12
COLTON
“Iknew all that extra cardio was bullshit,” I practically wheeze as Fallon hands me a water.
It’s the day before the bachelorette event, and I have been running myself ragged making sure everything is prepared for this event down to the most tiny, inconsequential, minute detail. It hasn’t helped that the silver screen princess keeps changing her mind about things. Three specialty cocktails turned into four. Décor changed from a cream palette to a bone palette, which apparently is a different fucking thing. One small adjustment has turned into twenty.
“Fuck, I don’t even like her movies that much.” I gulp down half the water in one go, passing it back to Fallon as she gives me a sympathetic look. Her red hair is piled high on her head in a messy bun, little strands making a valiant effort to escape as she drinks from her own bottle.
We’ve spent the last hour helping Marcus set up one long table extending from the stage, replacing the intimate setup the floor has on regular nights. Since the event is on a Friday night, we had to wait for the club to close before we could begin moving furniture around.
We could have waited until tomorrow morning to set up the new arrangement, but I wanted it to be ready for rehearsals right when people started to file in, not having to waste time on setup.
Marcus stands on the other side of the table, arms folding and unfolding across his chest as he scours the setup for imperfections. “Do you think we should…” Marcus starts, but I cut him off before the suggestion leaves his lips.
“No, it’s perfect where it is,” I assure him, hoping he won’t make us move the tableagain. A little to the left, a little to the right. I know he is meticulous about details, but even for him this has been a tedious affair.
“Sorry,” he mumbles, running his hand through his dark hair. “Ms. Mathers has been asking me for updates multiple times a day, I’m worried she doesn’t like something we put together, or is questioning my lineup for the night,” he states, looking over the setup like he’s contemplating making another unnecessary change.
I hadn’t told anyone that I had already decided not to accept her request. I didn’t want it to get back to Harper before I was ready for her to know, wanting to give her as much time as possible to admit what she wants, or in this case what she doesn’t want. Since this place is crawling with gossip, the only way to make sure it didn’t make the rounds was to keep it close to the chest.
After all, I hadn’t told anyone about the request from Ms. Harlin to begin with, and yet everyone seemed to know about it the next day.
When I hand out assignments for tomorrow night, it will be obvious that my clothes will be remaining firmly in place.Unless Harper wants to take them off herself.
I let out a heavy sigh, not having considered how our little push and pull could be affecting the rest of the staff. I’m notentirely sure what has Harper wound so tight—the meeting with Ms. Harlin, or the boxing sessions the following morning.
All week Harper has been unnervingly calm towards me, apparently taking her frustrations out on poor Marcus. She has been acting like nothing happened between us that morning, like she hasn’t been thinking about the press of my hand against her aching clit and my hard cock against her ass as she ground against me.
It's all I’ve thought about, every day since. I feel her throb under my hands while I organize files. I hear her breath growing shallow while sitting in meetings, and I see her face tilted back toward me in pleasure when I close my eyes. She runs through my daydreams and nightmares, making the mundane task a pursuit of concentration to accomplish.
Almost everyone else has already headed home for the night, Marcus joining them as he picks up his bag and heads backstage to gather the remainder of his things. I stare, unfocused, at the carved wood grain of Harper’s office door. I can picture her sitting behind her desk, hunched over invoices and contracts, the end of her pen resting against her bottom lip as she concentrates. I wonder how it feels to press against her lips. Would she kiss like she strikes deals, harsh and demanding, or would she tease with whispers of a kiss?
Fuck. I run a hand down the front of my face, trying and failing to wipe the image away.
I’m jealous of a pen. It’s official, I’ve become pathetic.
Fallon starts to walk by me, pauses when she realizes I’m not moving, backtracking a few steps to pause at my elbow. When I don’t break my gaze from the slightly ajar door, she lightly elbows me in the side, finally getting my attention.
“Why don’t you just go tell her you aren’t going to do it? Her light is still on.” She points to the faint beam peeking through the sliver of the open door.
“What makes you think she cares if I do it?” I ask, seeing if she can give me some input as an objective, completely unbiased onlooker.
Fuck that. She’d better lie to make me feel better.
“You never stopped to think about why the other women here have been keeping their distance?”
“You don’t keep your distance,” I laugh, bumping her with my hip.
“I don’t count,” she says, holding up her left hand to wiggle her fingers in front of my face, the movement making the gaudy ring on her finger sparkle and shine.
“Careful, or you’ll poke an eye out with that thing.” I bat her hand away, laughing.
“One night after the crowd died down, the girls were all talking about you, thenew kid,” she waggles her brows for emphasis. “Just joking around about whether you were single, taken, from around here, staying long term, looking to settle down, down for a fun time, basically anything they could think of, when Hannah decided it was a good time to inform the class that she had already made her move.” Before I can tell her that nothing happened, she puts a hand up between us. “Oh, I know she didn’t get very far. She said you were playing hard to get, and that she needed a little more time to break you in properly.” Fallon gags, and I resist the urge to mimic the gesture.
“Not really sure where you are going with this, Fallon, since it sounds like I should have a harem instead of being a pariah.”
“Anyway, Harper overheard the entire thing and scolded her for like an hour that she should be embarrassed to demean a fellow employee like that, and if the roles were reversed, she would be livid. I thought she was going to fire Hannah right on the spot, but instead she basically threatened the whole group against inter-work relationships,” she huffs out a laugh.
