It was hard not to walk back over there.
It was hard not to drag Keaton out of his chair with my hands fisted in his shirt.
It was hard not to push him up against the wall behind his desk and crush my mouth against his.
It was hard not to celebrate this victory in all the ways my body was dying to.
It had to be him.Ace and I had been working on this around the clock and yet it had to be Keaton that solved it.It seemed like Keaton was always the one with the solution to every problem I had since we’d hired him.
Except he was also my biggest problem.A boss couldn’t have those thoughts about his secretary.Not if he wanted to avoid a sexual harassment lawsuit.
Unless the secretary was the one who wanted it.
A knock on the door heralded the arrival of Fernando Quijada.He entered and closed the door behind him.
“Hey, you needed me?”he asked.I held up a hand to stop him.The first news alert had just pinged into my inbox.
I clicked the link and opened the report.A breaking news story about Ridley Angus having his drink spiked.
It was starting.“Come over here,” I said.I beckoned him as I scooted my chair across.I turned my screen so he could watch the video as I played it.“We have them red-handed.”
Fernando straightened quickly after watching the clip.“Wow,” he said.His voice was rushed.Clipped.Why was that?“I guess you never know who you can trust.”
“No,” I said.“You don’t.”
He looked at me.“What did you need me for?”he asked.He gestured at the screen.“This is Ace’s client.”
Hmm.
“It’s not about the clip,” I said.“Not directly.Ace and I will be busy dealing with the fallout for the rest of the day.Maybe the week.I want you to help out the junior agents.Deal with anything that comes up.You’re in charge of them until this blows over.”
“I can do that,” Fernando said.I wasn’t sure if it was just my imagination or if he sounded relieved.But there were lots of reasons for a man to sound relieved.Perhaps he wasn’t a fan of Ridley and didn’t want to work with him.“I’ll go down and let them know to bring their problems to me until you say anything different.”
I nodded.“Good.That saves me some time.I have some interviews to run to.”
Keaton looked up from his desk.“You’re going out?”he asked.
I stood with a nod as I buttoned my suit jacket.“I have to go now,” I said.“I have a couple of major networks requesting face time already.Cancel and move my appointments for the rest of the day.”
“Of course,” Keaton said.He lunged forward and grabbed his desk phone from the cradle.“Do you need me to call a car for you?”
I almost said no.I liked driving my own car.But he had a point.It was going to be a long day and I had a lot to think about.I could take my laptop with me and get some work done as a passenger.“Fine,” I said.
Keaton nodded rapidly.He was already dialing.“I’ll have them bring it around before you hit the street.”
I walked out of the office confident in the fact that the car would be waiting for me.And it was.That was just how reliable Keaton could be.
But sitting in the back of that car turned out not to be a place where I could get work done.I ended up not finishing off a single thing I started.
What I did instead was stare out of the window and think.
I thought about Keaton.How much I wanted him.How I wanted to let someone in.The timing was wrong but I somehow knew in the back of my head that the timing would always be wrong.
No one had ever made me want to let them in as badly as he did.I’d made him inner circle.Inner circle!I had agents who’d worked with me for five or more years whose marital status I didn’t even know!There were people in my life who had known me for decades and didn’t know I was gay!
There were so few people I trusted with the truth about who I was.What had possessed me to trust him?
Why didn’t I feel like I had made a mistake even now?
