Mia

I’m crying as I stand beside Santiago’s car on the little airstrip where his jet sits, the very existence of the thing making me think he’s been holding out on me about a lot of shit.

I am so freaking sad right now it hurts to breathe and I’m attempting not to cry even though my nose has already started pouring like a faucet at the thought of saying goodbye.

“Do not cry, Mia, this is just one goodbye of many. You will, of course, come back to visit me and those two crotchety old ladies and I make frequent trips to the States for business,” he assures me, smiling when I use my sleeve to swipe at my leaking nose.

I’m dressed for the Spanish weather and hoping that I don’t get home to a freeze, well California’s standards at least, because I haven’t ever really bothered with that sort of stuff.

When I travelled it was always with Lucas and he’d just bark at me to put on something warmer or cooler if I was dressed wrong. Darn it, there I go again.

“It won’t be the same though.”

No more wine and long talks sitting on his porch looking out onto the vast stretches of vines below, no more confiding in him or just enjoying a snuggling session and some hot kisses.

At this moment, I am sorely regretting wanting to go back home and I tell him so, even admitting that I was hoping he’d pop my membrane and break me in because he’s hot and I don’t want my first time to be with a pimp, if things get to dire straits.

He laughs at that, a booming bark of amusement and pulls me into his arms for a long hug that makes me want to cry harder.

“Oh Mia, sweetheart, I will miss you too, and if it ever gets to that point, please promise me that you will call me and let me bring you back here. I would be honored to be your first and even more honored if you let me help you.”

I am not comfortable making that promise but Santiago doesn’t take my silence as an answer and pushes me away slightly to glare at me.

“I want that promise, Mia Carmichael. You will call me if you need me,” he demands.

“I promise.”

I concede because I may need to and besides, now that I am standing here, about to leave a place that has welcomed me for a place that I am unsure of, I feel so afraid.

What if I fail? Before any of this, I strove to succeed because I had two boys to take care of and I knew that I couldn’t quit, but now it’s just me and I don’t know if I have it in me to prostrate myself and beg for a second chance.

“Good. Now come here.”

The kiss he gives me is the hot, tongue tangling kiss that I’ve come to rely on from him and I sink into it, needing the comfort and the reminder that someone wants me before pulling away with a pout.

“Call me, Mia!”

I nod and turn, walking up the steps to the jet before turning and waving with a smile that only slightly trembles. This is it, this is the end of something I thought I wanted, only to learn too late that what I had always wanted was to see these places with Lucas.

I’ve screwed up everything and ruined if not my chances at my job, then a friendship that has kept me going for over half a decade. Sure, I may have a thing for Lucas and it hurt when I finally allowed myself to understand that it would never go anywhere, but what’s likely to savage me is the fact that the friendship is irrevocably ruined.

*******************************************************************

“I think we’ll do remarkably well together Mia. You know I’ve wanted to steal you away from Fabrizio from the day I met you.”

I smile across the desk at Ben Oaks and feel the weight that’s been crippling me lift off my shoulders. I’m still sad, and a lot angrier than anything else too, because it’s come to this.

The day I left Spain and flew back home, I was so hopeful and filled with a sense of giddiness that even though I was nervous, I had immediately ordered the taxi to drive straight from the airport to the office building that had been my home more than the little single story structure I’d called home for six years.

I was nervous, frankly terrified, to see Lucas again and throw myself at his mercy only to have security at reception turn me away with the statement that Mr. Fabrizio had banned me from the building.

It was a humiliation I don’t think I will ever get over. It hurt that I had to be escorted out of there in front of many of my former co-workers, like a criminal, and then what hurt even more was being informed by some ditzy fool that he would not take my calls.

In short, Lucas was letting me know loud and clear, in no uncertain terms that my abandonment had been taken personally and he was done with me.

My use, it seems, is up and seeing as I am no longer of use to him, I have no place in his life.

I cried for two days after that, stuck in my lonely little house, the plain décor and unfamiliar surroundings only adding to my sense of desolation.

Santiago called me the day after and listened to me wail like a baby, gave me the very reasonable advice that I should forget Lucas altogether and that the cretin doesn’t deserve my friendship, never mind my love and then made me promise to come back.

I didn’t, refusing to be bowed and run away with my tail tucked between my legs. I may not have done the right thing but I was ready to apologize and plead a temporary insanity brought on by six years of stress. The least he could have done was allow me to apologize!

Justin and Shaun also called me and dazzled me with their plans to open an adventure lodge in Colorado. The project is highly ambitious, exactly the kind of thing I can see those two misfits doing and precisely what I didn’t need to hear because now I am terrified that they’re going to need my help and I don’t have a job.

So I sat down, sans emotional outbursts, no matter how badly I still needed to cry, and started to think. Hard. I had little options at that stage due to the very real reality that not many people would consider me for a job unless I was slinging hash or scrubbing toilets.

Not that I think I’m too good for those endeavors because I don’t, but those jobs don’t pay well and I now know I will need back up for poor Justin and Shaun.

They will have that lodge even if I have to cave and sell my body, I swear it.

My thinking was logical, concise and productive because after an hour of making lists of all the companies and CEOs, I managed to narrow down two men who I thought may consider me, even for junior secretarial positions.

Thankfully, Ben Oaks almost kissed me the moment I walked through his door without an appointment-I am desperate and I wasn’t gonna allow anyone to blow me off.

According to the dear old guy, he’s been praying for someone like me, if not me in person, to rescue him from the steady stream of ingoing and outgoing secretaries.

In short, I have a job, without an interview and with Ben’s knowledge that I don’t have the qualifications, only the experience.

“Well, I never thought for a second that I would actually leave so I assumed I wouldn’t ever need to consider your offer,” I say, trying to smile.

“Mia, darlin’, you never wanted to leave that man because you adored him but the truth is that I always knew you’d have to one day. No one can go that long with unrequited love and not break,” he says gently, smiling when I blush and start stammering a denial.

“Don’t bother. I may be old but I am not a fool, sweetheart. If that idiot was smart he’d have seen it years ago and nailed you down for safekeeping but since he only thinks with his balls and is blind to the gem he had in you, I’d say good riddance and welcome to the team. I promise to treat you well and never take you for granted. My wife is gonna love this.”

I should banter with him and laugh about his crowing, and I do try but the truth is that as much as I love and appreciate this opportunity, I am also a little saddened because this puts the very last nail in the coffin that holds what is left of my love for Lucas.

It should be a relief. I can move on now, let him go and plan for a life that includes a good job and maybe a man who will actually want me. And I will. Somehow.

After denying vehemently ever feeling anything for Lucas, because I have pride.

“I don’t and never have loved him.”

“Mia.”

“Nope, it’s either an agreement and the understanding that you will never even think it or I’ll go scrub floors down at the bus station,” I insist, narrowing my eyes.

“Fine! Fine, just don’t get your panties in a twist young lady. Now, how would you feel about firing my secretary and maybe getting me a decent cup of coffee?” He smiles, making me smirk.

He doesn’t understand my coffee dilemma yet and thanks to Lucas no one knows to be wary. Boy, I think things may be looking up.

 

 

Lucas

“What do you mean she’s working for Oaks?”

I yell the words at Cameron and ignore his scowl, patently unimpressed with his lack of respect since returning from Spain where I made the decision that I would now be done and wipe my hands of that disloyal floozy.

“Exactly what I said, sir. After your goons removed her from the building and she spent two days locked in her house she walked into the Oaks building and has been there ever since.”

Goddammit, the whole point is to forget her and move on, just like she obviously did and here I am hating the thought of Mia working for another man, a rival Goddammit!

How dare she shame me this way and give her loyalty to a man I don’t do business with unless I can help it.

“I thought she’d go to Harris or Fineman,” I mutter, hating that I planned it that way because it would mean seeing her regularly since those companies are part of my holdings, unbeknownst to many.

“Well, she didn’t. From what Barnes said she only went to Oaks and apparently that old man is smart enough to know when he’s got a good thing.”

I ignore that snarl, and the dig he’s been trying to get in since we returned home, and pace my office, my mind reeling with the thought of this being the absolute end.

If Mia works for Oaks, it’s unlikely that I will see her again. As a rule, I stay away from Oaks because the man is savvy and way too similar for my liking, making any business dealings much too difficult for me. I like my acquisitions and takeovers to be challenging, not impossible, which they are whenever I have gone toe to toe with the old coot.

If she works for him we won’t meet, our paths will never intersect and then how on earth will I ever rub Mia’s face in the fact that I have moved on and forgotten her treacherous ass?

“I don’t like this! He works his staff harder than I do,” I mutter, stalking to the drinks cabinet for a drink that I never have before five in the afternoon.

It’s noon now but I need that whiskey like I need fucking air.

Cameron snorts and I throw him a warning look before falling back to my seat with a huff.

“Sir, if this isn’t what you wanted then why did you have Mia escorted out of here and why did you refuse her calls?”

I don’t answer to anyone, ever and I let him know this with the dark glower I direct his way.

“She should have gone to Fineman, Goddammit. He opened up a position for her.”

“She despises Fineman.”

I know. That’s why I thought it would be safe for her to work with the asshole, knowing that his advances would go unnoticed or result in her knee in his nuts.

Not fucking Oaks who has two sons who used to stare at Mia like two slavering animals scenting a feast of prey.

“Which is why she didn’t consider him,” Cameron points out with a smirk that has my teeth clenching.

“But Oaks! She knows how much I despise that man.” I grate.

No, that isn’t the right phrasing to use, rather that I am in competition with the wily fox and dislike his clever ways of undercutting me or outwitting me at times.

Mia should have taken my feelings into consideration, after everything I had done for her, and steered clear of him. And yet here she is working as his personal assistant, giving him the well-run office that should be mine instead of having to deal with incompetence and tears from the women who are sorely taxing what is left of my patience.

“I rather think that’s one of the reasons she tried her luck going to him, sir,” Cameron murmurs, his lips twitching suspiciously, as if he finds my predicament amusing or in some way satisfying.

“I think she did it to give me the finger. The little minx,” I mutter, my own amusement firing to life.

Cameron laughs outright at that assessment and for the first time in a week he lowers himself to his customary seat across my desk and stretches his legs out with a groan.

“You know Mia, boss, she’s never one to let the dust settle under her feet and once she gets that twinkle in her eye, it’s battle stations or death for anyone who gets in her way. She’s probably even now plotting something to show you up.”

Quite probably, I muse, scrubbing at the stubble on my jaw with a smile. And therein lays a new challenge and something that has my blood firing excitedly.

It’s while I’m wondering what she’ll do that my phone dings, making me boom a laugh and proceed to chuckle so hard I can’t breathe for a second. The saucy, spiteful little upstart! Oh God, I can’t wait to see what’s next I think, re-reading the text message with a choke of humor bubbling up.

Even Cameron can’t help it when I hand the phone over.

Thanks for six years of experience, it works even better than a resume or reference. Hope you’re enjoying the new secretary. By the way you should tell her to put the phone down properly before she tells one of the other secretaries she’s gonna sneak out early.

“God, she’s so cheeky.” Cameron breathes reverently earning himself a curse and a scowl hot enough to singe his skin.

I don’t like how much they all like her and I really do not appreciate the wagers I’ve been told they’re all making. All in favor of Mia winning against me, their boss.

“Indeed she is.”

Dammit.

“What should I do now?”

“Text her back, man. Look, let’s be honest, you may be pissed at her but you’re obviously still wanting to see her sometimes and the easiest way to do that when a woman is convinced she hates you is to be her friend. Or enemy. Keep her angry enough to keep texting or calling you.”

The words make me smile because that is a good plan and certainly better than what I had planned, sabotaging her job. I should feel guilty about even thinking such thoughts and yet I don’t.

But Cameron’s right, I do want to have at least some contact with her, push her into the position that she will come crawling to me for crumbs of friendship, and the only way I can see through to doing that is if I keep her wanting to talk to me.

With Mia, anger is the only way because now that I have finally stopped being furious with her, it’s dawned on me that I had her tossed from my building like a common criminal and pushed so hard that if not for her angry messages or pushing her to want to send those messages, I will lose all contact with her and the last six years will mean nothing.

I should have seized on that and been done with her but for some inexplicable reason, the thought of Mia leaving my life entirely isn’t acceptable and makes me break out in a cold sweat.

I don’t like the feeling and yet I have to accept it before I go nuts and make plans to stop that from ever happening. Of course, it goes without saying that my crazy scheme to wed the traitor is off the table and that I don’t want her back-much-but I also do not think I could live without her acerbic presence in my well-ordered life.

When I manage to restore order, that is.

“Fine.”

Taking my phone in hand, I grin while I type, almost giddy with the thought of what she’ll do when she reads it. I can almost see her face going blistering red, her tiny nose flaring with anger and the words that will likely be muttered from tensed lips…

God, I wish I could be a fly on the wall for that.

Thanks for caring though I don’t really mind since she’s easy on the eyes. No olive green battle axe suits in sight! Hope you enjoy slaving away without benefits for your brothers. Watched the security footage yesterday and I’m glad to see you ate so well on your travels.

“Christ!  Did you just tell a woman she got fat?” Cameron explodes when I hand the phone over for him to read, my mouth twitching before a full blown laugh escapes me.

“Just making it personal.”

“You’d better tell Barry to be alert tonight, she still has a key to your penthouse.”

The warning is said laughingly and I oblige by chuckling along but I swallow too, because he’s completely right and I am man enough to admit that the amusement comes along with a little fear.