Impact (Iron Orchids Book 3)

by Danielle Norman

  I let out a laugh, not in the least put off by his description. It was no different from someone calling the reservation center and trying to get a nonrefundable trip refunded or rescheduled.

  He stood and held out a hand to me. My heart fell into the pit of my stomach, he was dismissing me, the interview was over. I stood and held out my hand.

  “Thank you for taking the time to meet with me today and for allowing Bee to tag along.”

  “Oh, you don’t want me to show you around so you know exactly where you’d be working?”

  “You mean I got the job?”

  “If you want it, the job is yours.”

  “Umm. Not to sound tacky. I don’t want this to come across—”

  “Let me stop you right there.” He turned back to his desk, picked up a sheet of paper, and handed it to me. “This is what I’m willing to pay. You will work for me directly and report to me directly.”

  I scanned each line. Insurance, 401K, sick leave, paid holidays, and vacation time, and . . .

  “Sir, is this correct?” He leaned closer and peered back over to the sheet.

  “Yep. That is the salary for this position.”

  Starting salary was fifty-two thousand a year. Holy fuck. I’d be able to buy Bee anything. This was six times my current pay.

  “Okay.” I know that I sounded a little meek at that moment, but I was in pure shock as I followed him out of his office via a connecting door to another office. It also had access to the hallway.

  “This will be your office. You are welcome to set it up however you like. You can put pictures of your daughter up, or Bee is welcome to draw pictures.” He looked over his shoulder, I was sure my smile was brighter than the sun at that moment. “Also, if you come in on the weekend for an hour or so, just bring her with you. She’s welcome to stay in your office.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. I have three brothers, so between the four of us and Sophie, there was always someone running these halls when we were younger. We’re Greek, family is everything.”

  “Wow, must be nice.”

  “What about you?” He rested one strong hand on the doorframe above my head.

  “What about me?”

  “Do you have any siblings?”

  “No.” My comment came out more terse than I had intended, but I didn’t want this man prying into my life. My family was Bee and me, and that life started the day she was born.

  I followed behind him, Bee holding my hand as he showed me around the different departments. Every time he pointed, the movement shifted his rolled-up shirtsleeve higher on his arm, revealing the tiniest hint of a tattoo I couldn’t stop looking at. This man was built, well over six feet, and probably had some model girlfriend named Gizelle I’d probably want to pin down and shove a few Twinkies down her throat. Why were people named Gizelle and Zsa Zsa always so thin? Did that name determine your fate to be an organic vegetable-eating toothpick? Fuck, the last time I went to the grocery store and bought organic vegetables, I came home with a bag of plain old donuts. Amazing how those little fuckers can just jump into your cart.

  “I know that you said you needed to give two weeks, but if I can talk to my aunt and there is a way around that, would you be willing to start earlier? I’m willing to give you a sign-on bonus. I’m desperate.”

  If his aunt couldn’t help, what would the ramifications be? I hated doing it, but I needed to put Bee first, Bee always came first.

  “I’d give you one week’s salary. So instead of waiting two weeks for your first check, I’d give you a bonus check next Friday. You’d still get your normal pay on our normal paydays.”

  I did quick math and then started over, not believing the number I kept landing on. One thousand dollars if I started Monday?

  “What type of attire?” Since Bee and I were headed out shopping anyway, I could get the right stuff if I didn’t already have a few pieces.

  “Business casual unless we are going to be out at the construction site. Those days, jeans are fine.”

  “Please talk to your aunt, I hate to burn bridges. But regardless I’ll be here Monday. I need this job, Mr. Christakos, not for me but for my daughter.”

  “Call me Damon. And I will definitely speak with my aunt.”

  I shook Damon’s hand, and then Bee and I headed out to do some shopping.

  After hours of scouring Goodwill and consignment shops, Bee and I each had some new clothes and shoes. But before we could head back home, or rather to the model house, I needed to sort out the cluster-fuck that was our living arrangement while there was still daylight.

  That was when the fluttery emptiness in my stomach started churning. I reminded myself that, if this all worked out, Bee and I would be in our own apartment in less than a month. She’d have her own bedroom, I’d have a kitchen, and we’d have some stability.

  Turning into the newest subdivision being built by Christakos Construction, my new employer, had my stress levels maxing out. I drove past the homes and wanted to cry. I didn’t see a single place for me to hide my car. They’d cleared everything away. Sure, they’d planted some trees back, but it was sparse and planned.

  Fighting back my urge to bang my head on the steering wheel, I headed back to the same house we’d been staying in for the past few months and tried to tell myself that I would have time to look this week after work. There had to be some other places. There were other builders, other model homes. Hell, in a week I could at least get us a hotel room, not a nice one, but something until the next paycheck. We’d have to stay in hotels longer because we’d save less, but we could do this, I knew it.

  Chapter 6

  Katy

  Monday morning, I arrived for my first day at work, riddled with emotions. Damon had called yesterday to tell me that his aunt handled my resignation with Disney. I thought that would make me feel better, but him being so nice only added to my stress.

  At the door, I seriously considered turning around and not walking into work. Fear that I’d lose everything not only my job but also Bee if we were discovered had my palms sweating and my mouth turning dry. This had been my life for years, and in less than a month we’d be out. I could do this. I needed to do this.

  Shoulders back, I walked in and headed down the hallway, the echo of my heels making it sound as if there were ten of me instead of just one. I rose up onto the balls of my feet, trying to quiet my steps.

  “Good morning, Katy.” Damon sat behind his desk and was wearing a pair of glasses. He slid them off as he stood, and I felt my knees go weak. I told them to knock it off and get their shit together. He was my boss, and I would not lust after him.

  “I’m going to take you over to HR and let you fill out all of the necessary paperwork,” he said, that sexy smile playing on his even sexier lips. “When you’re finished, just meet me back in my office, okay?” Damon tapped my shoulder, snapping me out of my fantasies of him. His broad shoulders. His muscular arms.

  I followed him out of his office and was still drooling over the way he moved when I realized that a woman was shoving a folder into my hands. I took it and opened it to find a stack of forms. Oh shit, pay attention, Katy. Don’t want to get fired your first day. I took a seat and began filling out the required information, adding the post office's physical address and my PO box number as if it were an apartment number. It was enough to get me a driver’s license, and Bee registered for school, it should be good enough for these forms. Coming to the last page, I glanced at my phone, shocked that it took me almost three hours.

  “Is that all you need?” I stood and handed over the stack of papers.

  “Yes, dear. Just head on back to Damon’s office.” I turned to leave, but she spoke up again. “Oh, wait. Here are the places you can go to have your fingerprints done.”

  I took the piece of paper from her as beads of sweat broke out on me. Fingerprints? Why did they need my fingerprints? “You look confused. Our insurance requires fingerprints so we can have you bonded.
You’ll be dealing with access to people’s private information and potentially access to a lot of money. So it’s just for our insurance.”

  Okay, that didn’t sound so bad. It was just for insurance. Not some hidden agenda. The last shelter I was in really fucked me up. Well, I had to be honest, I’d been fucked for a while thanks to my parents.

  It was official. I had a real job. Okay, my last job was a real job. But this one was real, real. It was real in the way that I had insurance and was making enough money to support my daughter and me.

  As I walked back to Damon’s office, I scanned the list, sheriff’s office, police station, some tax offices, and the agricultural office. I didn’t even know we had an agricultural office, but there was an address, so I figured I’d go there. Something about cops made me nervous. Okay, I knew what it was that made me nervous, probably the whole living illegally by breaking into peoples’ homes . . . well, homes that belonged to a company. I had no clue why I was trying to justify what I was doing. I knew I was wrong. It was the whole putting a face to the random no one I had been basically stealing from that bothered me. That face had offered me this fabulous job and kindness, and my guilt was going to eat me alive.

  In what Damon said was my office, I found a badge, a sticky note with a six-digit code, and a company credit card sitting on the center of my desk. Not really knowing what they were for, I popped my head into Damon’s office before I had time to think about it. Having never been a personal assistant, I didn’t know if it was okay to just walk into my boss’ office. I only had romance books to go on when it came to protocol. In them, it always seemed that the assistant and the boss had wild office sex before declaring their undying love, but I seriously doubted that was the standard I should hold myself to.

  “Hi, Damon.” I tried to sound cheery.

  “Good morning again.” He looked down at his watch. “Wow, almost afternoon. Did you see those things on your desk?” I waved them in the air to show that I had indeed seen them. “Great. You’ll need your badge to get into the building if you ever beat me here or if you are heading out to one of the construction sites and are stopped by a guard. The code is for the alarm, obviously, but it’s also the gate code for sites under construction after hours. Besides my father and me, there are only five others with the code, so please memorize that and then destroy it. The company card is for gas if you run any work-related errands or to pick up supplies, lunch, whatever we need that isn’t for your personal use.”

  I nodded, showing that I was listening to everything he said.

  “Just make sure to save the receipts and hand them in to Jenny on Friday each week. By the way, Jenny should be in after lunch, I’d like you two to meet. If, for some reason, you ever get stuck on something and I’m not here, Jenny will be able to help you. That’s her office across from yours. Any questions?” He gave me a wide smile that made me a little uncomfortable.

  “One, actually.”

  “What’s that?”

  “What should I start on?”

  Damon’s laugh was warm. Did that make sense? Did laughs have temperatures? I guess they did since my mom’s was always so damn cold.

  Damon stood and walked to a small table that had a stack of blueprints on top.

  “These all need to be filed away in the cabinet in your office. These blueprints are for phase three. Now, here is where the tedious work starts. I need you to ensure a copy of each blueprint has been scanned into the system and assigned to the proper lot number. Let me show you how.” He walked over to his desk and pulled out the chair. “Come on.” He waved me closer.

  I took a seat as he leaned over me and typed with one hand while moving the mouse to the other. I was encased, he had me encased—I was surrounded by one hundred percent man. Snatching a notepad and a pen from his desk, I attempted to write down every detail he told me and ignore the smell of him. He’d eaten a peppermint, and that, mixed with a woodsy scent of his cologne, gave me a memory of Christmas. And like the freak I was, my mind took a left turn and went straight to Naughty Santa and me being his ho, ho, ho.

  “Katy?”

  “What? I’m sorry. I was busy writing.”

  “You stopped writing halfway through. Do you need me to show you again?” Damon tilted his head to get a better look at me, and I felt the heat creep up my cheeks.

  “Do you mind? I tried to remember it all and write down what I thought that I’d forget.”

  “Okay, from the beginning . . .”

  Why was it that men’s hands looked sexy when the veins and tendons showed, but on a woman it made them look old? Damon had sexy hands, a workman’s hands. I bet he knew exactly how to use those hands. Each time he moved the mouse or typed on the keyboard, his hands looked powerful.

  When he finished, I stood and wished that I were a stilettos kind of girl. I was getting ready to walk out of his office. He’d only see my backside, my I’ve-given-birth backside, and no matter how much stilettos hurt my feet, they did wonders for my ass. Ughh.

  For the rest of the day, I stayed lost in my office, ate my lunch in my office, and only stopped to meet Jenny. And wrote three little words over and over and over on a scrap piece of paper, all directed at one Damon Christakos: Just say no.

  I scanned through Damon’s emails and sorted through them, trying to decipher them by priority all the while continuing to file blueprints.

  I cut out of work an hour early to go by the agricultural office to get the deed recorded. Forty-five minutes later, my first official day at my new job was over.

  By Wednesday, I was Jet Lee-ing the fuck out of this job. You need a copy of the permit? Boom, there it was. You need the number for the county surveyor? Oh yeah, boom, I had him on line two. In just three days, I was mastering this job and loving every minute. My workdays flew by, but better than that was that Damon was great to work for. He’d join me in my office during lunch, and we’d chat. He’d answer any question I had, no matter how small. On top of all that, the man was easy on the eyes. So, seeing him every day was definitely a bonus. He was patient, he was knowledgeable, but he was scaring the shit out of me. He always asked me how Bee was, and I didn’t like putting Bee in the spotlight, that’s where you’d find yourself left open and vulnerable. Then out of the blue, someone would dangle something in front of you by a string and either you do what they wanted or they’d cut the string and you’d lose everything. I couldn’t give Bee a lot, but I could give her unconditional love, love without strings.

  A knock on my door startled me, and I looked up to find Damon with a shoulder braced against the frame. “It’s quitting time, go home. You can finish that tomorrow.”

  I smiled, trying to push down the flush I felt creeping into my cheeks, and nodded. God, the man with his tempting lips made my panties wet, and I’d forgotten what that was like. He disappeared back into his office as I shut everything down, gathered my stuff, and headed out to pick up Bee, smiling the whole time. Realizing that I didn’t feel frazzled like I used to feel. Then that fucking acid roiled in my stomach, subtly reminding me not to get too comfy because at any moment my world could implode.

  Once that sign-on bonus money was deposited into my account, then Bee and I could move into a hotel. We had to, or I’d be spending my money on doctor bills for an ulcer.

  When I got out of my car at the community center, I saw her out in the middle of the playground, staring up at the sky and watching the clouds go by. That kid could find anything in the clouds. To her, it was better than a book, it was limitless possibilities. She created stories of the objects and people that she found in the billowy shapes. I signed her out at the front desk then joined her out on the lawn for a few minutes to see what she saw.

  “Hey, kid. What do you see today?”

  “A concert.”

  “A concert? What kind of concert?”

  “A singing concert. That big cloud is the singer, and it is rising up from a flat cloud. That’s the stage.”

  “What’s the
singer going to sing? Can you hear the song?”

  “Nope.”

  “You’re crazy, has anyone ever told you that?”

  “Yep, you.”

  I laughed at that, pot meet kettle. “Why a concert?”

  “Mrs. Rodriquez told the class that we could all sign up for the talent show. So, I signed up to sing.” Bee slid her hand out and grabbed mine. God, this kid did things that got me right in the heart sometimes.

  “Good idea, you have a great voice.” She really did, I had no idea where the kid got it from because I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.

  “But Tawney said that she was going to sing, and her mom asked me if I wanted to do something else. I said no.”

  “Why did Tawney’s mom ask you that?”

  “I don’t know. She volunteers in our class and is always bringing snacks, but she isn’t very nice.”

  What the fuck? I hated parents who involved themselves in kid crap. “What did she say when you said no?”

  “She said that she was sorry for me and she was just trying to help because Tawney has a singing teacher and was going to win the trophy.”

  “Don’t you worry about it. You have a great voice that is naturally beautiful. Maybe Tawney’s is so horrid that she needs lessons to try to learn how to sing.”

  Bee giggled.

  I didn’t let her hear the stress in my voice. There were three weeks left of school, and now I needed to add helping her practice for a song and finding her a cute costume to wear to all the normal shit I had to juggle. This was just one more time and money pit that seemed to be my constant lot in life.

  “Does everyone in the class like Tawney?”

  “No. But we all have to be nice to her. She brings in the best treats, and she has this huge party every summer. So we’re all nice to her so we get invited. This is the first year I’m in her class, so I have a chance of getting invited.”

  Wow, as a parent, how did I handle that? How did I teach my child not to be nice just to get something from someone and still teach her to be nice to everyone, especially when I rewarded her for being nice? Even as an adult we did it, we were on our best behavior to get a promotion. We didn’t tell our boss what we really thought of them because we didn’t want to get fired. In a kid’s mind, giant cupcakes and invitations to parties were just as important as that paycheck.