Mae

Pull it together. Pull it together. Pull it together. I splashed the cold water on my face for the fourth time, grateful that I had opted out of make-up today. Crap, he saw me without make-up. Which shouldn’t be a concern considering the bun in my oven.

What was he doing here? I raked my brain for any recollection of gossip about a visiting CEO and came up blank. I’d only been here a couple of weeks, but from what I could tell, if a fancy, schmancy CEO was stopping by our department, we were usually given the heads up. According to my department head, Francine, it was so we stopped slacking. No one slacked in our department as far as I could tell. I got the impression it was so we dressed the part because casual Friday tended to seep into all of the days of the week. We were the behind the scenes people, so jeans and leggings usually were fine.

Grabbing a paper towel, I patted my face dry before glancing at the time. Great. I was five minutes late for the department meeting with my new boss, Montgomery Dahl. That was the last thing I needed. It was bad enough they were going to figure out before long that I had a six-week maternity leave with my name on it. That was going to go over well. I shook my head, needing to clear that thought and reminding myself that it would all work out. It had to. I was no longer in this alone. I had a little one on the way who was going to rely on me for everything.

Throwing the paper in the trash, I took a deep breath and schooled my face. I couldn’t let him frazzle me. I would attend my meeting and then find him. He needed to know about the baby. This was not the reconnection I wanted when I first looked for him. That had been more about the guilt I had for leaving and the completely irrational sense of missing him that overwhelmed me from time to time. Must be the pregnancy hormones. That’s a thing. Right?

First things first, I needed to get to my meeting. If I were lucky, they might be dawdling and drinking coffee instead of making a start. A handful of steps and a turn around the corner stole that last bit of hope from me. The door was shut. Stopping briefly at the door, I decided going in was better than knocking first and twisted the handle before inching it over.

The voice that filled the air as the seal of the door broke shook me to my core. It was Matt. My Matt. The father of my baby, our baby. What was he doing here? His voice stopped as the door fully opened. My cubicle mates and Francine were now staring at me as Matt continued to speak, breaking long enough to tell me to take a seat.

He was saying something about new technologies and that was all I got from his talk. My brain was buzzing a mile a minute, my eyes glued to his mouth, wanting him to be speaking to me, only me, kissing me, heck, a little nibble would be nice too. After what seemed like a couple of minutes, but the clock indicated was actually an hour, the people around me started to stand and I slammed into reality.

Suck. I missed the entire thing. Why was Matt here and why was he the only one speaking?

“Do not think your tardiness went unnoticed, Ms. Gomez,” Francine announced a little louder than necessary.

“I apologize. I was in the restroom.” Great. Now everyone still in the room thought I was having gastrointestinal issues. Not that I cared what they thought, except for Matt. The last thing I wanted him thinking about was me on the toilet.

“Make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Who was I? I didn’t “yes ma’am, no sir” people. It wasn’t even regional here, so I couldn’t use that as an excuse. I needed to get out of here before I made an even bigger fool of myself, if that were possible.

I started to rise when a hand on my shoulder stilled my movement.

“Ms. Gomez. If you don’t mind, I would like to start with you, since you are still here. Is that fine with you, Francine?” First what? Crap. He probably spoke ad nauseum on the topic while I was zoned out. I needed to get a grip and fast.

“Absolutely, Mr. Dahl. If I were to pick one of our best new recruits, she’d make the short list, her out-of-character tardiness notwithstanding.” She made her way out the door, closing it behind her. We were alone. This is what I had been wanting for so long, but now that I was here and there was a baby. The conversations I ran through my head no longer fit. So much for mapping out things.

“Matt, what are you really doing here?” So much for looking professional. Now that I was starting to adjust to the notion that I found him, I needed to know all the answers. I didn’t even know all the questions yet, but the answers were like the air that I breathed, a necessity for life.

“Did you listen to my speech at all?” He sat across from me, shaking his head slightly. Was he amused by my pathetic listening skills or was that pride that he stole my brain? At least it wasn’t anger. I couldn’t take anger. Not now. Not when we had who knew how long together before he needed to leave and go who knew where.

“I tried,” I confessed.

“So that’s a no?” Oh yeah, he was amused. There were worse things.

“That’s an I was in shock to see you.” Shocked, excited, terrified, amazed, grateful. The words to describe my feelings were as varied as they were plentiful.

“Did you think you could work here and not run into me?”

“I thought… you owned your own business… I didn’t know your worked at Dahl Tech.” Had he lied to me? It was a one night stand, so deceit was probably the norm. But I thought we had a real connection, and the thought he might’ve been deceptive to get into my pants had an uneasy feeling settling into my gut.

“I think we need to start at the beginning.” He stood, walked around the table and offered me his hand in a formal manner. “I’m Montgomery Dahl, and you are?”

“Gertrude Mae Gomez,” I squeaked out as he took my hand, squeezing it instead of pumping it in a handshake.

“And you go by Mae because…?” His thumb swiped across the back of my hand sending messages to the rest of my body. Crap on a cracker. He was my boss. He was my freaking boss. Sure, he had offered me a job that night, but hormones were flailing and he was mostly joking, or so I thought, or at least rationalized at the time. But now, now I was working for him. And from the looks of it, he was as out of the loop about it as I was.

“Gertrude. My name is Gertrude and you have to ask?” I teased, glad he still held my hand as he sat beside me. “Is Matt your middle name too?”

“No. Gracie gave me the nickname.”

“You look like a Matt,” I offered. He was hot enough to pull off a Montgomery, but changing it would’ve been my first choice too, especially as a child. Heck, I still hated Gertrude, and in theory it was a name you grew into. I still call lie on that one.

“And you look remarkably like the woman who ran out on me without a word.” And there was the hint of anger I’d been expecting. Well-deserved anger at that.