Jace turned his attention back to me and handed me the coffee—pumpkin spice from Ackerson’s, based on the scent. He lifted an ID badge from around his neck and slipped it over my head, his fingers brushing my neck in a way that caused my body to tingle. “This will get you everywhere you need to go for now. Our first stop is security so they can get your photo and have your badge ready by the end of the day.”
I lifted the badge off my chest to look it over and saw Jace’s face printed on the front. “Surely your access is much higher than mine,” I said with a laugh. “This feels like too much power.”
Jace placed his hand on the small of my back and led me around the reception desk to a door in the back of the lobby. He gestured to the badge reader, and I swiped us through.
“You have access to everything, Liv. You’re my assistant. You need to be able to go wherever I go. I trust you completely.”
We stepped through the door and he led me down a short hallway to another door marked with a sign for security.
“Am I going to be your lacky?” I asked, stopping in front of the open doorway of an office where a security employee was engaged on the phone.
Jace smiled. “I would never describe this role like that. You’ll come to some of my meetings and take notes, yes. You’re also responsible for the office budget, approving several different requests from the otherdepartments on my behalf, and most importantly, making sure I’m where I need to be on time.”
I chuckled as the man inside the office continued his phone conversation, gesturing with one finger in the air for us to wait for him. “Is ensuring you follow a predetermined schedule usually a challenge for your assistants?”
If so, they seem vastly incompetent.
Jace smirked at me, his green eyes twinkling, and I got the sense he knew he was about to expose his fatal flaw, the reason all his assistants quit. “I pretty much never look at my clock, prefer to let every meeting take as long as is required to get to next steps, work out during my lunch break and then get incredible cranky in the afternoon when I’m hungry and have no time to eat, and constantly cancel meetings and shuffle things around whenever my best friend or her daughter need me.”
I sighed. “You really are going to be a nightmare. You’re lucky I like you. I’m already thinking about how I can be proactive to feed you. I don’t need a cranky Jace snapping at me.”
“I probably only seem like a pain in the ass because the corporate culture is so against my natural style,” he said. “Regardless, I’d never snap at you.”
“We’ll see. Maybe I’ll let you miss lunch today and test that theory.”
“You’re already my favorite assistant,” he said with a charming grin as he tossed his arm over my shoulder. “I like your back talk.”
My body warmed, reminding me why this was going to be a torturous gig.Just think about Kaylee, you can do anything for her. You can even spend eight hours a day with a man you desperately want to climb like a tree.
“So far it sounds more like you need a wife than an assistant.”
Jace chuckled and leaned close to my ear, speaking in a low voice. “Be careful, Liv. We’ve got a good thing going, but if you put ideas like that in my head, I might just risk everything. But I’d never expect my wife to manage my life for me.”
I stilled, his breath warm on my neck. It was the most suggestive thing Jace had ever said to me. I was dying to know if he meant it or if he was just making a joke that was dangerously close to what I wanted.
The security guard hung up the phone. “How can I help you, Jace?”
Jace dropped his arm from my shoulders and stepped forward. “Morning, Ralph. This is Olivia, my new assistant. I need you to get her set up with full access and then personally escort her to IT, please.” He turned to me. “I need to take a quick call with Martin. It was the only thing I couldn’t cancel this morning. I’ll be done with him before you’re finished, I promise.”
“It’s fine, Jace. I’m sure someone can show me to my desk,” I said, sitting down in a chair across from Ralph.
“I’ll meet you at IT in thirty minutes, Liv. And don’t argue with the boss in front of my employees.” He gestured to Ralph with a boyish grin. “You’re making me look bad.”
I laughed as Jace said goodbye to Ralph and disappeared down the hall. Fifteen minutes later, I finished with security and Ralph walked me down the hall to meet Steve, the lead IT guy who’d already been briefed on setting up my laptop. I signed into several programs, testing them with Steve to troubleshoot any new-user issues, and was just wrapping up when Jace reappeared to fetch me with a proud smile on his face.
He spent the next two hours walking me around the lavish building and introducing me to the head of each team in his division. He claimed he wanted them to know my name and face since I was the one they had to go through to get access to him, but it was clear he wanted me to see all the different roles and opportunities at the company for when I was ready to consider other jobs.
After the tour, he stopped at Cole’s desk to retrieve a bag of takeout and then showed me to the private elevator that brought us to our floor. My feet were tired from all the walking since I’d worn heels, and I was blown away by how much time Jace had already spent with me. I wasn’t about to repeat Cole’s ill-advised words from earlier, but surely Jacedidhave more important things to do than show his assistant around all morning.
We stepped off the elevator and I walked around the large, open-concept space. My desk was right in the middle of the room, a position that provided a clear line of sight into the open door of the corner office that Jace said was his. However, if he closed his door, I’d have no visibility into the room since it had no windows. A large,glass-walled conference room was right next to his office. A kitchenette that was separated by a glass wall and had entrances on both sides sat to the right of the elevators. “This space is beautiful,” I said.
“I’m glad you like it, since you’ll be spending a lot of time in it. I’m pretty sure Zachariah Acker designed it for himself—not that he ever spent any time here.” Jace glanced at his watch and gestured to his office. “I have a meeting in an hour, but we have time to eat together.”
I followed him as he led the way, shaking my head. “You went one morning without an assistant and look at you. You ordered lunchandchecked the time of your meetings all on your own,” I teased.
He set the paper bag on his desk and started unpacking several Chinese takeout containers—my favorite, which he knew I rarely ordered since Kaylee didn’t like it—and gestured for me to sit in one of the white chairs in front of his desk. I sat down and he grabbed two forks out of the bag, handing me one as he sat next to me.
He passed me the chicken lo mein and opened the pork fried rice for himself. “Cole ordered the food for me,” he said. “At my request, obviously, but still, I am not capable of managing on my own up here. I’ve got good business sense and a lot of vision, but I have the mind of an artist, Liv. I flow wherever the current takes me, and my biggest flaw is getting wrapped up in something exciting and forgetting about something necessary.”
