Vivica thought a lot of things and some of them made her feel funny. She certainly wasn't going to say any of that out loud to him. Vivica wasn’t going to give herself away like that. She was trying hard to stop the red flush that was creeping up her neck and over her face. He really didn’t need to know what she thought…
“I don't know, I don't know what to think, Shane. This is just weird, and I guess I just have never been in a situation where there wasn’t an angle being played. What is your angle?”
“See it for what it is, Vivica. It’s just an opportunity, and I think you will do well here.”
Vivica agreed, thanking him again for the job, even though she had no idea what the hell the job was or what she was supposed to do. All Vivica knew for certain was Shane was walking away from the car and she was on her own. Again.
In that moment, she could have taken off. She had told herself over and over again that she was just going to stay long enough until she could find a chance to leave. Now was the time, but Vivica didn't find herself leaving. She found herself going in through the front doors and giving her name to the receptionist. She didn't know what to expect, but opportunities didn't come very often, and they certainly didn't come in the form of a man like Shane.
What did she have to lose? It wasn’t like she had more pressing matters to attend to.
Chapter 7
Shane
Even though Shane would have liked to have stayed and helped Vivica get acclimated to the office, he did not have the time for that. As always, there was work to do, and Shane never seemed to be able to stop. A small part of him worried that if he stopped, he wouldn't be able to pick back up again and he would be right back where he started, even though there was a very slim chance of that happening. He would have to really mess up to lose it all.
Shane was driven by many things, but poverty in his childhood was probably the force that kept him going the most. When he was young, his father was an outcast and did not get any help from the family. His mother died when he was young, and his father went from failed job to failed job. Even when he worked hard and did his best, Shane's father always seemed to get the raw end of the deal. It wasn’t until Shane was older that he realized that his father was just lazy and was always looking for the easy way out.
Because he was so miserable in his past, Shane decided that he would never be poor and took steps from early on to ensure that he never would be. He wished that he had his family clan behind him. It would have helped in many ways, actually. He would have had some kind of help behind him. Instead, Shane had to do it all alone. His father was useless. Shane sent him a little money now and then to tide him over, but he didn’t disclose his business dealings and his father didn’t ask. As long as he got free money, that seemed to be all he was worried about.
So, poverty drove him to the first million. Something else, darker and deeper inside, brought him to a billion and there was something there, a hungry beast that was never satisfied, which pulled Shane along at a break-neck speed. He didn’t need the money, didn’t feel much with each new milestone, but something made him do it.
Shane was a workaholic. He was usually the first one there and the last one to leave for the next day, because he never left before midnight. Today was different though. He was walking in at almost 2:00 o'clock in the afternoon, and he was getting a lot of strange looks from other people. Yeah, he had dropped Vivica off with Devin, but he was still thinking about her. She had changed everything, made him wonder what she was doing, messed up his whole day. Shane couldn’t focus on work.
He went to the side of the floor where Vivica and Devin were, finding them quickly, engrossed in a lively conversation that he couldn’t quite hear. He didn’t like how Vivica smiled at Devin, or how close his assistant was to the new hire. His hackles went up to see it, not expecting the feeling of suffocation that took over.
Shane walked to his office and sat down. Devin was busy and was not bringing him his coffee. Shane knew that it was the afternoon, but he needed his coffee on his desk. He didn’t know what to do without it, but Shane was sure that he would be fine. Time went on though and he wasn’t.
Afraid to run into them, he beelined it for the breakroom and was immediately relieved to not find the pair in front of him. He would likely say something that he would regret and have to explain later. That was the last thing Shane wanted to do. He didn’t like feeling feelings, and trying to explain them would just be even worse.
After taking a few moments to figure out the coffee machine, he had something recognizable as coffee in a cup he wasn't even sure whose it was. Shane needed to get back to work, so he started heading that way. He had several meetings that he had to take care of since he was late. They were going to be back-to-back-to-back. They still wanted to meet, of course, so Shane obliged. He just wouldn’t have any time in between them like he would have liked. He was buying small businesses, looking at equipment, buying real estate. It was a little bit of everything, and Shane couldn't believe that he had been so irresponsible as to stay home to wait for Vivica, instead of going to work like he was supposed to. That wasn’t like him.
About the time he was getting into his office, he heard Vivica laugh and it cut into him. All of his focus was obliterated just like that. Instead of going to his office, something he definitely needed to do because of everything that was on the agenda for the day, he went to go find the source. Where was Vivica?
Shane knew immediately that he did not want to see Vivica and Devin together again. He did anyway. Devin was closer, he was trying to impress her, and he was annoyed to no end with them both. He was irked at himself for giving a damn.
“I see that you guys are getting settled in well.”
He was looking at Vivica and she agreed that she was. The smile didn't disappear off her face, like it did on Devin’s. Devin most likely could read into how Shane was feeling. Shane wasn't the only shifter in the business, so Devon most likely knew exactly how Shane was feeling, and Shane wished that he could keep it to himself. It was embarrassing to have such emotions over a woman that he had picked up in the middle of the night and had never even met before. Surely, she wouldn't have told him everything, right?
Shane really didn't want that to be the case. He would have liked if nobody knew how they met. The way they met, it would assume that they were not together. Shane did not want that assumption to be made. He didn’t want people to think that she was open for anything. She wasn’t.
Even as he thought it, Shane couldn't believe his own thoughts. What the hell was he thinking? Vivica was a human. It's not like they could even be together. Shane knew the rules, and even though he wasn't with a shifter clan, there were some rules that just couldn't be broken. He truly believed that being with humans was one of them. He still thought about it though…
“Devin has been very kind and helpful. Thank you for sending me to him. He has been very helpful.”
Shane didn't like how many times she said very and the way she moved closer to Devin as she spoke. He wanted to snatch his assistant up and throw him.
He realized that he was going to be late for a rescheduled meeting if he didn't leave. He had work to do. Why was he standing there, messing with them?
Shane told them that he had to get to a meeting. Devin asked him if he needed anything, and Shane said that he had everything squared away.
“Made my own coffee and I will just record for notes. Everything is taken care of.”
Shane hoped that Devin realized how easily he could be replaced. He was loyal and a great assistant, a friend even, but that didn’t mean that he wouldn’t get rid of him over Vivica.
The sour feeling was because Shane wanted to stay with Vivica. Or he wanted to get Vivica away from Devin, who was entirely too charming for Shane’s taste. The two of them were too chummy for such a short period of time. Why were they so close?
