by S. M. Soto
Her face clears. I watch as her slender throat bobs, working a swallow. “Right. Of course.”
Silence descends between us once again as I try to come up with another decent topic of discussion. “My mom will be happy.”
“Why is that?”
I roll my eyes. “You gave her a child to babysit. She probably won’t shut up about it for the next few years.”
I risk a glance at her and find her watching me, searching my gaze. I should probably apologize for what I said the other day, but as I sit here, staring at her, I can’t get the words to leave my lips. Just like I couldn’t get them to leave my lips when I was standing back at her place, watching her take care of that baby.
When we touch down in Chicago, both of us are at our wits’ end. We’re both hungry and irritable, and after sitting on a flight bickering with each other, we both need space.
“I need a huge hamburger and a bath.” Daisy sighs, mostly to herself as we make our way off the tarmac.
“What you need to do is get us to the Town Car so we can get the hell out of here.”
“Wait, what?” She stops walking, her brows tugged low with confusion.
“What do you mean, what?”
She wets her plump lips nervously, darting her gaze around at the people milling about in the airport. “I didn’t even think about Town Cars or transportation.”
I clamp my jaw and cock a brow. “And tell me, how did you figure we’d get around?”
“A taxi?” It’s phrased as more of a question than anything else, and goddammit, this woman drives me insane.
Slamming my eyes shut, I pinch the bridge of my nose, talking myself down from spewing any more hurtful words at her. I think I’ve already met my quota for the week.
“Did you do anything right on that itinerary of yours?” I deadpan.
She shoots me a scowl, clearly still hangry. “Maybe you should’ve done it yourself.”
“Excuse me?”
Heaving a deep sigh, she tips her head back, looking at the sky for patience or maybe answers. Whatever it is, she’s wasting my time.
“Let’s just get to the hotel sometime today. I’m starving.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “Oh, and pray tell, how do you suggest we get there?”
Her eyes flash with frustration. “A taxi, Callan. You’ll survive without your precious Town Car for one day. I’ll make arrangements for you tomorrow.”
For once, she stalks off toward the exit.
Swallowing my aggravation, I follow her, hating the way my gaze lingers on her plump backside.
We make it to the hotel in one piece, just barely. I’d forgotten why I stopped using taxis once I made a decent amount of money in New York—because they’re disgusting. The ones in Chicago are no different. The driver reeked of stale cigarettes, and I just knew my Armani suit would be ruined with the smell after only thirty minutes trapped in the confined space.
I snuck a few glances at Daisy throughout the ride, and her eyes were glued out the window, stuck on the impossibly tall buildings looming outside. I think some part of her enjoyed my discomfort.
Hell, I swear I even saw her smirking when she slid into the back seat beside me, all the while I grumbled mindlessly about her incompetence under my breath.
After checking in at the hotel, we head to the elevator banks together since our rooms are right next to each other.
“Go to bed early. We have a long day tomorrow. Oh, and Ms. Casillas, get me a damned Town Car, or you’re fired.”
Her mouth hangs open as I step off the elevator, leaving her behind.
I have one thing on my mind and one thing only: food.
The Drake Hotel is known for many things, its cuisine being one of them. A friend of mine owns one of the restaurants inside, as well as a few others across the East Coast. Since reserving a table at his restaurant usually has to be done in advance, I shoot him a message, and just like that, I have a table all to myself, nestled in the back corner where I can people-watch while enjoying my food.
With a glass of scotch and a porterhouse steak, there’s no better way to wind down after the past few tense hours with my assistant.
But I guess a quiet night away from her is too much to ask for. As I’m drinking from the tumbler, I pause with the glass pressed to my lips, an odd sensation traveling down my spine. There’s a distinct awareness in the air. A sudden tension. It feels like frissons of electricity in the room are growing stronger, and when I glance toward the entrance, I realize why. Daisy walks in with a maître d’ as he leads the way, guiding her toward the only available space at the bar.
Just like every other man in the room, my gaze rakes across Daisy’s flesh, admiring her from afar. She’s always had these subtle curves. Even in high school, her body was a dream, and now? It’s damn near impossible to keep my eyes off her when she comes into work wearing those tight dresses and even tighter skirts. They leave nothing to the imagination, and my hands itch to reach out and caress her. To feel her one more time.
She’s wearing a black wrap dress that hugs her curves, making her backside look delectable. Her dark brown hair hangs in soft waves down her back, somehow making her golden skin look tanner, more flawless. I set the tumbler onto the table with a thud, aggravation burning through my veins at my attraction to her.
She doesn’t even realize it most of the time—how beautiful she is. Just what lengths men would go to covet her. It’s why I get so frustrated whenever we’re in a room together for too long. It’s why I snap at her when I really mean to tell her she looks beautiful. It’s why I find myself growing angry with the sudden burst of lust vibrating through my veins. It’s all because this attraction I have to her is unwanted.
Daisy gets settled at the bar, and it’s like watching an animal in the wild. The predators slowly make their move, crossing the room, ready to pounce on their prey. The first is a joke of a man in a suit. He smells like corporate, and guessing by the table of idiots he’s been sitting with for the past hour, they’re only here for a business dinner.
With rapt attention, I watch as the guy takes an open seat at the bar next to Daisy, waiting for her to notice him. She doesn’t. Her eyes have been glued to her phone the moment she sat down. There’s no telling if she’s just ignoring him or she really is engrossed in whatever is on the device. Just as I suspected him to, he sets his hand on her thigh, just above her knee, finally gaining her attention. I tense in my seat. Heat simmers low in my gut, and I curl my hands into fists, fighting the urge to get up and drag him away from her.
Daisy lifts her gaze to his slowly, an uncomfortable smile on her face. With measured movements, she knocks his hand off her knee and repositions her legs. I can’t tell what’s being said from here, but from the looks of it, it can’t be good for him. His lips are now pressed into a thin line, and the smirk that was adorning his face just seconds before is long gone.
When her food arrives, Daisy dismisses the man, and I can’t help but smirk in satisfaction. Even though it’s hard to see her face from here, I can just imagine she’s wearing a self-satisfied expression. No doubt proud of herself for getting rid of the prick. I notice her shoulders tense, and when I see why, so do mine.
Another corporate asshole struts up to her from the same table and proceeds to hit on her as if she didn’t just turn his friend down. I’m close to pushing out of my seat when I feel a heavy hand clamped on my shoulder.
“Leave it to you to find the damsel in distress.”
I smirk, shrugging off the hold. “And who says she’s in distress?”
My buddy from college, Emilio, takes the seat across from me, both of us now fixated on Daisy.
“You’re right. She seems pretty capable of handling things on her own. Who is she?”
I quirk a lazy brow. “And why do you assume I know her?”
“Because I’ve been watching you watch her with a protective gleam in your eyes.”
My nostrils flare.
Sh
it.
“She’s my sister’s best friend.”
His brows shoot up. “So that’s the one that got away, huh?”
My eyes narrow in warning. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Emilio chuckles. “Your sister has quite the mouth on her. You were also a mouthy drunk in college.” He shrugs. “I remember.”
Ignoring him, I glance back at Daisy, and at the same moment I do, our gazes collide. It feels as though the air has been sucked from my lungs, and my heart, it thumps to life in my chest for the first time in years.
Daisy’s eyes narrow only slightly, probably wondering the same thing as I am—what the hell are the odds of both of us being here at the same time?
I don’t know what possesses me to do it, but I push out of my seat, ignoring Emilio’s questions. Making my way across the room, I ignore the looks, my gaze solely focused on hers. Daisy’s eyes are wide, mouth dropped open in mild shock. She’s completely tuned out the poor unfortunate soul next to her. I catch the tail end of his sentence and grit my back teeth so hard, I swear I hear a tooth crack.
“What do you say we get out of here and head up to your room?” He leans into her space, a smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth.
I clear my throat, putting a pin in whatever kind of courting that was supposed to be.
“Callan?” she asks, confusion tingeing her tone.
“Hey, buddy. We were in the middle of a conversation. Wait your turn.”
My lips thin.
Wait my turn?
I don’t fucking think so.
“Get your shit and let’s go,” I all but bark.
“Hey! I’m talking to you, asshole,” the man growls, growing angry. I shoot him a cold glare.
“I heard you just fine, and I can assure you, the very last thing she wants to do is go upstairs with you or anyone at your table. Now leave.”
“Who the hell do you think you are, man?” he asks, standing up. I tower over his small frame. A child merely pretending to be a man.
Ignoring him, I raise an impatient brow at Daisy. “Unless you’d like to cause a scene, I suggest you hurry up, Ms. Casillas.”
Her slender throat works a swallow, and then finally, she’s moving. She hikes the strap of her purse over her shoulder and begins reaching for her plate. I beat her to it. Taking her plate of untouched food, I tighten my grip around her elbow and lead her away. I try to ignore the way her skin feels beneath mine. The way my fingertips tingle from the point of contact.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she hisses, teetering on her heels to keep up with me.
“What does it look like I’m doing?”
“If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking, now would I?”
Always so fucking mouthy.
“Saving you,” I murmur, stopping in front of my table. I set her plate down on the opposite side of the booth.
“Saving me?” She scoffs. “Who the hell said I needed saving? I was perfectly fine over there on my own.”
“Oh, were you? It didn’t look that way from where I was sitting.”
“Why were you even watching me, anyway?”
I roll my eyes. “For Christ’s sake, just shut up and eat your food, Daisy.”
Her eyes flash at being told to shut up. “So, what, I’m just supposed to pretend to believe that you want to share a meal with me?”
“I’d much rather finish eating my meal alone, but seeing as that’s not going to happen, yes, you’ll believe whatever the hell I tell you.”
I take a seat, and without another word, finish off my now cold food. If mine is already this cold, I imagine hers is, too. Daisy follows suit, tossing her purse down in the seat beside her with unnecessary attitude. She pushes around the food on her plate, picking at it.
A crease forms between my brows. “Something wrong with the food?”
“No. Not really. I just wanted a hamburger, but that wasn’t on the menu. You couldn’t choose a less ostentatious hotel to stay at?”
I set my fork down. “You want a hamburger that badly? Fine.”
I shoot off a quick text to Emilio, and not long after, Emilio comes out of the back, cocky smirk in place, with a hamburger on a plate. When he slides it across the table to Daisy, she gasps, her gaze shooting from me to Emilio.
“How did you do this? It wasn’t even on the menu.”
Emilio claps me on the back. “Callan is a longtime friend. When he asks for a burger for his beautiful lady guest, that’s exactly what he gets.”
I roll my eyes at him. The bastard is laying it on awfully thick.
“You guys are friends?”
“Met in college. He’s been my right-hand man ever since. What brings you here with him tonight?”
I shoot him a glare, knowing exactly what he’s doing.
“Oh, no. It’s nothing like that. I’m his new assistant.”
The smile on Emilio’s face grows. “You don’t say. What was your name again?”
She smiles, clearly smitten. “It’s Daisy.”
Emilio laughs. It’s such a devious sound. “Funny story, actually. Callan’s first and only love was named D—”
“Don’t you have a business to run? Preferably someplace else?”
“Always the charmer, isn’t he?” Emilio smirks, taking Daisy’s hand in his and kissing the top. “It was lovely finally getting to meet you, Daisy. Enjoy your burger.”
He shoots me a wink behind her back, and I have the urge to flip him off.
“You don’t always have to be so rude, you know.”
If she only knew.
“And you don’t have to flirt with every man on the planet, yet here we are.”
Her hand curls into a fist on the table. “I can’t stand you, I hope you know that,” she hisses.
A laugh bursts from my chest. I’m so overcome by it, it startles her. “What are you even laughing about?”
“The simple fact that you think you can get away with speaking to your boss that way.” As if remembering that I am indeed her boss, her face pales. Just to really fuck with her, I lean forward, meeting her gaze. “And believe me, the feeling is entirely mutual.”
Her nostrils flare, and her jaw works with animosity, but she doesn’t say a word back. Instead, she picks up that hamburger and takes a bite, just like I knew she would. I bite back a self-satisfied smirk.
“Oh, my God,” she moans around a mouthful. “This is incredible.”
The amusement that was just there has been replaced by arousal. The sound of her moan goes straight to my cock, and I shift in the booth.
Christ, I’m like a horny teenager all over again.
“You have to try this, Callan. It’s so good.” I grind my back teeth together. The way my name sounds rolling off those lips shouldn’t affect me anymore, but fuck, it still does. That’s why I instructed her to call me sir or Mr. Reed. Then I wouldn’t be liable to do something stupid. Like fuck that pouty mouth.
“I’ll pass.”
“Oh, c’mon, don’t you ever live a little? Or is your go-to meal always a, what, porterhouse or a filet mignon?”
“I don’t need to try your burger to prove I more than live ‘a little.’”
She scoffs, looking me up and down. “Everything about you now screams uptight. What happened to the fun Callan? The Callan that lived for burgers from Annie’s and dipping his French fries into my milkshake? Let me take a stab in the dark here. Your college life was filled with late nights studying because you didn’t want to be anything less than perfect.”
Her words evoke a barrage of memories from the past, ones I thought I suppressed after all these years. With those memories come pain. Ice filters through my chest, the foreign sensation wrapping cold and savagely around my heart.
How dare she sit across from me and make me remember the past? Talk about me, about us, as if we’re two old friends catching up for dinner. She’s my employee. She’s a widow with a goddamn child.
She married the enemy.
She is nothing to me, and I want to make her feel like so.
“You don’t know anything about me.”
A pang of sadness creeps into those brown eyes. The openness that had just graced her beautiful face is now gone, wiped away with a closed off expression. “I thought I did. Once.”
“Yeah, well, you were wrong.”
A heavy silence blankets the table. Daisy glances down, staring at her burger, anything to avoid me. The air around us becomes tense and uncomfortably so.
I clear my throat and swipe a frustrated hand through my hair. “Spent the first two years of college partying a lot. Pretty sure I woke up drunk or with a hangover every morning.”
She peeks up at me through her lashes. When she starts to eat again, it’s as though she’s silently telling me to go on.
“Started getting a little harder on myself with each year under my belt. Though I still made time to party, Emilio and our friends wouldn’t settle for anything less.”
Her mouth quirks around a mouthful of burger. “You met him your first year?”
“Yeah. We shared all the same classes. He called it quits our third year. Said architecture wasn’t where his passion truly lies. He left for culinary school in France with a former flame and came back making meals from seemingly nothing.”
“Wow. That’s amazing. Is this his only restaurant?”
“He has a few in most of the bigger cities on the East Coast. He’s considering opening one in New York.”
“Considering it? Why hasn’t he done it already?”
I shrug. “Chicago is his home base now. I don’t think he wants to stretch himself too thin.”
She nods, digesting the information. “And what about you? Are you happy with your firm?”
I search her gaze, trying to gauge what she’s really asking. Does she want to know if I’m happy? The simple answer? Sure. I have a great company. I’m my own boss, and I wake up every day to do something I love. Outside of my career, though, I have nothing. Reed Architecture is the sole source of my happiness.
So I lie, not wanting her to see just how lonely my life can be when I’m not actively building something in my mind or on a drawing. “I am.”
