The whirr and click of the elevator behind me made me spring into action.Someone was about to see me just standing there staring at the door, and it wasn’t a good look.I instinctively reached out, pushed the handle, and stepped inside the office.
Well.Decision made, at least for today.It looked like I was staying.
I nodded and managed to fake a smile at Mr.Harvey, whose eyes went straight to my glasses.The corner of his lips…
Twitched.
Was he about to smile?
He looked back at the papers on his desk and I turned to close the office door, only to be confronted with the sight of the man who had stepped out of the elevator.
I looked straight into his chest – and then had to adjust my eyes to look up higher.And higher.
I didn’t need an introduction to know who I was looking at.
Caleb Coleman had played football for longer than Mr.Harvey had, and he’d grown more famous as a result.For a while, it had been hard to avoid news reports of how successful he was.Then, his retirement shocked the nation when it came so unexpectedly, making even more headlines.The injury had cut him down in his prime.
I’d know he was tall.I’d known he had one of the widest sets of shoulders I would probably ever come across.I’d known he was handsome, with close-cropped black hair that, like Mr.Harvey, he had never quite grown out.
I hadn’t realized he would be quite so imposing in person.
He wore a black suit with grey pinstripes and a pocket square that exactly matched the shade of his dark skin, and the overall impact was striking.More than anything, though, the thing that really struck me was the glare on his face – and the fact that it was aimed at me.
“Uh, sir,” I said, spinning around and hating the fact that my voice had come out in a squeak.I deliberately lowered it.“Caleb Coleman is here to see you.”
“I can see that,” Mr.Harvey said.There was a light hint of amusement in his voice still, but his face was completely flat.Coleman stepped into the room around me, almost pushing me aside, and I stumbled slightly to get out of the way.
“Harvey,” Coleman said, his voice rough, and then he took a breath – but hesitated.He looked around at me, sidling back to my desk, and frowned.
“Meet my new secretary,” Mr.Harvey said.There was an almost pleasant tone to his voice, but I had no doubt it had to be sarcastic.The rivalry between these two men was legendary, and I would have rather gone to hide than have to witness them interacting.Ace facing off with Brody Driver in the lobby had been enough.Now that both men’s bosses were doing the same, I was wondering if I would need to duck.
It would have been exactly the kind of thing that would be great for my secret footage, but after yesterday, I couldn’t work up the nerve to actually film it.
“He sits in your office?”Coleman asked, glancing back at me again as if he couldn’t really believe it.
“He does,” Mr.Harvey said.There was a kind of odd tension in his voice.Like he was hiding some extra meaning behind the words only for Coleman, a meaning that I couldn’t grasp.Were they hiding something from me because I wasn’t at their same level?
The idea of them having some kind of secret together sparked a strange jealousy to burn within my chest.So what if they did?They had known one another for a long time.They probably had all kinds of history together.It wasn’t anything to do with me.
But I didn’t have any in-jokes or private looks or memories I could draw on with Mr.Harvey.I hadn’t been working here that long, but it felt like maybe I wouldn’t get any no matter how long I worked here.I hadn’t had the impression that he was the type to let anybody in.
The fact that Coleman obviously had something with him, even if it was just years of mutual hatred…
I needed to stop caring so much.The idea of that shouldn’thurt.I was just his secretary, and besides,I was on my way out of here already.
“Well,” Coleman said, turning to face Mr.Harvey with his hands shoved into the pockets of his pants.“I just came to make something clear to you.It looks like you can’t handle Ridley Angus.You’re making a mess of his image and ruining his earnings in the process.”
Something strange flitted over Mr.Harvey’s face – again, the ghost of a smile.Like he wanted to laugh but held himself back.“Is that so?”he asked.His tone gave nothing away.
“It is,” Coleman said.“And if you and that Ace Park can’t handle him, you should hand him over to us.The Coleman Group will be more than happy to take over his management.My star agent, Brody Driver, has already written up a proposal for him.”
Something else meaningful passed between Mr.Harvey and Coleman in the tilt of a head, the blink of an eye.I watched them with my mouth open.It was like watching an intense telenovela, but if your first language was Russian and you couldn’t even make a blind guess at what any of the characters were saying.Somethingwas going on beneath their words, but I had no idea what it was.
Was it just posturing?Or something more?
“Get out of my office,” Mr.Harvey said, managing to sound bored.
“Yeah, yeah,” Coleman said, shaking his head as if this was the worst tragedy he had ever seen.“Whatever you say, Harvey.But one day I’m going to buy your little firm and make thismyoffice, just to spite you.”
