A Little Fool for You: A Sweet Office Romance (A Little Love Book 3)

by Emily Childs

  A Little Fool for You

  Emily Childs

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  Copyright notice: All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek

  Chapter 1

  Bastien: Did Holly send over the Cutler account information?

  Bastien: And did you email Oscar to confirm he’s coming to the accounting meeting? He’s doing a training. You know how he is about his trainings.

  Bastien: Brooks? You at the office?

  Laney: I am at the office, nice of you to ask Your Majesty. All account info should hit your email in five. And Oscar isn’t in yet.

  Bastien: Fine. I’ll need everything organized to review before the meeting.

  Laney: As always, your gratitude is so appreciated. And how nice of you to ask about my day thus far. I’ve had a morning latte, RSVP’d for the game this Sunday, and have very thoroughly been reevaluating my life choices. Mostly the ones regarding those I’ve allowed into my professional life. Nearly here? I think the sun dimmed a little.

  Bastien: Around the corner, bringing all the storm clouds I can.

  Laney: I can hardly wait.

  Bastien: By the way, who says thus?

  Laney: Intelligent people with souls.

  Bastien: I like mine good and black, Brooks.

  Laney: I think this would be a good time to remind you I have a Bachelor of Science in Business Marketing and am capable of doing more than forwarding emails.

  Bastien: You are the administrative assistant, right? Did something change during the night?

  Laney: Only my last drop of hope that you have a heart.

  Bastien: Such is life.

  Laney: Well, I’m off to warn the others you’re coming, so until then . . .

  Chapter 2

  Laney

  The breeze carries a hint of autumn chill even though the leaves on the corridor of trees are still green. I weave through the back courtyard of the tall office building. I’ve walked this same path a hundred times over the six months I’ve worked on the third floor with Everett Marketing and Consulting. With any luck, in a few weeks I’ll be taking these steps with a new title: Laney Brooks, market research. My current job at Everett is a foot in the door. Managing the lives of the analyst team, being the oil to their cogs, the fuel to their fire. But I didn’t survive four years in school to spend my day refilling coffee, arranging meetings, and avoiding my ornery, annoyingly handsome boss.

  I prefer to call him the team leader. Boss gives him way too much power.

  My phone dings with a new email and my stomach flips when I see the name. Piper Grant, as in assistant to the owner, Holly Everett. Also, Holly’s niece, but I won’t be the one to worry about nepotism if it means Holly notices me because I’m friendly to Piper.

  I read the first few lines of the email as I walk, quite skilled at multi-tasking after six months of assisting Bastien’s team: New entrepreneur team discussion at 2 pm in conference room B. All department heads to be in attendance.

  I don’t peel my eyes off my phone as I glide into the elevator, or when I push the third-floor button. Holly announced last week she’s considering handing down one of her newest, most profitable clients to a brand-spanking new team. A team designed to consult with self-made businesspeople along the East Coast. According to her, these people deserve their own team of marketers, statisticians, assistants. The works. Meaning positions will be revamped, new positions will open, and a girl will finally get a leg up to really shine, and such.

  I’ve thought of little else, but neither has Bastien. He wants to be brought on as the head analyst and finally snag an executive office like it’s his lifeblood. Can’t say I blame the grouch. Doubtless it would come with a hefty pay raise that he can then use to buy a few potions to blacken his greedy little heart even more.

  He’s good at his job, I’ll give him that, but then so am I. This account could be huge for us both in entirely different ways.

  I finish reading the rest of the email: Also, your resume has been received for consideration. Ms. Everett will be reaching out to department heads for references today. Best of luck.

  I halt the moment I step out of the elevator. Closing my eyes, I tilt my head up, face at the ceiling, and groan. Loudly. It’s not a pleasant sound. Guttural and from somewhere deep in my throat.

  By department head, she better be referring to Oscar, the head of HR, my future brother-in-law, and the name I put on my resume for reference. A foolhardy plan to be sure, since Piper and Holly know exactly who I report to, but still. I don’t want them dropping the bomb to a one, Mr. Bastien Olsen, that his assistant has a plot to leave him and reach her potential.

  He’ll probably tell Holly I breathe through my mouth while I eat, or something.

  Tucking my phone back into my pocket, I take the walk through the third-floor great room a little slower than before. Outside, commuters slog their way into different buildings, coffee cups to mouths, headphones on, or phones in hand. I wonder if they work for tyrants too.

  Sometimes I think I’m cursed. Always being forced to be around the man. Not only professionally, no, I’ve known him since college! Back then he smiled more, back then he’d been a studious grad student who helped us measly undergrads out. Something changed. Now he’s distant, abrupt, and a kind of delicious-looking fiend.

  My phone dings again, a text this time from my sister.

  Nic: Stop by when you can. I’ve got your shoes, and you know I always make too many garlic knots!

  I chuckle and shoot a quick response

  Laney: I’ll stop by on lunch, can’t wait to try on those six-inch heels you insist on me wearing.

  Nic: Four-inch, drama queen. You will not wear sneakers, Lane. I draw the line there.

  Laney: But will you even notice? Ans
wer honestly. Gotta go to the bear cave now, mwah!

  Nic: Play nice! Remember my dream? It shall come to pass.

  Bastien would probably ask who says shall anymore. Why am I inviting him into my head? Go away. Geez, even texting my older sister he finds a way to torment me.

  Laney: I’m amazing, but I’m not insane. Sorry, Nicki, a thing with me and his Entitled Highness is going to stay in your dreams.

  Shoving my phone back into my purse, I shake thoughts of Bastien Olsen, stilettos, and my sister’s romantic dreams away. Since Nicole got engaged to Oscar, she’s been dying to get Bastien and me to fall head-over-heels in love. Yes, the same Bastien I’ve been whining about all morning.

  It doesn’t help that he’s Oscar’s best-friend.

  Everett Marketing and Consulting takes up the third, fourth, and fifth floors of the building. The third floor isn’t the shiniest, and has a little too much math and algorithm talk going on since accounting and the statisticians take up shop here. Upstairs, where business administration and marketing spends their forty hours a week, has a full-sized kitchen, a game room, and couches in their break room.

  We do have a library of sorts. Weird, I know, but Holly Everett believes in—and I quote—the furthering of personal development through the written word. I’m not complaining, I spend my weekends lost in books. Once upon a time I was social, until I was run ragged at an office by a snob who is not going to be named inside my head again. At least not for the next five minutes when I’ll be doing tasks for him.

  “Hi Laney!” Janna chirps at the front desk tucked just inside the doors of our offices. She’s sweet, barely nineteen, but she’s a good greeter and leaves little pieces of chocolates on our desks to brighten our days.

  “Hey, Janna.” I lean over her desk for the two point three minutes I have left to chat. “So, how was it?”

  Her cheeks burn in a soft pink. “So much fun.” She drags in a deep breath through her nose and makes a little snort.

  “Wicked haht?”

  Janna tosses her head back and laughs. She always appreciates when I let out the Bostonian inside. “Wicked haht and smaht,” she tries. “Such a nice guy. Seriously. He has friends, you know.”

  Now I snort a laugh. “Sorry, anyone with teen in their age, just doesn’t sit right.”

  “One friend is twenty, but I get it. I’m not into younger guys either. You should think about it anyway. You’re not that much older.”

  True. Twenty-three is not so far away from twenty, but I still shake my head. “I’m glad you liked him. I’ll expect more details later.”

  “All the dirt coming your way.”

  My desk is nestled near the back, in front of the largest office, hidden behind privacy glass windows, and that’s a good thing. I don’t like the idea of me being anything more than a blurry shape to the guy sitting behind the desk inside the glass box. Relieving my shoulder of my purse, I fire up my computer, check a few emails, listen to some voicemails—one making me grin—then hit the coffee cart.

  Halfway finished stirring in two sugars and I swear the temperature drops.

  “Hi, Mr. Olsen!” I hear Janna chirp again.

  I stay facing the coffee cart, jaw tight.

  “Good morning, Janna,” he replies.

  He’s never that cheerful with me. Like I’m a bunion on his left toe, a boil on his back, a cavity in his tooth. I could go on. One deep breath in through my nose, one out through my lips. Smile in place, hip cocked, I turn and hold out the freshly poured coffee.

  “Brooks,” Bastien says, his voice a deep rumble as he takes the cup.

  “Good Morning, Smiley.”

  Bastien frowns as though proving me wrong on purpose, but I wish he wouldn’t. The blue of his eyes sort of simmers, like molten sapphires or something horrifically beautiful like that. He tilts his chin toward his office, his daily signal that I am meant to follow him. And I do, day after day, planner in hand.

  “Did you reschedule the conference call with the city manager?” he asks inside his office.

  Why does it smell good in here, better yet, why does Bastien always smell good? Abnormally good. All woodsy and rustic but with a hint of cinnamon, the same sweet cinnamon from his family’s bakery in Lindström. I can’t remember the last time he went home to his family’s shop. Geez, I feel like I’ve gone to the Scandinavian Market with Nicole and Oscar more than the man of the hour himself.

  Bastien strips his suit coat and slings it over the back of his office chair. He sits, and wakes his own computer before locking me in those blue eyes again. “Laney?” he presses. “The conference call?”

  “Rescheduled for Thursday at three. As requested, you’ll meet with Oscar today at one, right before the meeting with Holly. Osc thanked me profusely because he’s a human and has manners.” I go on before he can retort. Bastien loves to retort, but I do note the twitch of his mouth that almost resembles a smile. “Then I made sure that you’re all set with two tickets for the game on Sunday.”

  “I only need one.”

  “You have two.”

  “One.”

  I tilt my head, and do my best to sound condescending. “I know sometimes it seems like I do these things to annoy you, and don’t get me wrong, I do love to watch the blood rise. Did you know your ears turn red when you’re frustrated?”

  He glares at me, but the slight curl at his mouth is still there.

  “Every manager is bringing a plus one. So because I’m amazing at not making you look like a total killjoy, and to keep you on Holly’s favorite list, you were given two. You’re welcome.”

  “If you’re so amazing then you’d have the plus one thing arranged.”

  “My magic can only go so far,” I tell him. “But speaking of other humans who, for some reason, take an interest in your life—”

  “Are you trying to get fired?”

  “Every day.” I don’t even take a breath before barreling forward. “You had two messages. One from Jonas, reminding you about dinner next Wednesday. It’s a birthday party, Bastien, meaning you better bring a present. I have a list of ideas for six-year-old girls.”

  “I don’t need your list.”

  “Doubtful.”

  “I think I know my niece, Brooks,” he says, eyes on his computer screen. “Besides, I’m good at gifts.”

  I shrug and point my pen at the last note in my planner. “Then the last message was from your mother. Really it was for me to tell you to call her back, and to warn you that if you don’t, you know what’ll happen. Whatever that means. I like the sound of it though. Your mom is feisty.”

  “Now you know my mom?”

  I pause, then add some vigor to my voice. “Yes. I know all the women in your family, lest we forget the many dinners and luncheons I’ve shared with them throughout this engagement. It’s sort of cute how close your family is with Oscar’s family. And I mean your family, not you it seems, because your mother has told me many-a-time how she is severely lacking in sightings of her third son.”

  Bastien sighs, spins in his chair so he’s facing me, and smirks. I hate that smirk. I hate how the look of it turns my insides in cartwheels. Ugh, he’s awful. And beautiful. But mainly awful.

  “It’s only been four weeks since I’ve been home,” he mutters and takes a sip of the coffee.

  I slap a suit ticket onto his desk. Then follow with a market analysis he is supposed to sign by hand since Mr. Avant from a brokerage firm we consult with doesn’t like using electronic signatures. “Tuxedo is ready for you to pick up.” I point at the papers. “You’ll notice my Post-it note—”

  “Where?”

  I roll my eyes.

  “Oh,” he says. “The one with flowers and lady bugs on it, right. For a second I thought these might belong to a daycare.”

  “You know, without my cheery Post-its your face would be the Grand Canyon of frown lines. I can take it back if you don’t want me to point out when you’ve made a glaring error.” Ah, that got his attenti
on. I snatch the cutesy sticky note away with a smug look as Bastien scours the front of the packet.

  He curses under his breath, then the tips of his ears turn red, but I think it’s more because he doesn’t curse often, and especially not in front of others. He flicks those brilliant blues up and murmurs, “Thanks.”

  I press a hand to my chest. “Oh, so much emoting is going on in this room. Really, stop or I might—”

  “Okay, Brooks, I get it. Good catch.”

  Bastien turns back to his computer, doubtless, working on correcting the tiny mistake. That’s the thing with numbers people like him, though, one slip and the entire curve changes, or formula, or whatever it is statistic fanatics like him think about. I stand still, twirling my pen between my fingers, and rock a bit on my toes.

  “Is there something else?” he asks, still clicking and typing.

  “I wanted to remind you I’ll be taking Friday off for the bridal fitting.”

  “You need an entire day?”

  “I put this on the calendar two weeks ago,” I tell him. “Reminded you in an email yesterday, and here I am now.”

  “I thought it was just dinner and the fitting.”

  “She’s my only sister, Bastien. My only family. Have a sliver of a soul, and remember I have an in with your mother.”

  He scoffs and faces his computer again. “I can’t help how busy we are with these new accounts. Oh, speaking of accounts, what is this?”

  I lean over the edge of his desk as though he invited me to peek over his shoulder. He doesn’t shoo me away, but does flash a vicious kind of grin after a moment.

  “An email from Piper, asking for a reference,” he says with a touch of snideness. It’s unsettling.

  My tongue sticks to the top of my mouth. Why did he need to discover my aspiration to join the new marketing team now? With me in the room? It was supposed to happen at the end of the day when I’m safely behind the closed doors of my cozy, little townhouse.

  The panicked thoughts are whirling inside my head, but on the outside I’m cool, collected. I straighten my shoulders and tug on the cuffs of my silky sleeves. “It shouldn’t be a surprise. You know I’m interested in marketing. This is a good opportunity.”