Lost and Found (Growing Pains #1)(59)

Marcus saw her and raised his eyebrows in surprise. He finished up his conversation with, “I gotta go, babe, ciao.”

When he hung up the phone he leaned forward on his desk and smiled a welcome. “Well, if it isn’t our team geek! How are you faring?”

If said with disdain, Krista would’ve immediately taken offense. The way he greeted her, however, was kind and inclusive. It was easy and friendly. Krista relaxed as much as she possibly could through her desperate need to organize his desk.

“Hey Marcus, how are you?”

“I’m great, mama. Good as can be. How are you doing with the tidal wave of work that young stud has dumped on us?”

It suddenly occurred to her that Marcus might be g*y. He didn’t affect the g*y speech so common in San Francisco, he wasn’t in any way effeminate, and he didn’t have that “swish” of movement that she had seen so frequently among g*y men. All the same, her g*y-dar went off. It was quiet, but it was there.

She didn’t dare ask. She’d offered to hook someone up once, only to get a mean scowl. Some men were affronted by that question.

“I am through step one,” Krista shook her head and huffed. He laughed in commissary.

“So what brings you to the Dark Hub?” He leaned back and gestured around him. This guy was the most relaxed guy she had ever met. Ever! She relaxed that much more, itching to sweep the paper in front of her into a pile.

“Well, you, sir, are step two.” She lightly brushed a page toward another that looked similar. Obviously they belonged together; she just had to help Marcus see it.

“Am I?” Marcus said in surprise, easily ignoring her hint.

She tried to concentrate on him instead of his desk. “You are indeed. I did a bunch of research on everything jewelry, and now I am to report to you about new directions to travel.”

“Well then, I shall whirl you around like Dorothy and send you down the yellow brick road.” He turned to his computer and pulled up some spreadsheets.

Cue: avalanche.

The next half hour was her taking quick and fierce notes as he rattled on about this market and that niche, this idea and that scheme. He talked with his hands and stared out at distance ideas. It didn’t seem like he intended to be taken seriously, so he was spouting off anything that came to his head, realistic or not.

“Wouldn’t it be nice to get our little fingers in here and do this?” He’d ask whimsically.

Krista assumed that meant she was supposed to find out if it was statistically plausible, so she tried to outline that idea as quickly as possible before he went on to the next, “I wish we could…” or “Wouldn’t it be nice…” or “I was thinking…”

After his creative genius was expired for the first pass, Krista stiffly straightened from her crouch and returned his pen. He looked at her like he forgot she was there.

“Now what do you do, geek girl?” he asked, leaning forward again with a pleasant smile.

It occurred to her that no one knew what Research did—besides frown and say weird things.

She smiled. “Now I turn your gum-drop dreams into reality, Prince Marcus.”

He laughed. “What? A sense of humor? No wonder that young stud loves you!”

An explosion went off in Krista’s mid-section. She squelched it immediately. The last thing she needed was to get lovesick over a womanizing playboy in front of the biggest gossip in the company. She was not looking for career suicide.

“Well, I’ve always wanted my personal fairy Godmother.” He waved an imaginary magic wand and did something akin to giving her pixie dust. His phone rang during her dusting and he stopped to pick it up with a “Marcus at your service.”

Krista gratefully took that as her cue to get out of the weird world of overly creative people, and hustled back toward her desk. On the way out she got some odd looks, and realized she had probably mussed her hair while thinking about Marcus’s unreasonable whims. That, or she had ink on her face. Or both. It was a bad habit, but running her fingers through her hair, or holding her chin, made her feel like she was getting the brain juice flowing. She always walked away with a plan and in need of a comb.

Back at her office she put her desk into order, even though it didn’t need it, and then put her notes into some sort of order so she could look them over. She typed them up, adding all the detail she could remember, then stared at the screen.

Her music was some fast beats, and she thought they might be distracting her, so she changed it to soft sounds. It didn’t help.

The list was worse than Sean’s because it was so abstract. The ideas were just short of genius, but way too deep in the land of creativity for her to turn into something she could research. The barrier was just too high.

Crap.

An hour later she was still staring at her computer screen. She had shaken her head a couple times, did a couple doodles of ideas that didn’t pan out, but largely she hadn’t so much as changed position. She had no idea how she was going to accomplish this.

But she knew achieving those ideas was the key to their breaking ground and possibly making the marketing hall of fame with whatever elusive client they were chasing. She had to fulfill her end of the Marcus/Krista team. She just wished she was smarter.

Fuck!

In a blind panic, she printed out all the notes and headed home. On the train she continued to stare. Then walking to her house. Then sitting at the table. It was like trying to decipher Sanskrit.