26
Trevor is a team player.
No special treatment. That’s what I said I wanted.
So I shouldn’t be mad, really, when Rebekah summons three interns to assist a special team headed by Ben to fashion a plan of action for one of his clients—three interns that do not include me.
Really, it’d be a bad idea to be in there with them, working so close with Benjamin after the night we just had. Right?
I shouldn’t take it personally.
“Can you hand me the stapler?” mumbles Elijah, reaching out his hand.
Distractedly, I hand it to him, my eyes like needles as they stay glued to the glass windows that reveal the three interns and five employees around the round table in that office, Benjamin circling them slowly as he addresses them. Every now and then, he’ll stroll up to his dry erase board to squiggle out an image or jot something down. Even from all the way across the room, I can recognize the very specific way in which his butt wiggles as he writes on that board. It fills me with a mixture of longing and frustration.
I came to Gage Communications with the purpose of gaining traction in my career, impressing someone who could potentially make or break me, and soaking in all the brilliance like a big, soft, collegiate sponge.
I didn’t come here for a boyfriend. Or a lover. Or him.
Yet all of my priorities seem to have shifted overnight. When I come into work, I go through the motions like a choreographed routine I’ve rehearsed fifty-seven times. I give the boss as much attention as I would an out-of-place paperclip on a desk. I do my good work, but expect nothing for it and expect nothing to come from it.
Because all of my thoughts begin and end with Benjamin Gage and when we’ll get to be alone again.
Benjamin Gage, whose soul I dived into last night.
Benjamin Gage, who took me on an adventure that split me wide open and made me face both my fears and my joys.
Benjamin Gage, the man who’s supposed to be my boss. The man who’s totally in a meeting right the heck now with three of your fellow peers—and not you.
Don’t be a jealous little kumquat, Trevor.
“Alright, I’m callin’ it,” says Elijah.
I jolt out of my thoughts, then turn to him. “Calling what?”
“You. On your shit.” Elijah hands the stapler back to me by slapping it onto my palm, earning an “Ow!” from me. “We’re hittin’ the corner store pizzeria after work. You and I are gonna talk.”
I frown. “What’d I do now? Leave the toilet seat up?”
“Or stay out past two in the freakin’ morning?” Elijah squints at me like a scolding father. “Ring any bells?”
I sigh, already over it. “Elijah, you were the one who told me I needed to loosen up. You pushed me to go clubbing with you. You told me to get laid. You said—”
“Tonight,” clips Elijah, cutting me off, then swipes his laptop off the desk and struts away without another word.
No, my day doesn’t get any better after that. Why would it?
It’s almost time to go, and I’m stretched like a tree in the supply closet, reaching for the top shelf (unsuccessfully) when a tall shadow eclipses the light.
“Sorry,” I mumble to whoever it is behind me. “Just trying to get the damned box of envelopes back here. One more second.”
“Trevor.”
The voice catches me off-guard. I stop stretching and turn. The tall cold glass of water named Brady stands there, his bright blond hair sitting perfectly styled on his stiff, half-tilted head. He stares me down with two annoyingly sexy, frigid eyes.
“Brady,” I clip back for a greeting. “You need something? And if not, can you help me get these envelopes? I really don’t want to pull out a stepladder. That’s just humiliating.”
“Humiliating.” Brady snorts. “Now that’s an interesting word.”
I face him, confused. I have no idea where all this hetero sass is coming from. “What do you mean?”
He takes a step forward. Considering how small this closet is and how close he already was, he’s more than invading my bubble, which I might have one day welcomed in an entirely different context, but not right now.
“Let’s talk about humiliation,” he says, eyes narrowing.
That’s an odd way to lead an attack. I feel like he’s about to pull down my pants and give me an atomic wedgie on this supply rack. Instantly, I’m in high school again being cornered by a bully.
A sexy bully who’s staring me down right now. “Humiliation,” he repeats, “like the fact that, if boss man wasn’t so distracted by your dumb act, and if our supervisor wasn’t so easy to charm, then I wouldn’t feel like the ignored cat scratching at their back door.”
Uh, what? “I’m … not following.”
“I’m not the kind of guy who gets ignored,” Brady states, his voice steely and his eyes like two pools of molten silver. “When I’m in the office, the supers look my way. Right now, the only thing either of them seem to be seeing is you.”
My mouth just hangs open, unsure what to say to that. There are about a hundred thoughts racing around my head right now, like if Benjamin himself said something, or if there’s a rumor or two making the rounds, or if my own behavior has given anything away. All of these thoughts render me paralyzed.
Brady fills the silence with his own sexy threats. “I don’t know your game, Trevor, but I want you to know I see it. And I will not tolerate it. I don’t give two shits about any of these other guys, least of all you. But once I see through your scheme, I’m going to blow it up, and I’m going to get the recognition I deserve.”
“I’m not d-doing anything,” I state suddenly, gathering my courage at last. Despite my stuttering voice, I push the words out and straighten my spine in the face of heterosexual gorgeousness. “I don’t have any game. I just clock in, do what I’m asked, and clock out. I don’t know about the first d-damned thing your sexy ass is saying to me.”
I blink, stunned. Sexy ass? Seriously?
“You’re a schemer,” Brady states, either ignoring me or not having heard my words at all. He shakes his head disapprovingly. “I knew it the second I met you in the copy room that first day and you played dumb, acting like you didn’t know how to change the toner. Everyone knows how to change the toner.”
“I … I didn’t know,” I start, trying to defend myself to this guy with demigod eyes and a face cut from stone. Seriously, it’s not easy. It’s like trying to argue with Michelangelo’s statue of David.
“And maybe Rebekah and Mr. Gage are buying your innocent-eyed play-dumb thing, but I don’t buy it for a second. And unlike them, I can’t be flirted with. I see right through you.”
“Oh, can’t be flirted with, huh?” I counter. “So that makes it totally alright for you to … to play your sexy little game and flash your pretty eyes and cock-tease the boss with your tight gym body and … and … and your perfectly styled hair?”
I’m not very good right now at insulting him, apparently.
Brady ignores my tirade. His hard, unbending eyes bore down onto me as he whispers, “No matter what you do, just remember this: in the end, I’m the one who wins this game. Not you.”
His eyes are so bright and fierce, each time he blinks, it’s like two shutters eclipsing the glorious sun.
“Well, I hope you like playing with yourself,” I state, lifting my chin smugly, “because … because you’re the only one playing any game, apparently. I don’t play dumb, I don’t charm supers, and I definitely don’t flirt my way to the top.”
Nor do I hook up with my boss at a club.
Or go back to his place and nearly have sex. Twice. Sorta.
And let’s not forget our adorable bathroom tête-à-tête.
“Now if you’ll excuse me, Brady,” I continue on, addressing the tall slender block of perfection that is my rival, “I was in the middle of getting some envelopes.”
With that, I turn my back on the office bully and resume my little stretching exercise, humiliating myself as I grunt and reach for the top shelf. I pretend he totally isn’t glaring at me with those smoldering, sexy eyes. Shut up, Trevor’s dick.
After a beat, Brady steps beside me and, with ease, grabs the box of envelopes off the top shelf, then tosses them at my chest. I catch them, then watch as Brady saunters off without so much as a glance back my way. I stare after him awhile, feeling more and more unsettled by the second as his words sink in.
All humor aside, I realize the severity of his threats. It isn’t something I should take as lightly as this box of envelopes in my sweaty grip. Brady is certain that something’s going on with me, something strange, something of a game. That leads me to wonder if the other interns suspect anything, too.
And what about Elijah? Is that why we’re hitting the pizzeria later after work? He chats with all of the others. Surely he gets all the juice from the grapevine.
What if I’m the latest grape?