I blinked. “You mean, they think we’re a couple because you’re telling them we’re a couple, when in fact we’re not. Right?”
He snickered. “I can’t help the rumors that spread around our place of work.”
“The rumors you started, Tommy!”
He shook his head slowly. “Don’t you raise your voice at me. I’ve done nothing wrong here.”
“Oh, so telling your bullshit friends about some nonexistent sex life we’ve got is not doing anything wrong? Is that what you’re telling me!?”
He took a few steps toward me. “Come on. Do you really hate it? I mean, men only talk about their sex lives if it’s really, really good.”
I balled my hands up into fists. “I’ll report you to H.R. for harassment of the highest degree if you don’t--.”
He leaned down into my ear. “And what proof will you hand over of this supposed harassment?”
I took a step back. “Fuck you and whatever mental illness has made you the sicko you are today.”
He chuckled. “Since you love playing hard to get, I got your address from the company employee database.”
I blinked. “You did what now?”
He slipped past me. “I’ll pick you up tonight around eight for our date. You owe me one anyway, remember?”
Tears rushed into my eyes as Tommy eased out of the room and I heard his friends clapping and whooping and hollering in the process. I looked up at the ceiling, refusing to cry over some sorry excuse for a man before I turned on my heels and made my way back to my office. I kept my head down, trying not to let anyone see exactly how distraught I felt.
And the second I sat back down at my desk, I noticed I had an email.
From JoJo.
Miss Becca,
Enclosed is a list of things the board needs from me in terms of financials. I want a polished PDF in my inbox and a paper copy on my desk by tomorrow morning.
J. Ryker
And as I sat there, reading the words over and over, relief washed through my veins.
I’d never been so happy to stay late in all my life. So, I tanked through the few things I had to get done and started on the painstaking process of appeasing the old, crotchety board of investors this company had. I buried myself in the numbers and the statistics. The projections and the bar graphs. While it was boring work, numbers made sense. Numbers had a clear-cut purpose and held no motive to screw those over who were using them. Numbers felt like home some days. Numbers helped to make things make sense.
I didn’t once look at the clock until after I had shot the electronic copy to his email, and I noticed it was eight-thirty.
Thank the Lord.
I printed out a hard copy and made sure all of the pages were in order before punching holes and sliding it into a navy-colored three-ring binder. I stood up and cracked my knuckles, allowing myself a moment to celebrate dodging Tommy with something I had been asked to do. Then, I gathered my things, locked my office, and started up the steps toward JoJo’s office.
And as I got up to his top floor, I noticed him leaving his office.
“Done for the day, too?”
He slowly looked over at me and I held up the binder.
“Got this for you,” I said confidently.
He threw his office door back open with a muted face. “On my desk.”
I scurried past him and set it in the middle of his pristine, sparkling desk before I booked it out of his office. And while I would have usually sprinted out of his presence, something in my head screamed for me to stick by his side.
So, I didn’t ignore the voice that had kept me safe my entire life. Instead, I used looking through my purse as an excuse to step into the elevator with JoJo.
