Or at the very least, Jay thought, they weren’t supposed to fill you with panic and doubt.
It had been an awful day, too. Ominously so. After getting hung up on by one of Nicholas’s would-be investees and spending her morning correcting spreadsheet errors and bad formulas, Jay was ready to hide in the bathroom and never come out.
Soon, all eyes will be on you. No one will think you’re good enough.
She couldn’t shake off the terrified little voice whispering that this was part of Nicholas’s revenge. That he had coaxed her into falling in love with him just so he could shatter her heart.
“Jay?” An executive from one of the other departments was looking down at her impatiently. “Can you photocopy these documents for me?”
“I was actually just getting ready to leave, but sure, I guess. Just leave them on the edge of my desk and I’ll take care of them tomorrow morning.”
Annica huffed very quietly, and Jay turned to look at her.
“These are confidential figures,” the man said. “I can’t just leave them sitting around. I need them done today.”
“Well, I can’t do them today.”
His face darkened. “Then what are we paying you for?”
“She’s not your assistant, Harold.” The deep voice came from behind them both, with a hard edge that made a diamond drill seem soft by comparison. “Or do we need to discuss the reason you’re unable to get your own work done on company time without outsourcing it to the C-suite assistants?”
Harold blinked and stammered out an excuse, clutching his precious papers to his chest as he scurried away. Jay cringed, very aware of Annica’s notice when Nicholas turned his attention back on her. “Are you ready to go?”
“Uh, yeah. Let me just—um. Get my stuff. For my appointment.”
She could feel Annica’s stare as she tugged the bag out from under her desk. She walked to the restroom at a clip.Why did I think this would work?
Surely, Nicholas wasn’t so cruel that he would get her all dressed up in his mother’s white dress, only to abandon her at the altar, or wherever it was you abandoned someone when it was just a civil marriage ceremony.
(You let me tie you up, blue jay. Don’t you trust me to take care of you properly?)
She really didn’t care what he did to her body. She was more afraid of what he would do to her heart. That the whisper of vintage silk against her skin was just the first link in a chain that would bind her to him forever: a man who could hate as fiercely as he loved, who did not believe in uncertainties. Her polar opposite, some would say. Not the sort of man anyone would ever imagine her with. Not the sort of man that she had ever imagined for herself—
Until he made her.
The bathroom was empty and silent, except for a dripping tap. Sighing in relief, she went into one of the stalls to change.Even without the outer skirt, the dress had a lot of fabric. When Jay looked at herself in the mirror, the low sweetheart neckline made her blush and throw on her coat.
Good thing we’re not going to a church, she thought.
The office blurred around her as she stepped back out into the hall, holding the coat closed with the arm holding her purse as her eyes restlessly scanned for Nicholas’s rangy silhouette.
He wasn’t there.
Jay braced herself against the wall, sucking in a sharp breath as she tried not to cry. People glanced at her curiously and she turned her face away, hoping no one would ask her if she was all right.No. He wouldn’t do that to me, she thought desperately.He told me he loved me.
He promised he would never leave me.
A man’s hand gripped her upper arm and she looked up wildly, causing one of the tears in her eyes to slide down her cheek as she found herself looking into Nicholas’s cinereous gaze. She swiped at her face but she must have looked awful because his softened.
“I was parking the car out front.”
“Okay,” she said in a small voice.
“I’m here now.”
Nodding, she let him lead her away. Most people were in meetings or getting their late afternoon coffee, but in a company this big there were always a few peoplesomewhere, and the sight of their CEO with a crying woman in a coat was bound to draw stares.
Stupid, Jay thought, that desperate feeling rising in her chest until it felt as if she were about to burst.What the hell were you thinking?
