Not Safe for Work(57)

“Oh, come on. You’ve said yourself you’d rather gouge out your own eyeballs than hear about the things I do in bed.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t want to know what you’re doing. I want to know who you’re doing.”

“You know as well as everyone else.”

“What?” She straightened so fast, she nearly knocked over the coffee Marie had been worried about. “Who?”

I grinned. “Calvin’s mom, of course.”

She glared at me. “Liar.”

I picked up my coffee and raised it in a mock toast. “That’s all you’re getting out of me.”

“This isn’t over, McNeill.” She gestured menacingly with a tube of glue. “I will find out.”

I laughed, but deep down, a knot tightened in my gut. I had no intention of telling her or anyone else, but something told me she was absolutely right.

She would find out. No matter how hard Rick and I tried to be discreet, this secret was going to follow us to work sooner or later.

I tried to remind myself it wouldn’t matter if it did. My crew might rib me for it. My bosses might not be thrilled about it. They couldn’t fire me, though.

Still, I wanted this between Rick and me. It was nobody else’s business anyway. I sure as hell didn’t want anyone here to know it was happening until I’d figured out what it was.

So I kept my mouth shut and kept working.

*

My ETA for the current model turned out to be a bit optimistic. I could have finished it on time, even after my two-day tryst with sleep and Rick, had my materials cooperated. They didn’t, though, and after a piece of foam-core inexplicably crumbled and some paint reacted badly to some cement, I had to do some major last-minute repairs. It was four more days before the damned thing was done.

But at long last, it was done. My remaining projects were mercifully extended, and suddenly…the tornado was gone. The sky cleared. Just like that, everything in the office was back to normal, and we could breathe again.

The firm bestowed upon Teagan and me a few well-earned days off. She probably spent most of hers sleeping. I divided mine between sleep and Rick. My head no longer ached for lack of sleep, but my body did ache from some long nights with him, and I was looking forward to having the time and energy to give him what he really wanted. This weekend? It was on. We had plans that involved rope and a whole lot of lube, and I was counting down the hours. I couldn’t wait to make him moan again.

In the meantime, everything in the Zone was back to normal. The room was filled with the usual sounds of clicking, typing, cutting and bantering, with the background filled by some band I didn’t recognize screaming out of the speakers.

“I’m actually proud of you guys,” Teagan said to the drafters. “Jon and I were gone for days, and none of you managed to burn the building down.”

Scott shoved a chip in his mouth. “Actually, Cal tried to set Bianca on fire.”

“What?” I stopped typing an e-mail and eyed him. “First, why? Second, who the hell let him anywhere near anything that could set someone on fire?”

“I did not try to set her on fire,” Cal said. “She got her sleeve in the middle of things while I was lighting—”

“I did not,” Bianca said. “I was trying to get the lighter away from you, and you tried to set my shirt on fire.”

Teagan laughed. “You know, Cal, there are easier and less dangerous ways of getting a woman’s shirt off.”

“No shit,” I said. “You don’t have to burn it off.”

“That’s about the only way he’ll ever see me without a shirt,” Bianca muttered.

I laughed. “Okay, never mind, Cal. Apparently you were on the right track after all.”

“Shut up, McNeill.” Bianca threw a pen at me. It hit my shoulder, bounced off and landed on my desk. I picked it up and flung it back, but missed and hit Cal instead.

“Hey!” he said around a potato chip. “Watch it, old man.”

“What are you going to do?” I put my hands up. “Set me on fire?”

“Fuck no. I don’t want to see you with your shirt—”

“Incoming,” Scott said. The music abruptly died.

“Oh shit.” Cal craned his neck. “Satan’s coming, and she’s got Armageddon eyes.”

I glanced up. “Is that like having Bette Davis eyes?”

“Uh, no, it’s like—”

The door flew open, and if looks could kill, I’d have been a dead man.

Marie stabbed a finger in my direction. “We’ve got a problem, Jon.”

Mice stopped clicking. Gum stopped snapping. The only sound was Silent Dave’s fingers skittering across his keyboard.

My blood ran cold, and I recoiled slightly. “Okay, so—”

“The client’s rejecting the Elmhurst model, and I can’t blame them one little bit,” she snapped.

I swallowed. My heart sank—after all that work, now what? “What’s wrong with it?”

“It doesn’t match the drawing,” she said through her teeth. “It’s off. Way f*cking off.”

“Off?” I shook my head. “That’s not possible. I went over the drawing three times before I turned it in to make sure it matched.”