“Good ol’ Mrs. Big Al,” I laughed.
I grabbed the hardware I wanted from the shelf and waved them around triumphantly. “Got ‘em.”
“Can I take those to the till for you, miss?” he asked in an overly polite voice.
I smiled broadly. “Why thank you, good sir.”
Our hands brushed as I handed over the merchandise, sending a warm feeling up my spine. But it didn’t feel… right. As soon as we touched, my mind flashed back to being in front of the fireplace with Oliver. At the time I was arguing that I was in a hurry to leave so that I could get here, but the reality is I let Oliver distract me. I’d been waiting to see where it all went.
Wondering what would happen if I’d stayed.
Although at the end there, when it looked like something interesting might happen after all, I froze like a deer in headlights and then ruined the moment by saying something stupid. As usual.
Why was I thinking about that, when I had Harry leading me to the till, gallantly carrying my purchases just because he wanted to. I should have been thinking about Harry, and about how nice he was.
And I was, except not for the right reasons. I was thinking about them in comparison to Oliver. I was thinking about how I wished Oliver would be that nice to me.
Harry rang up my return and my purchase at the computer, humming something light and melodic while he did. As I’d expected, the total for the new knobs was much less than that of the old.
“I won’t tell if you decide to keep the difference,” he said with a playful grin.
I chuckled and tucked the cash into my back pocket, along with the receipts. The worst part was, he was probably serious. “As much as I’d like to…” I grabbed the bag off the counter and looked up at Harry, eyes wandering over his broad shoulders and expressive, hazel eyes. He would be a good catch for somebody.
Just not me.
“Thanks again for letting me come in after hours.” I smiled apologetically. For some reason I felt even more guilty now than I had when I’d arrived. “I swear I wasn’t this late on purpose. Bentley…” I forced my lips into a smile. “It doesn’t matter. I got here and got what I needed, thanks to you.”
“I still don’t think you should have to put up with that guy.” Harry’s lips turned into a frown. “There has to be somebody you could talk to.”
I hoisted the plastic bag from the counter, suddenly uncomfortable with the turn the conversation had taken. I hadn’t come here to think about Oliver, and yet all I’d done so far was do just that.
“I do lots of talking about him, don’t worry.” I chuckled. “No one is ever happy with their boss, right?”
Harry’s frown did not melt, but after a moment of apparent deliberation he ironed it into a something less unhappy and more thoughtful.
“If you ever do want to be here this late on purpose,” he said, “I keep the staff room well stocked with coffee. We could lock the door and hang out. Make it a no-boss zone.”
This was the most creative way I’d ever been asked to coffee, but I still recognized it for what it was. And I wasn’t entirely opposed. In fact, if Harry had come to the jobsite earlier and asked me out, I would have said yes. I probably would have screamed it. But now?
“Thanks Harry,” I replied. I pulled the bag off the counter and angled my body back toward the front of the store. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
He walked me back to let me out, holding the door open while I headed out toward my car.
“It was good to see you, Liz.”
“You too.”
Or it should have been, at least.
I felt betrayed by my own mind. I’d been looking forward to seeing Harry, but the idea had been so much better than the reality. The experience felt hollow, lacking some vital component.
Is it considered Stockholm Syndrome if you start to fall for your complete megalomaniac, asshole of a boss?
Chapter 13
Oliver
I had hoped that Elizabeth would decide to just go home tonight, instead of coming back to install the stupid knobs. But despite there being no contractors here, as soon as her headlights flashed through the front window of the foyer, I knew she was back to do it all by herself.
Of course.
And since it was still too early to go to Damien’s, I was here too, which meant my recent resolve to avoid her wasn’t going to start tonight. Not unless I was willing to hide away in my bedroom or study until she was gone, but that would have been childish and pathetic.
I headed over to the kitchen to make myself a drink. Everything had been placed with care back where it was supposed to be, though the storage space was now a good deal more expansive. That meant my liquor cabinet was looking a little bare.
Shrugging it off, I began to pour drink ingredients into a martini shaker.
The guilt I’d been feeling earlier had led me to the decision that I really needed to apologize. And then it was that realization that led me to really needing this drink. I’ve never been a fan of having to apologize.
“Hello?”
This far away, I hadn’t heard Elizabeth open the front door, but her call could have woken the dead.
She entered the kitchen a few moments later, nearly stumbling over herself in surprise at seeing me standing there.
“Oh, Mr. Bentley,” she said. “Didn’t you hear me calling? I thought you’d gone out.”
“People in China probably heard you calling,” I replied, snapping the lid back on the martini shaker and giving it a strong shake. “I knew you’d end up here, so I figured you’d find me. And no one else is here, so you can call me Oliver if you want.”
Her eyebrows lifted in a cute way, but she said nothing as she dropped a plastic bag on the countertop. It clanked dully against the granite.
“I see you made it in time after all,” I observed.
“No thanks to you, Ollie.” she said, in a mock honeyed tone.
I smiled wryly. “I said you can call me Oliver. Don’t push it.”
She chuckled and began rifling through the bag, pulling out the kitchen’s missing pieces. I opened my mouth, hoping what I needed to say would all spill forth without having to apply much effort, but apparently that wasn’t how apologies worked.
Luckily, Elizabeth was too busy examining the silver object in her hands to notice my lapse. I turned quickly and went to grab glasses from the cabinet. But the damn thing had no handle.
Of course.
As I tried to find a spot to pull it open, she spoke. “As it turned out, my connections at Big Al’s were useful after all.” More metallic clinking as she moved the bag over to the counter on the other side of the fridge. “Harry let me in even after he’d already locked up. It was really sweet of him.”
I finally pried the cabinet open, but my martini glasses weren’t there.
Of course.
My frustration building, I attempted to slam the cabinet shut but was foiled by the slow-close hinges she had installed. Thwarted at every turn, I turned my annoyance in another direction.
Harry.
There was a common man if I’d ever seen one. I’d met him here a couple of times when he’d made deliveries for the renovation—a service I would be shocked to hear was offered to any other clients. He practically drooled over Elizabeth like a lovesick puppy dog every time he was around her. She had to know. She was too clever not to notice.
“How nice of Harry to let you in after hours to show you his tools,” I said dryly, moving over to the next set of doors.
“Just his knobs,” she giggled. “Though he offered to have me back for coffee anytime I wanted.”
I laughed, prying open this door easier than I had the last. Still nothing. “He’s an idiot.”
Elizabeth turned to glance at me, furrowing her brow. “He’s a nice guy,” she defended. “And you barely know him. You shouldn’t talk about him like that.”
“He’s a nobody,” I replied, searching the last above counter cupboard on my side
of the kitchen. The glasses were there at last.
Finally. Alcoholic salvation.
“Hey!” Elizabeth said, voice raising. “It’s one thing for you to pick on me, but leave Harry out of this.”
I backed up from the cabinet and raised an eyebrow. “Why so defensive? I’m was just stating the facts.”
Knobs forgotten, she turned to me, anchoring hands to her hips and setting her mouth in a hard line.
“Is that what you tell yourself? That you’re just stating facts? Well here’s a fact for you: You’re a bully.”
“I’m not a bully. I’m just honest.”
“I don’t even think you believe that.” Elizabeth turned her back to me then and hunched over the counter, busying herself with the rest of the knobs again.
I scowled and turned back to the cupboard, grabbing only a single glass instead of the two I’d originally intended.
Harry was an idiot. She had to know that, just like she had to know he’d only let her into the store because he was hoping she’d let him into her pants. She was fooling herself if she thought he’d done it for any other reason than that.
Neither of us spoke. I poured my drink, she affixed her knobs, and yet we may as well have been in different rooms.
Or planets.
After finishing my first glass, I chanced a peek over at her. My designer’s face was one of marked determination, but by the way she was jerking her screwdriver so aggressively, I had no doubt that she was considering using it as a weapon. Likely imagining how it would feel to plunge it into my eye socket.
I should have left well enough alone. My intention this time had been to apologize, not antagonize. Besides, her romantic life wasn’t any of my concern. Yet simply knowing that did nothing toward banishing the irrational jealousy I was feeling at the thought of Harry touching her. Of anyone touching her…
“Don’t leave a mess when you go,” I instructed, hoisting my glass from the counter and preparing to leave her be.
“Says the man who just left all his crap on the countertop,” she muttered.
I wasn’t sure she meant for me to hear that, but I did.
I should have at least pretended not to, but I didn’t.
“What was that?” I asked, turning on my heel.
Elizabeth glanced over at me, her face pink. “Never mind,” she replied.
“No, please.” I gestured toward her with my glass. “Go on and tell me how messy I am in my own house.”
It wasn’t anything to pick a fight over, especially not after I’d just passed judgment on her potential hardware store paramour. Elizabeth and I had exchanged much more barbed comments in the past with less fanfare, but for whatever reason I was feeling touchy. And I wanted some goddamn respect.
Elizabeth sighed, turning to face me, as she put on her battle face. Only the kitchen island stood between us, but from the expression she now wore, I wouldn’t have been surprised to see her leap across it in an attempt to strangle me.
“Fine. This kitchen has been done for less than a day and you’ve already made a mess.” She pointed to everything I’d just left strewn across the counter. “Would it kill you to put three bottles and a martini shaker away?”
Normally it wouldn’t have. Normally I would have tidied up after myself without even thinking about it. But I wanted to take my drink and get out of there before I said something stupid.
“The maid will get it in the morning,” I shrugged.
Elizabeth’s eyes narrowed.
This is exactly what I was trying to avoid.
“The maid?” she challenged. “Did you really just say that?”
I had, and I also thought it sounded just as snotty as she did. Despite what Damien might think, I wasn’t opposed to getting my hands a little dirty. But I wasn’t about to retract my statement in front of her. It was time to pull rank and shut this whole thing down.
“Do you have a problem, Ms. Paulson?” I said, adding a bite to my voice that I hoped would stop her in her tracks.
Her eyes blazed with fury. If this was going to be a fight, it was going to be a spectacular one.
But then Elizabeth paused as she took a deep breath, pressed her lips together, and simply shook her head. “No, Mr. Bentley.” She dropped her gaze and turned away, immediately busying herself with finishing the cabinets. “Have a nice night.”
As much as I had wanted to avoid a fight in the first place, I found her reaction oddly disappointing. It was like watching someone light a firecracker but never getting to see it go off.
Chapter 14
Elizabeth
Cressida eyed me balefully from the couch as I stomped through the door, probably wondering whether I was about to burst out crying or into a rant.
Honestly, I could have gone either way.
“Honey,” she cooed. “What happened?”
I dropped my coat onto the hook and walked straight for her, sliding over the top of the couch and onto the cushions with a sigh. “I’m just so goddamn sick of him.”
She patted my head, moving strands of hair from my face. “What happened?” she asked. “I mean I can guess that he was an asshole, but fill me in on the details.”
I told her about the way he’d wasted my time in the library to the point where I was late getting to the store, then about how he insulted my friend. She listened through the whole thing, nodding slowly.
“So while I do agree that your boss can definitely be a jerk, for the record I agree with him on one point. Harry is a bit of a tool.”
“What? He’s nice!” I protested.
She put her hands up in mock surrender, shrugging sheepishly. “Maybe. But I don’t know what it is, I always get the feeling like he’s trying to wear you down until your life is finally sad enough to go out with him.”
“My life doesn’t need to be sad for me to go out with Harry,” I said, although my mind did flash back to the feeling I had in the store. There was definitely no chemistry there. But maybe there would be if Oliver wasn’t always in my head. Why was Oliver always in my head? “The timing has just never been right between us. I haven’t given him a chance. Neither have you, apparently. And Oliver hasn’t even given him the time of day.”
“What do you mean?” She reached across me to the coffee table, temporarily muffling my face in her arm. When she sat back up, there was a steaming mug of tea in her hands. I suddenly wanted one.
“I think he’s met Harry all of twice,” I replied, shuffling until my feet reached the floor. “It’s a strong opinion to form of someone that you’ve barely met.”
“But do you really need to spend more time with Harry to know him that well?” Cressida shrugged. “I’m just saying, I’ve probably met him just as many times and I have the same opinion. I’m not his biggest fan.”
“But you at least spent some time with him,” I insisted, rising to my feet. I raised my voice as I disappeared into the kitchen. “You didn’t just exchange pleasantries with him a couple times before passing judgment.”
The kettle was already on the counter, though it didn’t have enough hot water in it for a second cup. I filled it and put it on, heading back into the living room while it boiled.
Cressida had a pained look on her face, the one she made when she had something uncomfortable to say.
“I didn’t need much more than a few minutes with him to realize there wasn’t much there,” she said, almost apologetically. “I mean, the man laughs at his own jokes. And he’s usually the only one.”
“Okay, fair enough,” I conceded. The sofa accepted me back with a rustling sigh. “But you also judge people super quickly. I mean, how long did you hang out with that friend of Oliver’s before you ditched him?”
Cressida shook her head. “You would have done the same thing,” she said. She took a sip of her tea. “Who orders a girl a glass of Dom Pérignon at a club?”
I snickered. “I’m sure that usually works for him.”
“Maybe it does,” she replied. “And he
y, I gave Damien a chance to redeem himself. He continued being a dick.”
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Fine. Maybe Harry isn’t for me but I don’t think he’s that bad.” I paused for a moment before pouting a bit. “But more importantly, I can’t believe you’re defending Oliver.”
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