I haven’t seen Tasha and Ian for, well, almost forever. Needless to say, I get my share of well-deserved whining from them both. Complaints that are spat at me without an ounce of mercy, even for the sake of the good ol’ L word.
Hardly a week after Daniel and I start our lockdown, Tasha phones to say she was about to post my face on a milk carton. “Your ugly face,” are her exact words.
I’m snapped back to the present by the sound of my colleagues’ laughter, becoming more and more irritated with the task I’m currently doing. I have an urge to shut off the PC, maybe even yank the cable out of the wall, then grab my purse and get the hell out. Instead, like the true rebel that I am, I wheel my chair back and push myself up. I stride to the kitchen, peeved by the amount of time I've wasted so far and will be wasting on such a Sisyphean task. I tap the button on the coffee machine and bend to fetch milk from the mini fridge. I shake the carton, to find that there's only a drop left and almost growl, really wanting to scream 'fuck' at the top of my lungs. I end up just tossing the carton in the trash can, though with a vengeance.
“Woah, should I duck?” Mathew, one of my coworkers, smirks at me with his hands up in surrender, flipping his hair Bieber-style. I covertly roll my eyes but quickly smile.
“One of those days.” I shrug, trying to show some friendliness.
“Want to grab lunch together?” He asks a tad too enthusiastically. Surprised by his eagerness, I furrow my eyebrows and study him for a moment too long, making everything kind of awkward.
“No is also an answer,” he says, smiling, and his cheeks take on a faint, rosy color.
I force on a smile and try to make it look even the least bit genuine. I say, “Maybe some other time.”
“Okay then,” he says uneasily, clapping once, his entire body radiating discomfort. Then out of nowhere, to my complete surprise, he tugs on my pulled up hair.
The hell?
I’m not sure who’s mortified more by this infantile act: him, or me for him. Thankfully, he just nods and quickly makes himself scarce. I shake my head and reach for a bottle of water. A short snort and a giggle escape my mouth. I feel sorry for the guy. Ian and Tash will love this little anecdote. But when I get back to my assignment, my annoyance returns much too quickly.
My phone chimes and prompts me to unglue my eyes from the monitor. Seeing Daniel’s name on the display always comes with a warm, fuzzy feeling. No, not pathetic at all.
“Hey.”
“Hey back, beautiful,” he says. Deep inside, I heave a molten, feminine sigh.
Yep, definitely pathetic.
“Any chance you're coming over for lunch?”
“Define lunch,” I purr.
A low, husky chuckle comes from the other end. “I might also let you eat. Depends how satiated I’ll be.”
“Wow, thank you. You are far, far too kind, Mr. Stark. Am I due for a performance evaluation?”
He chuckles again. “So, you coming?”
“Umm, will I? Be coming?”
“Hayley…” I laugh it off.
“Isn’t making you cum my middle name?” We chuckle in unison. Though, truth be told, the man did earn the name, with great aptitude.
“So?”
“Mr. Stark…” A feminine voice meows on the other end, absurdly, making me slightly more alert.
“I’ll call for you later, Jasmine.”
“Did she just meow at you?”
“What?” he snaps.
“Nothing.” Glad he didn’t pay too much attention to that one. “I don’t think I'll be able to make it, there’s this annoying thing I need to do, it’ll take me ages, and I need it done today.”
“What is it, exactly?”
“Aren’t you busy? Do you really care?”
“Yeah, I'm busy. Tell me.” Short and impassive. Okay… And I elaborate on the less than remotely interesting subject.
“Okay, so it’s only in these ten websites, you say? I’ll call you back, go get something to drink meanwhile.” And he's gone.
Huh?
I pass by Josh’s office to catch up on a report we should prepare for management, just to make sure I have everything he wants covered. With his confirmation I leave to share it with the relevant people from our team. When I get back to my desk, more than half an hour later, I notice that I’ve missed a call from Daniel.
“Daniel?”
“So, I’m sending you this program. I’ll tell you how to install it, it’ll do the search for the data.”
“What? Software? Do what?” I hear a piqued sigh from his end.
“Open the email I’ve sent you five minutes ago, and just do what I tell you.”
He guides me for several minutes. I’m clueless about what he wants me to do, and he is less than patient when explaining.
I grin hugely as I look at the small, dark window running data on my desktop. “So basically it’ll do the search for me?”
“Yes.” I can just see the eye roll that was uttered with.
I giggle. “Oh my god, you are like the hottest computer geek alive.”
“So are you coming now?” he says, dry and impatient.
“On my way,” I say with a full-blown smirk.
“Can I go in?” I ask Anne, Daniel’s PA. She stands up for no apparent reason and smiles, her usual edgy smile.
“Miss Grace, he should be done shortly, but you can go in.”
“It’s Hayley…” As if this will ever register with her, no matter how many times I insist. Why do I even bother?
The door to Daniel’s office is half open. I take one step in and freeze. They don’t notice me, but I can see them clearly, and something unbidden and bad, very bad, shoots through me.
There’s a curvy butt raised high over the desk, clad in a tight knee-length skirt that salutes me as I look ahead. A pair of never-ending legs in black stockings continue from the skirt and end with mile high, thin heels. The body attached to the sexy butt is bent over the desk, cleavage almost touching what’s mine’s nose. She utters a familiar meow while a hand with very red nails moves over Daniel’s hand, which rests on a mouse. The woman in front of me could not be more flirtatious; she’s literally throwing mating signals all over the place. From where I stand I can’t see Daniel’s expression, or his face for that matter, as it’s hidden behind a large monitor, though I can see that his hand is trying to move out from under the talons that trap it.
Numerous emotions run through me; the one that stays triggers the creep of acid up my throat. The thought that I’ve managed to cage at the back of my mind wakes up with a roar, and I can’t help but think, Could this meowing butt be the one he slept with? Something takes over me, something very irrational, ugly and unfamiliar. On impulse, I nearly turn on my heels, when Daniel's voice stops me.
“Hales?” In tandem with his question, the butt pivots at the waist to look at me, and her face just adds the few drops of oil to intensify the fire spreading wildly inside me. Her dark, shiny hair is pulled into a tight bun. She has on a pair of those thick black plastic glasses that reminds me of those me-and-my-boss porn movies, and the reddest lips. A part of me, the rational part, kisses confidence and trust bye-bye and dies, but not before asking me to strangle the man who seeded these fears in my consciousness to begin with. I’m aware that a suicidal train wreck is about to happen, but stopping it is beyond me.
“I’m just leaving,” I say. “I’m meeting Brad.” I’m not sure which nasty part of me came up with that, but now it's out there.
Daniel’s reaction is a deadly look in my direction; his expression morphs into something dark and menacing. He locks eyes with me and my stomach turns at what I see in them. Someone stupider and emotionally weaker than I am possess my body and my mind, urging me to leave, while tears pile at the back of my eyes. The man-eater with the thick glasses smiles devilishly at me, or is it just my imagination?
Daniel mumbles something to the predator, who is still studying me attentively, and takes a few steps toward
me. Only half a step away, he cups his hand around my chin and gently lifts it to look at him. He tilts his head to the side. “You're meeting who?” I shake my head in response, feeling both confused and embarrassed by my conduct, but frankly, there’s nothing I can do to shake it away. It already gathered huge momentum. I've become just a pawn of this madness possessing my brain.
“I’ll see you at home,” I say, and turn away, but before I can, Daniel grabs my hand and tugs me back. He holds my face, from both sides this time, and looks me dead in the eyes.
“Hayley?”
“I’m interrupting your...” I gesture with my hand toward the room. His brows knit together.
“Jasmine, can you excuse us?” he says coldly, without breaking eye contact, and there’s a clear bite of exasperation to his words. Jasmine sways slowly toward the door, and before leaving, says, “Call me when you need me again, Mr. Stark.” To me it sounds like it's bursting with innuendos, and I brush Daniel’s hands from my face.
His eyes open wide and the muscle on his jaw starts ticking. “What in the name of fuck is going on?” he says, shutting his office door with a loud thud that makes me wince. I’m trying hard to stop this craziness I’ve just crafted so deftly, but it’s stronger than me, and at this point the snowball in my head has already begun to roll, too far and too fast.
“Was she the one?”
“The one what?” He narrows his eyes and twists his mouth. “Hayley, you are not making any sense. What's gotten into you, for fuck’s sake?”
“Was she the one you slept with?”
In less than a heart beat the air between us becomes so tense and bitter, I can almost taste it.
“Did you just ask me what I think you did?” A vein begins pulsing at the side of his neck, and his stare turns livid.
I just nod.
“Where’s that coming from?” His eyes run across my face, assessing and penetrating, confused. “What’s wrong with you?” He is angry: majorly, fuming, angry.
“Was she the one you slept with?” I ask, and this time my voice is harder.
“I’m not doing this shit here,” he murmurs, more to himself. Unceremoniously he turns to his desk, grabs his car keys and puts his hand on the small of my back, though his touch is far from gentle. Silently, he directs me out of the room.
“I’m leaving, I’ll be back later,” he says in a clipped tone as we pass by Anne's desk.
“Mr. Stark, you have…” Her voice fades at the glance Daniel throws her way. During the short elevator ride we stand at opposite walls, my eyes burning with unshed tears, colliding with his smoldering ones, but we don’t say a word. The palpable silence in the small compartment amplifies the tension that grows with each passing second, that I know very well will end with an inevitable explosion.
When we get to the garage, Daniel presses a button on his remote and a double beep comes back from the Veyron. I look at him questioningly and he snaps, “Just get in the car.”
“Where are we going?” He huffs loudly, his expression menacing.
“Would you get in the goddamn car already?” The chilling tone of his voice reminds me of times I'd rather forget.
I don’t ask where we're going again and he doesn’t appear to have any intention of sharing it with me. With fire in his hooded eyes, he stares ahead, driving the car at an insane speed that makes me grip the sides of my seat with every turn and twist, til my knuckles turn white. When he finally slows the car, ending a trip that I should thank some deity for surviving, I can see that we're at a racing track.
Daniel jerks the car to a stop and sends an aggravated glance my way, then shakes his head in a way that silently says 'unbelievable', and gets out of the car. He stands outside, his hands momentarily covering his eyes. I can literally see the next breath he takes, as his chest rises underneath his black tie and crisp, white button-down shirt. He takes a short step and leans on the driver side door, his hands crossed and his back to me. I wait a few minutes, letting him cool off and trying to explain to myself what I’ve done and what I want to say. I take a deep breath, the whirl of thoughts that initially got us here still gnawing at my mind as I step out of the car.
I round the vehicle and stand close to him, though far enough away to respect his personal space. He turns his head sideways to look at me, his arms still crossed, and his jaw unmistakably working overtime.
“Why Hayley? What the fuck did you just do to us?”
I bite on my cheek and try to make it sound reasonable in my own head before answering.
“We had it so good, and you had to find a way to ruin it?” His nostrils flare. “Where’s this coming from? Brad, Hayley? Brad?”
“She was practically jumping you in there.” Is the most clever thing I can come up with.
“And did I do anything that made you think something would come of it, whatever that was?” His voice is low, cold and somewhat hurt. “Did I?”
“No, but it’s not like you pushed her away.” What the fuck is wrong with me?
He shakes his head, and I can clearly see that the composure he's kept so far is now held together by threads. “I can’t believe you. I can’t believe we're having this fucked up conversation.”
“What can I say, it triggered something.” I answer, hating how I feel but hating the way I make him feel more. But still, for some twisted reason, I can’t stop. I can’t let it go.
“Didn’t we declare forgive and forget?” He licks his bottom lip. I don’t answer and just look at him.
“Do I want to drive the hell out of here, right this minute?” His stare almost burns a hole in mine. “Yeah, I do,” he says more to himself than to me. “Will I do that? No, Hayley, because I’m trying, like I promised you. I’m fucking trying here. What I don’t get is why the hell you're going out of your way to make it impossible.”
He's completely right, but I can’t find the strength to quiet my insecurities. I need to think this over, I need to make whatever is screaming in my head stop, cause I haven’t got the slightest clue how to proceed. I don’t want to say anything, anything at all til I figure out for myself what just happened.
“I don’t know.”
His eyes on me muddled, but they soon regain the heat residing in them a moment ago.
“You don’t know?” he repeats in irritated disbelief. “You don’t know?” This time his voice is colder, an octave lauder, somewhat scornful.
I look at him from under my lashes and nod. “I need to be by myself and think.”
He shakes his head, exasperated. He uncrosses his arms, and is about to say something, but then stops.
“I’m not even sure what I want. I’m not sure what’s come over me, D.”
“That makes two of us.” His struggle to keep it together for my sake is so obvious my heart constricts in a painful manner.
“I love you so much. Please give me some time.” His entire demeanor melts a notch as he returns my stare. He takes a deep, frustrated breath and his next words are jaded and soft.
“How much is 'some time', Hayley? I won't be waiting around forever this time.” I nod and the tears sting, fighting to be released.
“Just a few hours.” He seems a bit relieved as he nods, but there’s no mistake: he's still furious with me.
We drive back in silence, a silence that screams 'danger', a silence that screams “What the hell are you doing?”
Daniel brings the car to a stop below the YOU offices, and sighs. We don’t exchange any words but we do swap charged stares.
“I’ll see you at home,” I say finally, feeling like I should say something, anything.
He darts a look my way that sends a direct pang to my heart. “What ever happened to trust and communication?” He turns to look ahead, making it clear it wasn’t really a question, and that he can’t wait for me to leave.
At my desk, distressed and restless, accompanied by a well-deserved inner tirade of self-loathing, I rush through all my pending tasks. At six sharp I flit to my car, an
d drive home. I park in the open parking lot and immediately look for the Veyron. Its absence sends a strange blend of gloom and relief through me. What the hell is coming over me?
When I get inside I throw my purse aside and change into a light, white sundress. With a bottle of mineral water in one hand, and my iPod in the other, I step barefoot onto the deck, heading toward the beach. I adjust my headphones and dip my toe in the shallow water where it meets the sand. I take a step deeper and start walking on the moist, sinking sand.
The chain of events that started at Daniel’s office play vividly in my mind's eye. I think about what happened, my reaction, what I've caused—and my thoughts are confusing, accusing and disconcerting, saturated in uncertainties. I slowly process the madness I brought between us and my chest tightens. A sudden realization clears the rest of my thoughts away: Daniel said he wasn't going to wait forever this time. It hits me, hard. I’m afraid to lose him, plain and simple. I’m terrified of him hurting me again because it'll make me run away and never come back. My insecurities all sum up to getting hurt by him again and having to leave him, for good. Plainly, losing him. The thought stiffens my throat.
In every ongoing struggle throughout life, there comes a time to weigh your gain against your loss, and make your final decision. Leave or stay?
I close my eyes and focus on the lyrics playing in my ears as I retrace my steps back to the house.
The space is dim and quiet, though I can see a faint glow of light coming from the corridor that leads to the master bedroom and Daniel’s office. As I near the end of the corridor I notice that the light is coming from the office.
Inner Core: (Stark, #2) Page 15
