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“Of course it would be completely paid for by the company as you will get moved into a position in our financial department,” he adds taking away one of my arguments. “And if you’d like to visit your family on the weekends, I will have a car arranged for you,” he adds taking away another.
“It sounds good and all but…” I state still resisting for some reason.
“The position here at the company will be a permanent one, if that’s what’s holding you back. I’m sure we can negotiate the salary but if your input helps us get Lemans there will be a sizeable bonus for you,” Rafe tells me. “I believe in rewarding my employees for their hard work, but I can see you’re still wavering, is it your husband…fiancé?”
I bite my lower lip, the one telltale sign that I’m worried or nervous about something. “No, nothing like that. I have another part-time job waitressing and I’m scheduled to work this week and weekend.”
“It’s Wednesday, right?” he says looking down at his date book full of meetings. “I don’t see us leaving until Monday morning at the earliest so if you’d like to finish your shifts there this weekend I don’t see a problem with it, but I will tell you that my salary packages don’t leave you with the need for another job, not even here in the city.”
He then named a starting figure, and I thoughtmyhearing had gone out. It was absolutely enough to make working at Vivian’s unnecessary but the thought of leaving the club thatI tried so hard to stay away from in the first place strangely made me feel sad. I’d only been working there three and a half months, but it lit up my life and losing that light would be hard. Not wearing the five-inch heels every night…not so much.
“Okay, I’m in,” I say with a grin and thus my life is in the hands of a man who makes my mouth water and my palms sweaty. If I were looking for a man to be with, he’d certainly fit the bill, but since I’m not and heisnow my boss I have to find a way to distract myself from him, if it’s the last thing I do.
∞∞∞
“Tired?” Rafe asks me two weeks later as we sit in traffic, a pile-up is blocking the entire road and we have nowhere to go. The accident is blocking the intersection in front of us, and the last one is back around the curve where another pile-up is. Yeah, there’s one in front of us and one behind us. I have to hand it to Rafe, his reflexes when we came around the corner and saw what was going on kept us from getting involved in one like others behind us did but now, we’re stuck and have been for nearly forty-five minutes.
“Somewhat,” I tell him not admitting that I’m exhausted, completely and utterly exhausted. We’ve been working around the clock finding the numbers we need and schmoozing up to Charles and Gloria who are reluctant to let go of their family’s heritage.
“You were great today,” he says and my pulse races.
“Thank you,” I say demurely, trying to get myself under control. The man is my boss for fuck sake. Okay, so I shouldn’t swear but you’ll have to forgive me, I’ve been cooped up with the man for almost two weeks and the closeness is driving my sensescrazy. Crazy enough that I haven’t even given a single thought to Vivian’s or going to see my family all week.
“You were,” he says as though he thought I didn’t believe him, but I do because I know I was great today. Not bragging or anything, I’m simply telling the truth. I rocked.
“Thanks,” I say bright enough for him to know I believe him. “I think we’ll hear from them tomorrow—no make that, I know we’ll hear from them tomorrow. Charles liked the ideas and Gloria is enamored with you enough to follow you anywhere,” I end with a laugh.
“The woman was very…” he said searching for a polite way to put it.
“Hospitable?” I suggest with a grin.
“Quite,” he states. “Looks like something down there’s moving.”
Indeed, it was; a wrecker was moving one of the cars down the side of the exit and another came up it to start moving others from the roadway. The police officers started directing traffic down the exit and we were able to move. Well, creep actually. Thirty minutes later we finally, yesfinally, make it to the bottom of the exit ramp and he’s about to go through it when I suggest, “Take a right actually, we’ll get there faster.”
“We will?” he asked skeptically.
“Trust me,” I say, and he turns right. Fifteen minutes and several back roads later, we’re standing outside the hotel and Rafe turns to me with an inquisitive expression on his face.
“How did you ever come up with that route?” he asks.
“Five years living here, going to school here, you learn your way around,” I say with a shrug. It’s true I learnt my way around, but some of the roads we took were ones girls from Sam’s club lived on or other friends from college. In fact we drove right past my old apartment, but I wasn’t going to mention that.
“A few of those roads had me worried. I would never have believed you knew how to get through some of those neighborhoods, they’re a little on the rough side,” he says leading.
“I’m a girl of mystery,” I joke, “once you unravel one knot there’s twenty more.”
“I’d say,” it sounded like he said but his back was to me, and I couldn’t quite make it out. Louder he stated, “Would you like to have dinner at the restaurant?”
It sounds okay. We’ve been ordering room service almost every night except for the couple when we went out with this person or that one trying to ascertain the information needed. I really am tired, and for some reason what sounds the best to me is ordering in a pizza and vegging on the couch or alone in my room. Any more time spent with Rafe could prove deadly to my resolve.
“Don’t tell me you’re tired of my company…” Rafe joked when I stayed quiet.
“No, I just thought that after the day we’ve had a pizza and a glass of wine sounds much better than some stuffy restaurant that tries to act five star when it’s only two,” I say with a shrug of the shoulders.
“You know what,” Rafe says surprising me, “that sounds just about perfect. Make it a beer and you’ve got yourself a deal.”
“You’re willingly going to have pizza for dinner?”
