of things pretty well. See, I said I was a fast learner, she told herself as she returned to her office.. She had just left a meeting, probably her fifth of the week. Mr. Vincent was still there talking with a few of the department heads, but she came back to the office to order lunch. She took in a deep breath and blew it out. It had been a long meeting. A very long meeting, she thought as she rubbed her hands that were sore from all the typing she had done. And her brain was whirling from all of the numbers and information overload. She had never heard so many sales numbers, budget items, and income predictions. She thought back to her one business class in college and wished maybe she had paid a little bit more attention.

  By the time Mr. Vincent walked in the office, she had sent him over the notes and lunch was sitting on her desk. “Here you go, Mr. Vincent,” she stood and handed him the takeout bag. When he reached to take it he touched her hand ever so briefly. She looked up and realized he was watching her face. Their eyes met and neither one of them moved. It only lasted for a moment, but Abi felt like it was an important moment.

  “Please,” he said without taking his eyes off of her, “Call me Stewart.”

  “Okay,” she whispered.

  “Did you get your lunch?” He peered into the bag.

  “Uh, yeah, right here,” she motioned to the food on her desk.

  “You didn’t want to eat in my office?” He asked.

  Abi’s heart raced, did he want her to eat in his office? With him? “Oh, umm, well, I just have some work to do, so I just thought I would eat here so I can multitask.”

  Stewart cleared his throat. “Alright. I have a few things to go over with you for the rest of today and next week. So when you’re done come in and we’ll talk before my afternoon conference call.”

  “Yes, sir.” Abi said. She thought he seemed a little…something. Disappointed? She thought. No, there’s no way. “I’ll be in in a few minutes.”

  “Perfect.” He didn’t meet her eyes again as he walked away.

  Abi wasn’t sure what to think about that. She slowly sat down and ate her lunch. But her mind was too jumbled to do any multitasking work now. She grabbed her personal cell phone and texted Kim: Just so you know, I’m mad at you.

  Kim texted back: And why is that?

  Abi: Because you’ve made me think about my boss. Now I’m distracted and letting my mind play tricks on me like thinking he wants me to come eat lunch in his office with him.

  Kim: Did he ask you to eat with him? She added a wide-eyed emoji.

  Abi: Not exactly, but he seemed to assume I would and it was almost like he was disappointed that I didn’t

  Kim: And WHY wouldn’t he be?

  Abi: Because I’m his ASSISTANT. He probably just wanted to talk business and was frustrated that it would have to wait. I do have to say he can be a little impatient.

  Kim: Then you two should get along just perfectly.

  Abi: Ha Ha she added a rolling eyes emoji.

  Kim: Are you eating lunch now?

  Abi: Yes, at my own desk.

  Kim: So go in his office and say you changed your mind, and then see if he talks business or not.

  When Abi didn’t text back right away, Kim texted again. Go on. Do it.

  Abi: Hmm, I don’t know if I should follow your advice. It’s your fault I’m staring at a sandwich thinking about his face.

  Kim: LOL. That sounds like a good looking sandwich.

  Abi leaned back in her chair and considered Kim’s idea. But still decided against it. She had to go in his office after she ate anyway, so she might as well enjoy the food without worrying if he saw her taking giant bites.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Call me Stewart? He could hear himself saying the words, but he couldn’t believe he had said that. I have never, ever had an assistant call me Stewart. But when he had looked in her eyes, he just couldn’t hear her call him “Mr. Vincent” one more time. What is wrong with me? He thought. Sure, he had had a wonderful assistant all those years, and she was a grandmother. Maybe that had been smarter than I thought. But there were plenty of secretaries and other assistants in the company, most of whom came to his office at different times, and plenty of them sat around the table at meetings. But none of them had ever distracted him the way Abi did. And it all seemed so effortless for her. He didn’t feel like she was putting on an act. And he had been in business long enough to judge someone’s character pretty quickly. No, this was the real Abi. He felt certain of that, even if nothing else.

  But what did he do with the way he was feeling? The way he couldn’t take his eyes off her when she was in the room, and the way his pulse quickened when he heard her voice? Certainly he couldn’t act on that. She was his assistant, after all. Even if he was looking for something, Which I’m not, he told himself emphatically. He would do the only thing he could do: only think of her as his assistant and do the work they needed to do. He could do that. He was a professional.

  He spent the rest of the day focusing on work. Abi came and went from his office as he needed things. But he didn’t initiate any extra conversations. When she came in just before leaving, she tried to make small talk. But he kept his eyes on his computer and answered her questions with brief responses. He did look up to tell her that he would be working late the following Monday and she should plan to be available all evening.

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “Is there anything else before I leave today?” She asked, her voice sounded formal and even a little cold.

  He glanced at her to see that she had crossed her arms and looked a little put out. He hated that. “No, that’s it for today.” He watched her walking away and couldn’t stand it, “Abi,” he said. She turned around but stayed where she was, raising her eyebrows in anticipation of a command. “Thank you for your help today. You did good work.”

  The corners of her mouth lifted just slightly. “Thanks, see you Monday.”

  “Bye,” Stewart practically whispered, but she couldn’t possibly have heard him. He could tell that she had noticed him being distant this afternoon and he didn’t want her to think he was rude. He leaned back and swiveled around in his desk chair. “Ugh, I’m handling this all so badly.” He stood and rubbed both hands over his face and then through his hair. He didn’t usually talk to himself, but the situation seemed to require it. “First I tell her to call me Stewart, then I treat her like a low class hired hand.” He paced back and forth for several minutes before finally coming back to sit at his desk. He got out a pen and piece of paper, he always thought better when he could see it in black and white on a page. And he could fix this. He was a problem solver, a cre
ator, and a businessman who had worked through every kind of drama and problem a business could encounter. But now, as he stared at the blank page, no solutions came to mind. He was good with technology and business, and even with people when it involved work. But he had kept his distance from any kind of relationship for so long that he felt lost in this situation.

  He sighed, but finally decided to just start writing whatever came to mind. Brainstorming, he usually called it. Free writing with no editing and no bad ideas, his high school English teacher had called it. Several minutes later he looked at the paper that he had filled up with jumbles of words. Assistant. Professional. Kind. Funny. Excited. Bad idea. Cute. Inappropriate relationship. Work place professionalism. Like her.

  Some of the words he had written small, and others he had written in all caps. He went through and circled the words or phases he had written more than once. It was quickly obvious the phase he had written the most, and it seemed to outweigh all of the others. The words “Like her.”

  ***

  By Monday morning, Stewart had decided he would just act normal and let things happen as they happened. He wasn’t planning any kind of romance, much less an office romance, but he wasn’t the kind of person who could be rude to someone he worked with every day. So as a peace offering, he went by the coffee shop on his way to work and picked up what he called “frilly coffee” for both of them. He knew it would be a long day and he wanted to start out on the right foot.

  When he heard Abi arrive, he hurried to his office door to watch as she found the coffee on the desk. She was hurrying in and walked straight to her desk. She had sat down, taken off her coat, and was opening her laptop before she looked over and saw the cup. She paused, picked it up, looking as if she was testing to see if it was warm. Seeing that it was, she turned and saw Stewart leaning on his office doorframe. He didn’t say a word, but held up his own cup as if offering a toast.

  “For me?” Abi asked, pressing her hand to her chest and raising her eyebrows in curiosity.

  “Yes,” Stewart said.

  “Well thank you. That’s a surprise. I thought I was the official coffee fetcher around here.”

  Stewart pushed himself up from his leaning position and walked to her desk. “As a matter of fact, that is the job title I listed on your employment papers.” He smiled. “But I thought I could take care of it. Just this once, of course.”

  “Oh, of course.” Abi sipped her coffee, “Wouldn’t want anybody to think you were capable of doing menial little tasks or anything.” Her eyes were full of laughter as she teased him.

  “Nope. Not at all.”

  “So what’s on the agenda today?” She asked, opening up his literal agenda.

  “No meetings today,” he said, motioning towards her screen.

  “Well that’s different.”

  “Today is a project proposal deadline. We have one every quarter, and this one is the most important. We get the most project proposals for this quarter every year. Each one has already been through a manager, and a department head, so these are the best of the bunch. I will go over every proposal personally. Plan to order dinner for both of us. I’ll need you here to assist me.”

  “Alright, anything particular you want to eat?” She asked.

  “No, whatever you want is fine.”

  “Great. And what exactly will you need me to do?”

  “Assist me.”

  “Meaning…?”

  “I might ask you to look something up, research an idea or look at a competitors product that is similar. Or I might need you to run projection numbers with me. And then I can bounce ideas off of you. Who knows, maybe I’ll even ask your opinion.” He winked at her before he could stop himself.

  She laughed. “Really? Me? You just might want to know what I think about an idea?”

  He shrugged. “I said maybe.”

  Abi laughed again. “Alright, you just leave dinner to me, and I’ll be here for all the menial work, and the idea bouncing, and opinion giving.”

  “Perfect.” Stewart said. And truly he believed it was.

  ***

  Abi thanked the delivery guy and carried the food bags to Stewart’s office. They had already been reading over proposals for a couple of hours, and she was thankful for the break. Stewart stood when she walked in and started trying to make space on the desk for the food.

  “No, no.” Abi shook her head. “Let’s eat over here.” She pointed with her head towards the leather couch and coffee table off to the side of his office. “Do you ever sit over here? It looks much more comfortable than those desk chairs.”

  Stewart stuck his hands in his pockets and walked towards her. He had loosened his tie and rolled up his shirt sleeves. “Not really. The designer put it in, but I just get more work done sitting at a desk.”

  “Yes, but at least when you’re here at night, no one else is expecting you to be so formal at your desk. You could at least kick back and relax a little while you read over proposals.” While she spoke, Abi had laid out the food on the table, and grabbed two water bottles out of the office mini fridge. Now she motioned for Stewart to take the seat beside her on the couch.

  Stewart looked indecisive for the first time since she had met him. He took slow, hesitant steps around the coffee table and sat a few inches away from her. “Thanks for setting this up. It looks delicious.”

  “You’re welcome. I thought it was time you had a decent meal, even if it is eaten in your office.”

  “This is nice, thanks.” They sat in silence for a few minutes while they ate. Stewart was the first to speak, “So about the proposal we were working on…”

  Abi held up her hand to stop him. “Nope. We’re on a dinner break right now. No business talk while we eat. Let’s talk about something else.”

  “Like what?” Stewart seemed puzzled at this suggestion.

  “Anything. I barely know anything about you, so just start with something about yourself and it will be new to me.”

  Stewart cleared his throat. “Alright. Well I hate golf.”

  Abi burst out laughing, nearly choking on the bite of food in her mouth. She composed herself and put her hand to her chest. “You hate golf? That is the most random statement I have ever heard anyone say.”

  “Hmm, I doubt that. But it’s not that random, really. I’m a business man and it’s kind of stereotypical for me to play golf, watch golf, and talk about golf. But really I can’t stand it.”

  “Tell me more,” Abi said.

  “It’s just boring. Slow and quiet. I just want them to hurry up and move on.”

  Abi laughed again. “So do you like other sports? Football?”

  “No, not football. They take an hour to play fifteen minutes worth of the game, But I can watch a game of soccer. That’s where the action is.”

  “I enjoy watching football, but I can’t really argue with you there.”

  “Your turn.”

  “My turn for what?”

  “To tell me something about yourself that I don’t know.”

  “Ohhhhhh. Alright, then. Let me think of something as random as ‘I hate golf’.” She smiled to show she was teasing him. “Umm, I’ve never been outside of the country.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep, really. I’ve always wanted to travel somewhere, but just hasn’t happened yet. I do have a passport that I keep up to date, just in case I need to flee the country on a moment’s notice.”

  “You really should make use of that. There’s a lot of things to see in the world.”

  “Maybe one day I’ll have time off of work and a private jet to fly me anywhere I want to go.”

  Stewart laughed. “Well I only have one of those things. And speaking of work, I’m officially finished eating, so I think we’re allowed to talk about the projects again.”

  Abi rolled her eyes. “Fine. But only if I can reserve the right to request more random personal facts in between proposals.”

  Stewart seemed to consider that for a
moment and finally said, “It’s a deal.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “You know what we need?”

  “What’s that?” Stewart’s eyes lit up with the possibility of what she might say.

  “We need a break, and…”

  Stewart raised his eyebrows in anticipation. “And?”

  Abi stood up and spread her arms wide for emphasis. “We need a Christmas tree!”

  Stewart smiled but shook his head, “We talked about that. They’ll put one up in the lobby in a few days.”

  “But we need one here, in our office, for us to enjoy. And we need it tonight.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Yep, tonight.”

  “No, we still have proposals to go over.”

  “But are we really going to finish all of them tonight? There’s still so many left, there’s no way we will make it through all of them tonight. It will probably take us all week to finish. But tonight we need a Christmas tree. Come on!” She reached out and grabbed his arm to pull him off the couch.

  He allowed her to pull him and stood up til they were face to face. He reached up and tugged a curl that hung in front of her face. “Where are we going to get a tree right now?”

  “There’s plenty of stores open twenty-four hours. Come on, we’ll figure it out on the way.” She didn’t wait for him, but hurried out of the office. He had no choice but to follow her, and in that moment he knew he didn’t want to do anything else. He grabbed his phone and texted his driver.

  Within a few minutes Stewart and Abi had put on hats and coats and exited the back private entrance of the building. Stewart’s driver picked them up just outside the door.

  “Nice,” Abi said as she slid into the sleek black sedan. The leather seats were heated and warmed for their arrival.

  “Where to, sir?” the driver asked.