The Billionaire Bargain #1(10)
He fixed me with his gaze, and it was like a telescope zooming in on me from miles away, the whole rest of the world disappearing to him, and to me.“It matters a great deal,” he said.“I want to know more about you. Everything, in fact.”
Well, that made an amount of sense that was about zero. Grant Devlin, wanting to know more about a lowly admin assistant? I’d seen Saturday morning cartoons that were more believable. I threw up my hands in exasperation.“Why?”
He looked away abruptly, his face closing off. He fiddled with his fork.“Why not? You’re a dedicated employee.”
“So’s Moneypenny, and James Bond never takes her out to lunch.”
He gave a real smile at that, wider and more sincere than any I’d ever seen on his face before, and turned back to me.“What a revealing metaphor, Lacey. Tell me—do you watch many James Bond movies?
And that was how the rest of the meal went—no matter how I tried to turn it around, he just came up with question after question about me, and eventually, I stopped trying not to answer. All of us want to talk about ourselves sometimes, and the fact that the guy doing the asking in this case looked like he’d stepped off the cover of GQ was certainly not making this any less like catnip for my ego.
I kept waiting for the catch, but he seemed really interested in everything I had to say—not just the important stuff like my ideas for the company, but silly little things like yes, I had watched every single James Bond movie, but I preferred its predecessor, the 1960s Avengers with Steed and Mrs. Peel. Or that my favorite course in college had been Ethics in Modern Capitalism, followed closely by Drawing I. Or that I used to play dress-up as a kid, pretending I was a princess invited to the ball, or a fairy warrior queen presiding over my court.
(Yeah, I couldn’t believe I let that last one slip either. If he ever brought that up around anyone else, I was going to deck him. And then deny everything. And then hopefully be swallowed up by the earth underneath me before anyone could laugh.) No matter what banality I came back with, he listened to me natter on with an intensity that actually started to freak me out—the sympathetic nods, the wide eyes, the encouraging questions…this was starting to feel a little bit, just a little bit, obviously not more than a little bit, like a— No. No no no no no. I was not even going to think the word‘date.’ I didn’t know what the hell it was, but it was not a date; Grant Devlin didn’t go on dates with people like me! Dammit, self, stop thinking about dates. That way lay madness.
In the middle of dessert—glass dishes of mango sorbet garnished with mint, plates of fried bananas hot from the stove and topped with whipped cream and chocolate, bowls of sweet sticky rice balls topped with slices of tropical fruit—I happened to glance at my watch, and my heart stopped.“Oh, f*ck me!”
Grant smirked.“Not very ladylike, Lacey.”
“We’ve been here an hour and half! Jacindais going to have my head.”
Grant waved his hand, dismissive.“I’ll explain it to her—”
“She will literally kill me.”
“I believe you mean figuratively—”
“No, I mean literally!” I snapped, my heart pounding against my ribcage like a drum.“She will literally cut off my head and put it on a pike and stick up a sign that says‘Admin Assistant Needed’ in front of it written in my blood and spinal fluid and whatever else is going to squirt out when she literally kills me.”
My mouth was running a mile a minute, way too fast, these weren’t the kind of things you said to your boss! But I was panicking, the whole world starting to spin as I realized how much trouble I was going to be in; she could fire me! No job, no chance of getting another one without a reference, I’d have to move back home with my parents— I stood up quickly.
Too quickly, as it turned out. My open purse fell off my lap, scattering small change, lipstick, and Tylenol across the marble floor with a clatter that got the attention of every single person in the restaurant.
My stomach dropped down to my shoes, and I felt the tears begin to well up in my eyes. It was all over. I’d f*cked this up too.
And then Grant’s hand was on my shoulder, warm, firm, comforting.“Don’t worry. Take your time. I’ll pay the bill, and walk you back.”
I rounded the corner into Jacinda’s office before Grant, and nearly ran right into her, her mouth open the very second she saw me. She sucked in a deep breath like a vacuum cleaner and let loose with a scream that would have done a steam locomotive proud.
“Where the hell have you been? I can’t even depend on you for one little thing, the one littlest thing I ask you to do, do you even have one brain cell in your head, even a complete f*cking idiot like you—”
“You’re fired.”
Grant’s calm voice cut through the shrieks and dropped the room into deadly silence.
Jacindagaped at him like a goldfish.“Mr. Devlin. I—you—you can’t—”
“If you speak to HR, I think you’ll find I can.” Grant sauntered into the room, and leveled a calm, contemptuous look at her, as if she were a bit of dirt he had discovered on the bottom of his shoe, inconvenient but easily removed.“Why don’t you run along and ask?”
Jacinda wavered, clearly not sure whether to retreat to HR with her tail between her legs or protest.