AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I turned on my heel and marched out of the staff room.
Arrogant, spoiled, lazy bastard. That’s what Luke Crawford was. I couldn’t believe fate put him in my path again. I had hoped never to see him again, but now he stood in the way of me wrapping up this audit in record time. I wouldn’t let him get away with it. Not this time. No. This time, I wouldn’t hide in the hallways or behind my locker door. I would fight back.
A few minutes later, after having settled back down in front of my laptop, Luke walked into the boardroom with a steaming plate in one hand and several paper plates in the other.
“I brought breakfast,” he announced, laying the dish in the center of the boardroom table.
“Thank you, but—”
James cut me off when he pushed his chair back and shouted, “All right!”
Luke’s eyes met mine across the room and he smirked. I simply shook my head, realizing that not only had Luke not changed, but people still crumbled at his feet whenever he walked into a room. But not me. Not anymore.
“Have you brought the financials?” I asked, tapping my pen on the table.
“Our accountant, Daniel, has emailed them to you. You should have them in your Inbox already.”
I checked my email and saw the message from Daniel. “I thought it was your job to provide us with the information?”
“I did. I just got someone else to send it to you. Work smarter, not harder. That’s always been my motto.”
“I’m surprised you work at all,” I mumbled.
“Pardon?”
“Never mind,” I said. “We’re good for now. You can go back to doing whatever you’d rather be doing right now.”
When he didn’t reply with a smart comeback, I looked up at him. His eyes roamed over me, then settled on my face. I narrowed my eyes.
“Your hair’s shorter,” he said, his voice low.
“I’m surprised you noticed.” I ran my fingers through my hair and pushed it behind my ear, but a few strands fell over my cheek.
He pulled in his bottom lip then smirked. “Oh, I notice everything about you, Sweeney.”
His words unnerved me. We were friends once when we were little. But then we started high school and everything changed. If Luke Crawford had noticed me in high school, it was only to make my life miserable.
“Great. So, you’ll see that I’m quite busy right now. I’ll call for you if we need anything else.” I wanted him gone. I didn’t want him looking at me or helping me. Sticking my nose inside my laptop, I prayed he would leave.
Finally, he walked out and I exhaled in relief. I stared at my screen, but instead of the financial report, I saw Luke’s fourteen-year-old face.
*
Fourteen years earlier…
Luke stood next to me at my locker. He had shaved off his curly brown hair over the summer before high school, making his green eyes and long lashes stand out.
Staring at the color photocopy of The Mona Lisa I taped to my locker, he asked, “Why do you love this painting so much? She looks miserable.”
I frowned in confusion. “What do you mean? She’s smiling.”
He snorted. “No. She’s not.”
“That’s because you’re looking at her mouth,” I explained.
He shook his head and chuckled. “Grace, sometimes you make no sense at all.”
Then he grabbed my backpack and swung it over his shoulder. “Are you still coming to my baseball game tonight?”
