The Dating Plan(56)

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? ? ?

TYLER was in a mood.

“What took you so long?” he demanded when Daisy walked into his office.

“I was in the flow.” She sat on the chair across from his desk and peered at him over a giant stack of papers. Unlike her tidy workstation, Tyler’s office was a sea of paper, coffee cups, pizza boxes, charts, boxes, books, and, curiously, pink paper umbrellas. No surface was clean. Every movement was a study in not knocking something over.

“Brad isn’t happy,” Tyler said abruptly. “Apparently you convinced Liam to give Mia and Zoe a chance to present the branding pitch that I rejected last year.”

Daisy shrugged. “Can he be unhappy and still hear them out? Not one of the women in that room felt that a rebrand of unicorns, rainbows, and scantily clad nondiverse women resonated with them in any way.”

Tyler ran his hands through his hair, taking his look from slightly crazy to mad scientist in a heartbeat. “I thought you were a behind-the-scenes kind of person.”

“It was all an act.” Although she’d made the comment flippantly, the words rang true. Although she’d been a high school nerd, she’d never been shy or quiet. At least not until her mom had thrown out a comment that made her wonder if her personality was one of the reasons she’d left. But something had changed in the last few weeks, and it wasn’t just the fact that she’d almost slept with her high school heartbreak. She’d made friends at Organicare and discovered a confidence she’d thought she’d lost. She had a passion for the product, and a voice that could help the company succeed.

“Good to know,” Tyler said. “Anything else you think we’re doing wrong?”

Daisy hesitated. “Is that a trick question?”

“It’s an honest one.”

She leaned back in her chair, considering. “I’d put people back in their own divisions. Developers in one corner. Marketing in another.” She slipped a side eye at Hunter in the glass-walled conference room next door. “Finance could go beside the developers because they’re generally quiet.”

“Andrew gave his notice.”

She startled at the abrupt change in topic, and the skin prickled on the back of her neck. “Yes, I heard.”

“Now I don’t have a project manager.”

“Josh could take over quite easily,” she offered. “He worked closely with Andrew.”

“So you’d pick Josh over anyone else?”

“He’s good at what he does. People like him. He’s a bit of a cowboy, but you can easily rein him in.”

Tyler studied her for a long moment. “Not you? After all, you came in here and advocated for Mia and Zoe’s rebrand, proposed an office reorganization, questioned Brad’s vision, and tried to get Josh a promotion. You have the skills and the experience. I think you’d do a good job.”

Daisy’s mouth went dry. Project manager? It was the next step in a developer’s career. More money. More prestige. More responsibility. Better work. But on the flip side, it required more commitment. The project manager was the glue that held everything together, and you couldn’t be the glue if you weren’t prepared to stick around. She had started to find her voice, but it wasn’t loud enough to lead.

“No,” she said. “Not me.”



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? ? ?

LIAM’S phone buzzed on his desk. He picked it up and barked a hello. Usually, he enjoyed the rare opportunity to work in the office, but tonight was hockey night. He hadn’t seen Daisy all week, and every minute until quitting time felt like a damn hour.

“Your tickets have arrived.” His new assistant wasn’t fazed by his odd behavior. She’d come from a start-up where the developers dressed and acted as characters from the game they’d created. Even the days when Liam arrived in full riding leathers didn’t merit the lift of an eyebrow. “You got the club seats with a center ice view.”

“Yes!” He pumped a fist. There was no point going to the game if you couldn’t see the sweat on the players’ brows. No point making money if he couldn’t share one of the few things that brought him joy with his fake fiancée.

He wanted Daisy to know him—the man he was today, not the man who had messed up his life so bad that it took three years on the road and a kindhearted stranger to set him on the right path again. He wanted her to look at him with all the passion and desire he had seen in her eyes when she was a teen, like he was perfect and not flawed, whole and not so utterly broken. And the best way to do that was to show her the things he loved.

Six hours until game time. He drummed his thumb on his desk for a full ten seconds before pressing Daisy’s number on his phone. He’d never been a patient man.

“To what do I owe this honor?” Her voice lit him up inside and he instantly forgot all about the accounting systems software pitch deck James had given him to review.

“I wanted to let you know the details of our sports date. I got club seats with a center ice view! It’s going to be a great game. I can feel it. One good run and the Sharks will get close to the top.”

Daisy sniffed. “A Sharks turnaround that results in a playoff spot is a long shot. There’s no point in denying reality.”

His breath left him in a rush. Her informed assessment suggested more than just a passing familiarity with the game. Could this day get any better? “You follow hockey?”