You didn’t get anywhere in life by complaining. You didn’t get anywhere cutting corners. If you worked harder, better than everyone else, that would win in the end. It always did. She lived by that, always. And she would live it now.
“Doug was looking for you,” Carol said.
Grace forced her smile wider. “Wonderful, I just have a client...”
“He said it was urgent,” Carol said, looking apologetic.
Oh, frick. Carol was only apologetic if Doug was breathing fire.
Double argh.
She walked down the hall and toward her boss’s office, a feeling of impending doom crowding her heart, shoving up against her breastbone. Suddenly, she would give a hell of a lot to be back down in that cab with Zack Camden. And not just so she could check her email.
They sometimes called the walk to Doug’s office The Green Mile. And for good reason. And it wasn’t because the shiny tile was green.
She lifted her hand and knocked. “Come in,” she heard him say through the heavy oak.
She pushed the door open and smiled, even wider than she had coming in. “Hi, Doug.”
“Grace, have a seat.”
Shoot. A seat. He wanted her to sit? Oh, she was screwed. She obeyed, sitting in the chair in front of his desk. It didn’t escape her notice that there was a box of tissues within her reach. Not his reach—hers.
For emotional breakdowns after he screamed at people, she imagined. Or worse, if he didn’t scream at all, but set about condescending to them until they melted into watery shame.
Luckily, she had tear ducts of steel.
She took a deep breath. Ice bitch, take me away.
She would not care. She would not care.
“Look, Grace...” Doug leaned back in his chair, his tie riding up. His tie was too short. He looked like he got dressed in the dark. You’d think that one of the more high-powered businessmen in the city would know how to properly dress. But no. Obviously, not. “I had a call from a client just a little bit ago.”
She gritted her teeth. “Right.”
“He complained about your conduct.”
Her mind shot back to the lunch meeting she’d had an hour ago. Yeah, there was no question he was the one who’d filed the complaint.
“What about my conduct?” Grace asked. “Specifically.”
“He said you’re quite rude and abrupt. Very cold.”
Bastard. Bastard jerk-face bastard. She would never say any of that out loud, but it was the truth. Of course she was cold, she hadn’t agreed to let him bang her.
“I...apologize that it was perceived that way....”
Doug held his hand up. “It’s not perception when it’s a client, Grace. It’s fact. If a client is alienated, all that matters is their truth.”
Grace felt her eyes go wide completely of their own accord. She worked to keep the rest of her face frozen, her hands clasped firmly in her lap. “Of course,” she said, her lips barely moving.
“And since you were late meeting the client who was in your office...”
Because of the other client. And the taxi debacle.
Grace bit the inside of her cheek.
“I have moved her to another consultant. Consider this a warning. I like you, Grace.” Grace snorted internally. As if liking had anything to do with anything in this office. She hated Doug. If her keeping the job was about liking him, she’d have lit his desk on fire and said adios sometime back when he’d had her play the elf at the company Christmas party for Secret Santa because she was “so cute and petite.”
He continued. “I’d hate to let you go. You’re a sweet girl.”
She was going to blow a blood vessel in her eye. But she wouldn’t say anything. She couldn’t. The inaction all but reached in and paralyzed her, freezing her. Because if she opened her mouth she could lose this job, this great job she’d worked so hard at. It could be a mistake. A failure. And she couldn’t afford either.
“Thank you, Doug,” she said, her words coming out quiet, measured. If only because she was choking on her rage. She stood. “I guess I better go organize a new client. Since I probably have two less—” she forced out the most tortured laugh in the history of mankind “—than I did before I walked in here.”
“Great job, Grace. Use this to get motivated.”
“Ha! Yes. Yeah.” She gave him a thumbs-up, since raising her preferred fingers in his direction would likely be grounds for termination. “Go Team Grace! Population me. I’m gonna...my office.” She pointed broadly and went back out into the hallway.
What good was perfection doing her now? Getting reamed by her boss for daring to stand up to some self-important doorknob was not...it was not the way things were supposed to go. She’d worked too hard. Had done her best to please everyone and...and...ugh.
Her heart was thundering hard, and she reached into her purse, fumbling for her phone, to check her email. Except then she pulled it out and there were two hundred unread messages and none of them were hers.
She needed a paper bag to breathe into, stat.
No, more than that, she needed her office. And her damn phone.
She opened the door and shut it, then threw ice bitch out the window and did a full-flail scurry to her desk, jiggling her mouse at high speed to wake her computer up before typing her log-in as quickly as possible.
She clicked into her mail client and read the two—only two—emails she’d gotten since she’d last checked, fired off two speedy replies and then breathed a sigh of relief when it was back at zero.
And now, she needed to get her phone back.
She typed in the web address she used with her tracking app and clicked on Grace’s iPhone. The little circle went around for a while before loading a map. And there it was. She zoomed in, and frowned.
It looked like her phone was at the Mandarin Oriental. Which was several shades fancier than she’d given the man in the Stetson credit for.
But whatever, if her phone was there, she was going to be there, too. She had no more appointments, thanks to Doug.
So she was on a mission to retrieve her phone.
Chapter Three
Zack stepped out of the shower and ran a towel over his chest, then down lower, before wrapping it around his hips and walking out into the living area of the hotel room.
He thought it was a little bit stupid that the studio was putting him up in a place like this, considering he was trying to raise money for a charity. But if everything went well, the proceeds would go above and beyond his hotel-room bill.
“The bar tab is another story,” he said out loud.
No. He didn’t drink like that anymore. Rock bottom had been a few years back.
Still, he eyed the minibar with no small amount of interest. Then his thoughts shot back to his shared cab ride.
Grace Song.
Hell, he hadn’t flirted like that in more than a decade. It had been...well, it had been great. She’d been so damn pretty. So uptight. And he’d wanted to uncoil all that glossy black hair and see just how long it was. How it would feel sifting through his fingers.
That