Neat (Becker Brothers, #2)(14)
An amused grin split my best friend’s face as he took another sip of champagne. “I never said anything about dating him, Mallory… but apparently that’s a subject that’s been on your mind.”
He cocked a brow as I stood there like a guppy, mouth open, catching flies.
I rolled my eyes, trying to play it off. “I was just making a statement.”
“Mm-hmm. You know, this actually would be kind of perfect.” He gasped. “Oh, my God. It’d be like a modern-day Romeo and Juliet! Oh, please, can you do it? Date Romeo, Mallory. It’d be so fun!”
“You do realize that play is not romantic in the slightest, and that both Romeo and Juliet die in the end.”
He waved me off just like he had when he first arrived. “Logistics.”
“Logan Becker will never be my Romeo,” I said definitively. “Now, can we get back to the subject of how the hell I’m going to survive the deal I made with the devil that is my father?”
Chris chuckled, standing straight and wrapping me in a bear hug with his glass of champagne still firmly in hand before he rested his chin on the crown of my head. “Oh, darling. Don’t think of it that way, okay? This is a trigger for you. You hate to feel manipulated or controlled in any way, and that’s what this feels like. The one man you’ve been trying to establish your independence from is the one man you can’t seem to escape.”
I sighed.
“But, that’s not what this is,” he continued. “You’re a bad ass business woman, and you made a business deal. It’s five years of sacrifice, and then?” He pulled back with a supportive smile. “Then, you’re free — and this place really will be yours.”
I swallowed, looking around as emotion threatened to surface. I didn’t do emotions — but standing there inside of a blank canvas I’d been painting in my imagination since I was a little girl, I couldn’t help but tear up.
“So, first thing’s first, show me your uniform so we can make it cuter. If you look good, you’ll feel good,” he said, releasing me and draining the last of his champagne before he refilled it to the top. He spun, looking around at the empty space with a mix between an optimistic smile and a timid grimace. “And then, we start on this mess.”
Logan
On a normal Monday morning at the distillery, I’d be happy to be back at work. Of course, I’d be missing the weekend just like anyone else, but for the most part, being at work never bothered me. Even when I was a newbie and had to work tours on the weekends, I never complained. I was in my element when I was talking about history, and I was always happy to do it.
But today wasn’t a normal Monday.
Today was the day Mallory would shadow me, which meant I’d be spending all day long with her. And as much as I’d spent the weekend pretending like that didn’t faze me, like she was just another new guide and it would be business as usual, the unease in my stomach that Monday morning proved it’d all been bullshit.
Still, I schooled myself as much as I could, revisiting her training plan and making notes on important things I wanted to cover. That was my M.O. — throw myself into what I could control to avoid what I couldn’t.
I couldn’t control the fact that I should have hated Mallory Scooter, but I was intrigued by her, instead.
I couldn’t control the fact that I had to train her when she didn’t even want to be here.
And I couldn’t control the fact that she was most likely here to take the job I’d been working my ass off for years… no matter how much that fact killed me.
All I could control was how well I trained her, how well I demonstrated that it was me who was made for the management job, who was destined to lead this team of tour guides — not her. It wasn’t much, but it was something I could throw my all into.
If they gave that job to her instead of me, I wanted everyone in this company to know the wrong decision had been made — including the ones who made it.
I was still making notes in the margins of the day’s agenda when there was a knock on my doorframe, and I looked up to find Mallory leaning against it, arms folded and an amused smirk on her face as she eyed my stack of highlighters.
“Mornin’,” she said. “I see you’re already color coding the day.”
“And I see you’re already making a habit of being late,” I countered, checking the time on my watch. She was supposed to be in my office at eight, and it was eight twenty-two. “Have a seat, I’m just finishing up my thoughts here and we can go over the plan for the day.”
“Can’t wait,” she muttered, and it wasn’t until she unfolded her arms and made her way into my office to the chair across from me that I realized what she was wearing.
My eyes bulged — so much so that I knew there was no use in trying to hide the reaction. Her tight midriff was exposed by the tour guide polo that she’d maimed with scissors, cutting it into a crop top. A belly button ring glittered under the fluorescent light as she took a seat, and she crossed her right leg over the left, looking around my office like there was nothing out of the ordinary. She’d cut the hem of the sleeves, too, which caused them to roll slightly and show more of her toned arms. Tattoos crawled around the bicep of her left arm, and black script lined the skin of her right forearm. There was even the tail end of something peeking out from under her top, something that appeared to line her ribs and dip down to the top of her navel.