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“Ahh,” she said. “So, no sneaking kisses along the way then?”
“Afraid not,” I said.
“Well, then I may as well clock in now,” she said with a labored, but somewhat silly sigh. “Don’t forget you have a two o’clock video call with the Singapore division of Lampler Company. After that, you have a five p.m. face to face with the Medver Group. I believe they are the ones looking to help invest in the Chinese market. Also, Mr. Quing-Pin will be expecting some sort of communication from you today on a possible trip out there.”
I marveled at her recall ability. She was doing this all off the top of her head. No phone, no tablet, no laptop. She just kept all this in her skull and referenced her notes when she needed to. I was so used to seeing the other people who attempted to do her job physically attached to their tablets and phones, that seeing Julia do this so effortlessly was jarring. And inspiring.
Once we were up in the offices, she split off to her own small office to work on a few things I had asked her to write up for me, and I sat down at my desk to look over the pre-meeting notes for the Singapore call. It was going to be a complicated mess, an acquisition that required a lot of babying of local officials and the people who already worked there as to how to streamline the process. I had made an assurance that no one would be let go for at least a year, and I meant to keep it, but finding ways to keep people employed while also cutting down on redundancies was going to be difficult.
Around one, Bobby came in the door, knocking as he opened it as was his custom. No one else on earth could get away with that with me. But Bobby earned that right a long time ago. Besides, just seeing the door open before a knock was as good as a knock. I knew exactly who it was.
“Afternoon,” I said as he came in. “Come take a seat.”
I was still knee-deep in notes, making sure I had them placed strategically around my laptop so I could access them as they came up during the call. It was a habit I picked up years before from Bobby himself. He liked making sticky notes with relevant numbers and topics on the top in bold. Then he’d put them all over his desk and on the sides of the laptop screen, able to adjust to whatever he needed at that moment.
For me, the sticky notes were too much. I liked a clean, if full desk, and the various bits of paper bothered me. Instead, I had several notebooks, each with a page that had a clear delineation in the middle, with topics on both top and bottom halves and notes under each. The notebooks just seemed less chaotic than the multi-colored stickies, and to the viewer, it looked like I just kept picking up the same notebook. Besides, it kept more details.
“Are you ready for Singapore?” he asked as he sat down.
Julia came out of her office, sweeping forward with a notepad of her own. She placed it on my desk, and I looked up to thank her. We exchanged a smile that probably lasted just a second too long, and I picked it up to look at it for a moment.
The notepad had all the information I needed that I was missing for the call, but a note said,
Purple, by the way. Top and bottom.
I knew instantly what she was talking about, but if I had any doubts, when I looked back up again, she was in her office with the glass walls. She was taking off the jacket she wore over her blouse, and as she did, her shirt slid down her shoulder just slightly. The bra strap underneath showed it was purple.
“So,” Bobby said, a sudden sternness in his voice, “how far has that gotten?”
“Hmm?” I asked. “Singapore? Just about ready.”
“No,” he said, and his voice was deep and angry enough that I looked over to him. His eyes were like icicles, white and blue and sharp. “You two.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
“Don’t play dumb, Hunter. You’re the smartest person I know. How far has it gone? I’m assuming you’ve already been stupid, but please tell me you’ve had the decency not to do it here.”
“I…” I began. But I stopped. I knew I had been caught. Bobby was exceptionally perceptive, and I wondered if he had suspicions before today. But today had sealed it, one way or the other. He saw how I looked at her. How she looked at me.
And he knew.
“Nothing has really happened yet,” I said.
“It has to end. Now,” Bobby said. “You know that. You can’t play with fire like this. Send her home. Tell her I’m going to be with you for the rest of the day. Then cut this thing off. You can either keep her as an assistant and be professional or you need to fire her and date her. Your call.”
“And if I don’t?”
Bobby’s jaw tightened. “It’s your company, Hunter,” he said. “But I don’t have to work here.”
ChapterSeventeen
Julia
It was weird having Hunter let me off work early, but I wasn’t going to argue. Getting off early meant that I could do something for myself for a change, rather than going back to the house, changing into pub clothes, and going to work again. I had weekends off from the office, but only one day off from the pub, so getting an afternoon with nothing to do sounded lovely.
Most of the money I had made so far had been going straight to the pub, which meant I was left with very little to spend. Considering I didn’t have time to spend money, it hadn’t really been an issue, but today, I felt like treating myself. After changing in the bathroom of the lobby, I headed down to the corner coffee shop and the bus stop beyond.
Taking the bus down to Boylston Street, I hopped off and double-checked for my debit card. All the money I had was on that card, aside from the hidden twenty that my dad always insisted I keep somewhere on my person. Currently, it was inside my protective phone case, between the phone and the plastic.
