Working Desires: A Dirty Office Romance Boxset

by Hazel Keys

  She switched on the front burner before setting the wok directly on top of it, squirting a little bit of oil into the pan to try and keep it from sticking. She had grabbed a pair of chopsticks to use to flip the eggs as she did every morning, then quickly cracked a half dozen eggs into a bowl. Using her chopsticks, she whisked the egg yolks until they were all broken and stirred together, then poured them into the now warm wok and smiled as the eggs quickly began to whiten from the heat of the metal.

  She pulled some ham, peppers, and even bacon from the fridge and chopped them into a pile of nicely cubed ingredients. She poured them into the wok, using her chopsticks to fold the eggs over the other ingredients to make a large omelet. She was careful to rinse off her chopsticks each time they touched the raw egg, since the last thing she needed was to make herself or her roommates sick by contaminating their food. Bella might be a bit of a hypochondriac, but she had never found herself in an unfavorable position thanks in no small part to her own trust in her instincts.

  She sprinkled some seasonings on in the last minute, not wanting to give them time to burn onto the food since it gave it an acrid, bitter taste. She didn’t particularly like that taste, and after many failed attempts to cook eggs in a wok in college, she was no stranger to that unpleasant taste. It was what made her strive to make sure that she cooked the eggs just long enough, and for the most part, she had it down to a science. If there was one thing that she could trust about herself, it was her now almost second-natured knowledge of how to prepare her omelets. When it was finished she lifted the omelet out of the wok with a spatula and set it onto three plates, one for her and each of her roommates.

  The sound of her roommates approaching put a gentle smile on Bella’s face as she finished buttering the plate of toast that she had casually been preparing and helped herself to a few slices, carrying her plate out into the dining room and seating herself on the chair nearest the kitchen.

  “Thanks for breakfast, Bella,” Rachel said gratefully as she walked out into the dining room and sat down across from Bella. The rather attractive brunette cut a slice of omelet with her fork and lifted it eagerly to her mouth.

  “How are you feeling?” Isabella finally came out of the kitchen carrying her plate and a glass of orange juice, sitting down in the last available chair before looking over at the petite young Asian with a playful smile spread across her lips.

  “I wasn’t feeling too hot when I first woke up, but I am slowly starting to feel a little better. I should be able to make it through the day. I might have to refrain from drinking so much wine with you guys during the work week from now on, though,” she added playfully, lifting a piece of toast up to her mouth so she could take a bite.

  They finished their breakfast chatting playfully with one another, making jokes about Rachel’s relationship with Bradley and the fact that the Bellas still hadn’t found a man that they had liked enough to go steady with. In Bella’s case, it came as no surprise since the young Asian woman was incredibly shy in social settings by nature. When she had a few drinks she opened up a little, but she wasn’t at the point where she was going to the club to try and pick up a guy. Besides, there was a guy at work that she happened to be interested in, even if she didn’t have the guts to tell her friends.

  Glancing up at the clock, Bella let out a startled little cry as she saw that their breakfast had taken a little longer than she had intended and the three women were now in danger of being late for work. There was a lot of scrambling that ensued as they hurriedly finished their meal, grabbing their purses before making their way out the door. Bella and Isabella were carpooling as they did almost every morning, and Bella gripped her knees somewhat tightly as Isabella sped through the early morning traffic on their way to the office. Rachel followed them closely in her own car, and after speeding just a little bit, they arrived at the office with minutes to spare. They barely managed to make it through the front door on time.

  Chapter Three

  Tristan

  Tristan couldn’t help but notice when the girls showed up for work, each one of them being slightly out of breath as they sprinted through the front door of the building and down the hall to where the main work area was located. Bella had come in first, the young Asian woman looking surprisingly cute in her chosen get up today, the business suit giving her the definitive air of a businesswoman. Isabella followed after Bella, and Tristan found himself smiling widely as he was able to take a good look at the woman whom he had been crushing on for a long time now.

  She had done her naturally curly, blonde-streaked hair up into a very tidy bun at the back of her head that only served to put her already graceful features into sharp clarity. Her golden skin seemed to be glowing on her face that morning, and Tristan idly found himself wondering whether she had used some sort of product that he could attribute to her glowing skin. He decided that he didn’t mind either way, instead allowing his own brown eyes to catch sight of Rachel as she finally managed to hurry in after her friends. He couldn’t help but feel a small smile tug at the corner of his lips when he saw her, the thought that she had finally broken down and started dating Bradley despite how rocky their business partnership had started out serving as a constant source of amusement for him. Even now, months after the two of them had started going steady, Tristan still couldn’t quite believe it had happened.

  “Hello Tristan,” a soft voice said from the side of him, and he had to blink in surprise when he glanced over to see Bella smiling shyly up at him. Her facial features were just like the Chinese actresses that he saw in the martial arts movies that he liked to watch all of the time, something that was not lost on him. He was grateful for his dark skin just then, since he could feel the telltale warmth of a blush beginning to appear on his cheeks. He didn’t want her to think he was being weird by just staring at her, so he forced himself to reply.

  “Hey, Bella, how is it going? You are looking really nice today,” he blurted out, though he was grateful that he had somehow managed to keep his voice mostly straight throughout that little tirade, meaning he had thankfully prevented himself from looking like a complete idiot in front of her.

  She looked a little taken by surprise by his compliment, a rush of red color immediately brightening her cheeks as he watched. He didn’t really think anything of his comment, but no doubt she was simply enjoying the niceness of having her looks complimented. He ran a hand through his dreadlocks gently, patting them into place before allowing himself to take a good look at her. He could see that she seemed just a little more pale than usual, though whether that was a result of her having rushed there to the office as opposed to her possibly being sick he didn’t really know. All he knew for certain was that she was now smiling over at him, her eyebrows moving in an obviously flirtatious manner.

  “Why, thank you, Tristan. You look very handsome as well,” she replied earnestly, the sound of Isabella calling out to her serving to interrupt the rest of her conversation as Bella was forced to rush off to assist her friend, leaving Tristan standing alone by his office. It was there that Bradley found him only a few minutes later, a smile spreading across his lips as the blonde-haired vice-president of the company clasped him on the shoulder gently.

  “Hey there, Tristan,” he said casually, his blue eyes twinkling mischievously as he spoke. “How was your night?”

  “Oh, the usual,” Tristan said with a dismissive shrug, his fingers stroking his chin gently. “Got home after work, made a quick dinner and unwound with a movie and a few beers before bed. Nothing too extraordinary, and definitely nothing worth bragging about,” he added, waving a hand in an obviously dismissive gesture.

  Bradley seemed to laugh at that, his head shaking slowly back and forth as his hand lifted off of his friends’ shoulders. His expression then grew a little more serious, the obvious air of a vice-president billowing off of him as he leaned against the door to Tristan’s office, which he still had yet to head inside of. “I came down here because I have heard fro
m Marcy that you came by a couple of times yesterday saying you needed to have a word with me. I must apologize for having been unavailable for you at that time, for you see, I was scheduled for a multitude of business meetings yesterday with Ryan and some prospective partnerships with some shipping companies that will allow us to keep our shipping costs competitive. But, that aside, what is it that you needed to talk to me about?”

  Tristan’s head was swimming slightly from Bradley’s words, the more upper-level management of the business always serving to make his brain hurt from how much it required him to think. He simply nodded along as Bradley spoke, honestly hoping that his friend would wrap up the conversation quickly so that he might get to his work. At the mention of his reason for trying to get a hold of him, though, Tristan perked up immediately. He had been so engrossed in what Bella and Isabella had looked like that morning that he had almost forgotten part of the big project that he needed Bradley’s approval on in order to begin it.

  “That is right. I need you to look over this proposal that I have for something that I was thinking about posting on our social media sites. I would want to increase the functionality of the catalog by opening up the ability to have each of our items posted up on Facebook as well. This would likely increase both the traffic to our Facebook page and traffic to the catalog for those who will be interested in the other things that we will offer that won’t be posted online,” Tristan said excitedly, his words tumbling out of his mouth in a somewhat rushed manner.

  “Are you suggesting only posting select goods to Facebook so as to retain intrigue for what the catalog contains, so as to guide curious potential customers to the catalog?” There was a note of mild incredulity in Bradley’s voice, but it was tinged with what Tristan thought might have been awe.

  “Well, the whole point of social media is to supplement the business. We don’t need the catalog receiving competition from the Facebook page, since they are only supposed to help one another. Besides, Rachel would kill me if she knew that I had tried to outshine the catalog that she put so much effort into. I don’t know about you, but I rather enjoy my life and would hate to see it forced to come to an abrupt end just because I managed to tick off your girlfriend. I’ll pass on that, thanks,” he said with a laugh, his chest shaking slightly from just how much amusement he was getting out of the whole situation.

  “Well, I have some meetings a little later this morning, but I have a window of open time between 1:30 and 2:30 pm today. Why don’t you make time to come up to my office then, and we can see about reviewing those things that you said you need my approval for. The sooner I can look over that and possibly approve your project the sooner you can get started working, right?” Bradley’s tone made it sound like more of a statement than a question. It was as if he already knew the answer to his own question and was merely asking it for the sake of asking.

  “You would be right about that. Otherwise, all I have lined up to do today is update our social media announcements and talk to Bella about updating certain aspects of the company website. It’s going to be a nice and easy day for me, I am thinking,” Tristan said with a barely concealed smile, the prospect of being able to take it somewhat easy on the job a novelty that he was thoroughly set on enjoying fully.

  “Lucky you. Well, I’ll see you later in my office. Have fun till then,” Bradley said casually before clapping his friend on the shoulder once more. He moved off in the direction of the elevator that lead up to where he and Rachel now shared an office. Tristan watched him until he saw the elevator doors close before making his way into his own office.

  He sipped patiently out of his thermos of coffee as he waited for his computer to flicker on, his eyes watching the Acer logo briefly flash across his screen for an instant before it began to boot up. He noticed that his computer seemed to be taking a little bit more time to boot up than usual, and he made a private note to himself to give his computer a look over once he found himself with some downtime. The last thing he needed was to find out his computer was about to have issues right as he was potentially going to be placed on a big project that would certainly need the use of his functioning computer to complete.

  He couldn’t stop himself from letting a small noise of triumph escape from between his lips, the taste of his coffee only seeming to be improved by how optimistic his friend and superior had been when he had told him about his plans for the project this morning. Things were looking like they were prepared to get even better for Tristan Melbourne, and he was eager to get that particular ball rolling.

  Chapter Four

  Bella

  Bella had felt like she was walking on air as she made her way towards the office where she and Isabella shared a workspace, her heart still beating in her chest rather rapidly in the aftermath of her run in with Tristan. He had complimented her, the memory of his words easily causing a dark pink blush to spread across her cheeks. She had done her best to act casual as she had walked into her office, but her friend had immediately seemed to catch onto the fact that something had pleased her greatly. Isabella had only needed to hear a few moments of her friend quietly humming to herself behind her desk before she had turned to face towards Bella. The Puerto Rican hottie had her eyebrow arched inquisitively as she glanced over, a small smile beginning to spread across her lipstick-covered lips.

  “Well, doesn’t someone sound awfully cheerful? You didn’t seem to be in this good of a mood when we left our house this morning. What happened?”

  Bella bit her bottom lip in response to her friends’ question, not quite certain that she wanted to reveal to her what had just transpired between her and Tristan. She couldn’t help but think that there was a possibility that she was reading too far into what Tristan had said to her, and if that was the case then she simply wanted to be allowed to hold onto her playful little fantasy a while longer. She shook her head lightly, forcing a smile to her lips as she rolled her eyes.

  “Nothing special. I just happen to be in a good mood. Is that suspicious or something?” She sounded defensive as she spoke, and as she saw Isabella’s eyes narrow slightly she knew that she had given herself up in that very instance.

  “It was when we came in and Tristan greeted us, wasn’t it? You took a while to come to the office after I walked past him, and when I looked back I saw you standing in front of him as the two of you talked. Is he the one that you have been secretly crushing on this whole time?” Isabella leaned closer to Bella, her green eyes twinkling as she looked her friend directly in the eyes. “Oh my gosh, he is! He totally is!” she added in a rushed whisper, a huge grin now spreading across her face.

  Bella couldn’t help but blush even brighter as her friend managed to hit the nail right on the head, her voice not seeming to want to work even as she fiercely wanted to deny what her friend had just said. She didn’t want to have to deal with being teased about it, and Isabella was the kind of person who wouldn’t let something go until she had satisfied herself upon the subject. Bella could only sigh at the thought that she was going to soon be subjected to a large amount of ridicule from her friend surrounding the subject of her office crush, which she had been working so hard to keep secret up until now. She tried to keep playing it off, hoping that she might be able to salvage the situation yet.

  “He complimented me about how I look. Is it so wrong for me to feel good about being told that I look pretty?” she asked, sitting down in front of her computer and pressing the power button to bring the screen flickering to life. “Besides, you get the exact same way each time that you finish talking to Amun each day,” she said accusingly, pointing her finger at her friend as she spoke.

  This time it was Isabella’s turn to blush, and she suddenly found something very interesting on her computer screen to focus on. Bella was grateful for the silence between them, busying herself with taking a preliminary look at the code for the interactive catalog so that she could get an idea of how Rachel had set it up. Doing so now would make it far easier for her to be ab
le to go through and edit the code later should the need arise. Bella was quite impressed with the work that her co-worker had put into the interactive catalog, silently reminding herself to compliment Rachel for her skill the next time that she saw her.

  Bella found that her attention was occasionally being shifted over to where she could see Tristan sitting at his desk through the window of his office, his head leaning against his hand as his eyes scanned over the screen of his computer. No doubt he was hard at work already, since Tristan had a reputation of being one of the hardest working people there. Not that Bradley had not been working super hard during the time leading up to his promotion, and Amun was currently the best sales representative because his numbers were steadily consistent, so he deserved his own credit as well. However, in her mind, Tristan was an even harder worker.

  With the world having become so intimately tied to the internet, she and Tristan, in particular, were the ones responsible for ensuring that nothing went wrong with the business when it came to all matters of being linked with their customers on the web. Tristan manned the company social media outlets every single day in addition to the consistent proposals and project outlines that he was required to come up with, while Bella was in charge of the IT department, which was something that had become an increasingly difficult position the longer that she spent there. Their computers had been rather old models up until recently when a request that she had made to Ryan for them to upgrade their office computers had finally been approved.

  Now that their company was working using higher quality computers, Bella was even more efficient at her work. That didn’t stop the computers from occasionally having issues, of course, and it would be left to Bella to go and try and sort out the problems in a timely manner so that the work day wouldn’t be held up too bad. No one in the office liked it when they fell behind, after all. She smiled and came back from her thoughts to find that she was gazing in the direction of Tristan’s office once again, her dark brown eyes twinkling gently as she watched him work, turning her gaze back towards her computer screen each time she thought that he might be noticing the fact that she was watching him.