by Emelia Blair
Halley glances at me then she shifts, uncomfortably, as if her instincts are warning her that she’s in danger.
“Watch the tone, Hunter,” Hashem hisses. “And who’s this pretty little skirt you’ve got holed up in your office? This is a workplace, not a brothel.” His tone is deliberately insulting.
Halley flushes in shame and tugs at her skirt as if to pull it over her knees.
I don’t know why but it makes me see red. Grinding my teeth, I deliberately keep my tone casual, “Unless you want HR breathing down your neck, I’d watch what I say. This is my intern.”
“I never approved this,” Hashem says.
That strange gleam in his eyes puts me on edge. He’s up to something! I pick up the pen laying idly on the table and tap it, impatiently against the desk. “I didn’t need you to approve it. HR approved it as did Mr. Starr.” I know he hates the way I’m casually throwing around Caleb’s name.
His hands clench by his sides. “There is still a protocol you’re supposed to follow and that means informing me that you’re hiring an intern!”
“I did inform you, Sir,” I say the last part with a mocking tone.
Hashem realizes this is true. However, even as his face tightens, he steps towards Halley, and before she can move, he forces her down with his hand on her shoulder. He’s standing right behind her.
I see the way his eyes move towards her chest and I stand up, inexplicably furious. “Take your hand off her!”
“Since you didn’t clear it with me, and since interns are assigned by the HOD, I’ll be taking this one with me. I’m sure she has a lot of valuable skills that I can put to good use.”
The implication in his words is clear and I suddenly remember the female employees that left after working with some of the men that Hashem was close to. I recall the broken look in the eyes of one of those women who used to work with me. I had run into her when she had been leaving as she had fled past me and resigned that very day.
Imagining this perky, bubbly little thing with that look in her eyes, makes my blood boil for some reason, and I’m moving towards Hashem, my mind blank, only the desire to punch his fucking face in.
Halley raises her arm and then elbows Hashem in his balls.
The man crumples to the floor with a howl.
I don’t even consider my actions, just grabbing Halley and forcing her behind me. “You fucking prick. Be glad that’s all she did to you. Come near her again, and I’ll break your fucking legs!”
“You bitch!” Hashem screams in agony. “You’re both fired! I’ll—”
“What is going on here?”
Lana’s cool and composed voice makes Hashem’s face pale even more before he regains his bluster in a heartbeat as he tries to straighten up. “This girl assaulted me and Hunter threatened me. I want to file complaints against both of them and I want Hunter fired!”
I feel Halley’s hands clenching in my shirt and I can sense her fear. And it pisses me off even more. “He touched Halley and frightened her. She reacted in self-defense!” I hiss out, my tone hot with anger.
Lana looks over my shoulder and her tone is gentle, “Halley, is this true?”
“He said he’d put my skills to good use and he implied that I was a w-whore.” There is a quiver in Halley’s voice, which she’s trying to firm, as she responds, her fingers tightening in my shirt where no one can see.
“Well…” Lana looks at Hashem, who’s still out of breath from the sucker punch but he’s on his feet. “Is that true, Mr. Jameson?”
Hashem splutters, “I said no such thing!”
“He did,” I retort, quietly. “You leered at a girl who’s half your age, you made her feel uncomfortable, you implied that she belonged in a brothel and then you said you’d use her. Then you put your hand on her shoulder possessively, I might add.”
Lana’s face is growing harsher and harsher under the light.
I can see the simmering rage in her eyes.
“It’s two against one, Mr. Jameson. And since this is the second complaint filed against you, I—”
“Look at what that bitch is wearing! She was asking for it! She’s dressed like a two-bit hooker—”
His words drown out my rationality, and for a man who prides himself on not having any violent tendencies, I smash my fist against my boss’s cheek, hearing the sharp crunch as his nose breaks with the impact against the floor.
“You fucking prick!”
Lana stares impassively at Hashem and her voice is cold, “You had that one coming, Mr. Jameson. I’ll see you in my office after you’ve cleaned up. You and I need to talk about your future with this company.”
Hashem doesn’t get a chance to respond because a sharp gasp from the doorway has everyone’s attention there, and I wince when I see him.
Raymond standing there. “W-What?” His sharp eyes take in the scene and the way Halley is standing behind me while my stance is protective. The blood on my knuckles, Lana’s disapproving gaze, and Hashem huddled on the floor, cradling his face, gives him all the information he needs.
He strides past Lana, his face hard. I step aside, letting him reach out and enfold his niece in his arms, “Are you okay? Did he—?”
The concern and fear in his voice is tender and it makes me feel like I’m intruding on a very private moment.
Halley nods, shakily.
Raymond lets out a breath and turns around as Hashem gets to his feet.
If I was expecting Raymond to strike him, I’m sorely disappointed. Raymond has always been an amiable man, a very peace-loving personality. However, the anger on his face is mixed with bitter disappointment and self-loathing. “I blame myself for this.”
Hashem’s face is pale.
Raymond shakes his head. “I brought this upon myself when I turned a blind eye to when you harassed all the other women in this office. I never once thought that my Halley would face the same treatment at your hands.”
Hashem’s eyes are wide. “Raymond, I didn’t—They’re lying!”
“Halley wouldn’t lie,” Raymond responds, quietly. To Lana, he says, “I want to press charges. Against him, not the company.”
I step forward and murmur, “Raymond, it will be a very flimsy case. You’ll lose at best. There is no solid evidence.”
The words are only meant for his ears and I see a flash of helpless rage on the older man’s face.
“Let’s discuss this in my office,” Lana offers.
Hashem isn’t allowed to say anything as Lana threatens to call security and he leaves, his face white as a sheet.
Raymond follows Lana out but not before looking reluctantly at Halley.
“She’s safe here with me,” I tell him.
Once it’s only me and her left, I turn around and my voice is kind for a change, “Come on. Sit down.” I guide her to my chair and she obediently sits down.
I hand her a water bottle but she refuses it. It’s bothering me that she’s not speaking or meeting my eyes. I sigh. “I can’t tell you to shut up if you don’t say anything, Halley.”
This makes the corner of her lips twitch.
I take it as a good sign. “Good job elbowing that bastard in the balls. Although if it were me, I would have used my hands and twisted them right off.”
Halley makes a face at this.
I feel a hint of relief.
She finally says in a small voice, “I’ll change my clothing from tomorrow. I—”
“You’ll do no such thing,” I tell her, firmly. “You wear what you want to wear and what you’re happy with. If you want, you can ask Lana about the dress code here if there is one but you don’t go changing yourself over what somebody said to you.”
She grips her hands in her lap.
I hate seeing the cheerful girl I know reduced to this. So, I grab her hands. “Hey, this is my office. As long as you do your work properly, I don’t give a fuck as to what else you do, you got it?”
My words calm her down but she still isn’t smiling, so I ge
t up. “Come on.”
She looks up at me, confused and anxious. “Where?”
Her light blue eyes and the way she looks at me with them, makes me feel a little off-balance, and without thinking, I cover her eyes. “Stop that.”
Baffled, her hands reach up to grip my hand as if she intends to remove but she just asks, “Stop what?”
“That!”
“I don’t know what that is!” she responds, sounding frustrated.
Stop looking at me with those big blue eyes of yours and making my chest feel weird.
She pulls my hand away and glares up at me, a hint of her old self in her eyes. “Why are you so weird?!”
“Shut up,” I tell her, embarrassed. “Let’s go. I’ll take you to that sushi place you never shut up about.” I start walking and after a moment’s hesitation, I hear her feet scuffle on the floor as she follows me at a distance.
“That’s the shawarma place.”
“The other one.”
“Oh…” She pauses. “I thought you hated sushi.”
“Shut up, Halley,” I mutter, and I hear her giggle. The sound is like a balm and I feel a little bit at ease.
I don’t let myself ponder too hard, as to why her actions are wreaking havoc on my emotions.
Because a part of me fears …I won’t like the answer very much.
4
Halley
I’ve never dated anyone before.
Uncle Raymond always kept me near him, never encouraging me to go out to parties. He never said no, either, but he wouldn’t go out of his way to tell me to hang out with guys.
Between my nightmares and my freelance work, I never really had the time to think of dating. I enjoyed going to clubs with Mia and Cameron, but those were usually gay clubs, and if someone danced with me, it would all be in good fun.
I’ve always been a free spirit, dressing how I wanted to, never bothering with what people thought of me. I enjoyed my short clothes and dressing up.
Today is the first time when a man’s eyes made me want to cover myself up. Today is the first time when a man’s touch and his words made me freeze in pure fear.
I felt unsafe.
Then the way Jace came to my rescue, first using his words and then physically by putting himself between me and the man, it made me feel grateful to him.
And then he punched the man who said all those cruel words to me.
And after that he comforted me, in his own strange way.
I don’t know how but it worked.
Right now, he’s sitting across from me, staring at the sushi roll before him with utter distaste written all over his face.
I try to suppress my smile. “Just try it. It’s not that bad.”
Jace shudders. “It’s raw fish. How can you eat raw fish?”
I chuckle. “I shoulder through it.” I nudge his foot with my own. “Go on. Dip it into the soy sauce. You’ll like it.”
He glowers at me as if he doesn’t trust a single word coming from my mouth before obeying. The look on his face is of one who is being forced to undergo great torture as he dips the sushi into the sauce and then bites into it gingerly. He immediately makes a face.
“Oh, come on!” I protest, laughing. “You can’t hate it!”
He chews, manfully before sticking out his tongue, mumbling, “Dead fish. I ate dead fish. You made me eat dead fish.”
This man is grouchy, grumpy, sullen, and sometimes he acts like a five-year-old. But he is protective and strong and he can be gentle and kind as well.
My face still tingles from his touch from when he covered my eyes.
“All the fish we eat is dead fish, Jace.” I snicker. “Why are you so weird?”
He glares at me. “Do you want to foot the bill for this place?” He glances meaningfully at my second plate.
I immediately become sickeningly sweet. “No, boss!”
“I thought so.” He smirks in satisfaction.
His permanent state is however that of an asshole.
It takes me a while to realize that more than an hour has passed when we are sitting on the bench in the park near the office. “Don’t we have to go back?”
Jace is munching on a hot dog, he swallows and shakes his head. “We’re taking a long lunch today.”
I’m about to ask why before I realize that it’s for me. He’s doing this for me.
And just like he had done today, covering my eyes and asking me to stop it, I have the urge to do the same because my heart skips a beat at this apparently ill-tempered man who can be surprisingly sweet.
Misinterpreting the look on my face, he adds, “I’ve told Raymond. Don’t worry.” He shows me the text message on his phone along with the reply. “He knows where you are.”
“Oh.”
After a few minutes, he asks, “So Raymond raised you himself, huh?”
I pause, before saying, “Well, no. His wife, Aunt Angela, she raised me as well. They had a daughter who was two years younger than me.” My heart tightens. “They died in a car crash when I was around eleven.” Thinking of Suzie with her laughing eyes as she chased after me and the endless hours that we played hide and seek, my throat swells a bit. “They were lovely, both of them. Aunty Ange loved me as her own, and when there were thunderstorms, Suzie would climb into bed with me because we both used to be scared of thunder.”
Losing those two had been like losing my mother all over again.
The grief is so tangible I can almost taste it.
“My mother died two years ago,” Jace admits suddenly, and
I look up.
He’s wearing a tired expression on his face. “The pain never truly goes away. It’s okay to grieve sometimes even if a lot of time has passed.”
I bite my lower lip, trying not to let the hot tears that are burning my eyes fall. My gaze is lowered.
Jace doesn’t say anything else.
Then something hits me and I ask, “So, wait, Kendall also—”
“Kendall and I share a father.” There is discomfort on his face. “I’m a year younger than her.”
The implication in his words hit me. Their father had an affair!
Reading my mind, Jace says, “Kendall’s father was married to her mother. My mother and he had a brief affair but our father, he still took responsibility for me. He wasn’t a bad man but he was a weak one.”
“Do you miss him?” I ask, hesitantly.
“Sure.” He shrugs. “Occasionally. I don’t remember him that much.”
I fall silent, sorting through my own memories and emotions. After a few long minutes, I say, “I remember my mom a little bit. I know she loved me. I know she had curly red hair, which never seemed to end, and she used to laugh a lot. All the memories I have of her are of her laughing. It was as if she was always happy. The day she took me and ran away, I don’t remember anything from that day or that week. I don’t even know who we ran away from. All I remember is that I was in a parking lot, alone, and it was raining. And a policeman found me. I was holding a stuffed bear my mom had made me.” My eyes mist at the memory of that, which is vivid in my mind. “I remember that he brought me to the police station and then Uncle Raymond came to pick me up. He hugged me as he cried and cried. It was as if he didn’t know how to stop crying. And then Aunty Ange took me home. She gave me a bath, fed me, and then got into bed with me. She slept with me for a whole week.”
“She must have been grief-stricken as well,” Jace murmurs. “Your mother was important to a lot of people.”
I sigh. “Yeah.” Having a heart to heart with my boss hadn’t been on the agenda today, but I feel like I’ve misjudged the man. The image I had of him in my head is morphing into something else.
We sit together in comfortable silence for a while before Jace says, “We should get back now.”
I jump to my feet, feeling much better. This day has been a long and emotionally draining one. I just want to go home, take a long bath, curl up in a blanket, and watch mind-numbing come
dies.
But I follow Jace back, my eyes on his back.
He’s got a narrow waist and I recall his body in that tank top I saw him wearing at the gym, the first day I had met him. He is really hot.
I can’t imagine a girl sleeping with him though.
I try to do it and all I can see is him frowning at her and correcting her moves.
Snickering at the mental imagery, I sense Jace’s eyes on me, and I try my best to look innocent.
He gives me a small smile, it’s barely a flicker.
I feel my heart stop. The guy is gorgeous when he smiles.
What the hell?
I stare at him, stupidly, and his small smile fades into that familiar scowl of his. “What?”
“Nothing,” I mumble. “You’re just really pretty when you smile.” My words are torn from my lips in an almost absentminded way and the horror on Jace’s face makes me wince. I immediately try to backtrack, “I meant—?”
“Stop talking.” He increases his pace.
He leaves me to eat his dust and I can see the tips of his ears are red as he enters the building. I follow him and stop to watch him hurry towards the door that leads to the emergency staircase.
He’s obviously trying to avoid me. Good going, Halley.
That’s what every man wants to hear. That he’s pretty.
Feeling a little gloomy, I’m about to make my way to the elevator, telling myself off for finding this situation a little bit funny, when I hear a familiar voice calling my name.
Elise Smith is a cheerful woman, with a core of steel. The front desk receptionist, she’s also engaged to Lucas, the company lawyer. “Oh, honey.” She hurries over to me. “Lana told me about what happened. How are you doing?”
She’s incredibly sweet and so friendly, and I really like her. I finally took Kendall up on her offer for lunch last week and she introduced me to Elise. Lana, I had already known, but I hadn’t really interacted with Elise all that much.
“I’m okay,” I assure her, letting her hug me.
Elise’s daughter, Sophie, is the cutest little thing I have ever seen.
She brought her over last Friday and I got to see Lucas carrying her around like a little princess, a proud smile on his face as he made her say “Dada” in front of everyone he encountered.
