“What?” I ask, my head spinning in two directions at once.
“Yeah. They replaced it with buffalo chicken dip. Personally, I prefer that, but it’s much more sports bar if you know what I’m saying.”
Jaylen stops and looks between us, and the expression on Harper’s face tells me she didn’t tell him about her new job. Awesome.
“What are you doing here?” he asks, his eyes scanning her very business casual outfit before looking at me.
“Ash didn’t tell you?” she asks.
Fuck.
“Didn’t tell me what?” he asks slowly.
“I work here now,” she answers.
“You work here? Now?” he asks.
“Yep,” she answers. “I’m his new assistant.”
Jaylen looks over at me while slowly arching an eyebrow, and it all crashes in on me at once. I might be out of Costa Rica, but I’m still in the eye of the storm.
Chapter 19
Harper
Apersonal assistant does whatever the boss wants done.
Whatever they need, you’re on top of it, preferably before they even ask. Hot latte at 7:00 am waiting on their desk when they walk through the door? Done. Meetings arranged in a way that makes sense both logistically and lucratively? Done. Dry cleaning, mail, new appointments, customer complaints, checking in on restaurants…all of that, too.
But here’s the real catch.
The part of the job that, while I should have known it came with the description but didn’t actually think about it until I’d already accepted the job, bought a business casual wardrobe, and even a couple of desk decorations for my new office?
Being a personal assistant means being with your boss…
All.
The.
Time.
I know I should have known, but I didn’t actually think about it until after I accepted the job. I was too busy falling back into my normal life. I need to sell my wedding dress or attempt to. The amount people are willing to pay for a tainted dress ispathetic. I’d get more satisfaction from burning the thing. I need to schedule an oil change because apparently, it’s overdue, and I’m still learning the ins and outs of my new job.
When he offered me the job, I didn’t really have time to stop and think about what it actually means to be someone’s personal assistant. The reality of my job is that I will be spending an enormous amount of time with Ash.
Essentially, I went from being stolen from my wedding to trapped with my brother’s best friend to now working with my brother’s best friend. I’m now doing a job that forces more proximity than the post-wedding vacay did.
Since my brother works at the office too, any and all tensions between Ash and I have to be masked. He has no idea what happened between us in Costa Rica. Now he’s just found out that I work here too, as Ash’s shadow.
If the universe really does have a hand in my fate, I am sure it’s laughing its ass off right now.
By the time the first Friday rolls around, I am practically crawling out of my skin for the week to be over so I can spend the weekend alone in my apartment. I need to take a breather from the rollercoaster that is my life.
It’s just gonna be me, my books, and my fantasies. It’s much safer than being around the man who seems to constantly try to get me to make the steamy scenes I read a reality.
It started earlier this week when he was giving me a tour of the office. Despite my brother working here too, I’d never been in the actual office building. There was never a reason to go before, and I worked for Daniel.
As Ash showed me around, it was almost as if he was making a point to avoid places we would run into Jaylen. If Jaylen was in his office, which is across from Ash’s, we’d go to the break room. If Jaylen was in the break room for a cup of coffee and a cookie baked fresh by Nina, the receptionist, he was showing me thefront desk. If Jaylen happened to be near the front desk flirting with Nina about how good the cookies are, we went to Ash’s office. It was like a game of Pac-Man that left my head spinning and kept me wondering what the real objective was.
