CHAPTER 11
Emma
“Time to celebrate,” Elizabeth said as we took the elevator back to the ground floor. I hated the way Ms. Johnson had treated me, like I was beneath her. She did have a lot of money, and she was a part of an elite family, but it didn’t mean she had the right to make people feel that way.
“Well, don´t look too excited,” my sister groaned as she stared at our reflection in the mirror in the back of the elevator. I hated mirrors in elevators sometimes; this one made me feel small and reminded me to be self-conscious about my outfit. A plain cotton dress in comparison to the high-powered suit of Ms. Johnson? I glanced over at my sister. She was wearing a red suit with a matching skirt that didn’t look too different from Ms. Johnson’s. I looked back down at my outfit and suddenly I felt cheap. “Did you see the way she looked at me?”
“Yes, and I saw the way you looked at him. He is her brother and she is protective of him, so remember what your role in this household will be,” she scolded me. She seemed to be forgetting that I had only ever been with one man. It wasn’t like I was going to sneak into Mason Johnson’s bed in the middle of the night. Then again, if he showed up in my bed . . . hell, I was only human, so of course I wouldn’t say no.
I grabbed her arm, trying to bring her attention away from her own reflection. When had my sister become so vain? In fact, now that I thought about it, she was different around the Johnsons. She seemed like someone I didn’t know.
“How the hell have you never told me that you’re working for the most gorgeous, no beautiful, no sexy man alive?”
“Stop. I just don’t see him that way. He’s my boss.”
I had never realized my sister was blind, or was he just not her type? Maybe she actually liked women, and that was why she was blind to Mason Johnson’s charms. I realized she’d never introduced us to a boyfriend. And she never talked about men, either. She mostly just talked about hanging out with the girls or all the work she had to do.
“The only reason you wouldn’t notice that Mason is too hot for words is if you’re rooting for the other side.” I poked and teased her as the elevator continued its slowed decent.
As we walked through the hallway, the doorman gave us a sly look. We continue to walk outside when she exclaimed, “I’m not gay. He’s my boss, and I know how to separate business and pleasure.”
Well, maybe she wasn’t gay, but any woman who couldn’t see how sexy Mason Johnson was had to be dead in all departments. Could Elizabeth have a secret boyfriend? Perhaps that was why she was so worried about her appearance. Maybe she had plans to meet someone.
My hunch was correct. As soon as we hailed a taxi to the train station, she told me that she had somewhere to be and kissed me and congratulated me again on getting the job. In reality, I wasn’t sure what I had done to get the job, as Elizabeth had been the one to set up everything. The only thing I did was look too long at Mason, while Ms. Johnson quickly noticed. She and Elizabeth had both insinuated that I needed to keep my lustful eyes to myself, and to not act on anything with him. The thing was, though, he had looked at me that way, too—I knew it, and I was kind of insulted that no one else seemed to have picked up on it.
“This is my stop,” I said as I passed the taxi driver his money, got out, and started digging in my bag for my cell. I was so sure I had put it back in my bag when…
“You left this on the table,” someone said from behind me. My knees almost buckled at his voice. I would have recognized that voice anywhere, and the light tap he gave my shoulder spread warmth throughout my body.
I looked up, scared to find myself lost in Mason Johnson’s eyes once again. I could feel the heat in my cheeks, my heart beating at twice its normal speed as I gazed into his eyes. He looked deep into my eyes and smiled.
“Your phone.”
Oh, I had left my damn phone at the Johnson house. But how had he found me here? I tentatively grabbed it from his strong hands. Our fingers touched slightly and I could feel my cheeks heat up.
“How did you know I would be here?” I managed to stammer out.
“I told your sister about your phone, and she told me you’d caught a cab to the train station.” He laughed as he handed it to me, maybe because I couldn’t verbalize the words to thank him. What was it about this man that transformed me into a stumbling, silent fool? He was everything any woman would desire, that was all. Stop it, Emma!
We gazed into each other’s eyes until a passerby bumped into me and I dropped my phone. I tried to recover what was left of it, cursing under my breath all the while, as he helped me. I rushed under people’s legs and finally recovered the remains of my cell. I stood up to see that not only had he stopped helping me, but he had been closely watching my performance of being on all fours in the middle of a busy street.
My whole body flushed.
“I’m sorry,” he said with a smile. “The view was too good to resist. I think the least I can do is take you home.”
I sighed and tried to catch my breath. “But I live in the suburbs.”
He held out his hand, and that was when I noticed the limo parked on the curb, waiting for his return. Holy smokes, I’d be traveling in style. This was too good to be true, and it made me forget all about my phone.
I hesitated, though, thinking about the words of warning I’d received today. I shrugged. “Maybe this isn´t a good idea. I mean, I just got the job as your son’s tutor. I’m so grateful you brought my phone to me, but I can´t understand why. You´re… well you could have sent someone else with it. Like your driver, who’s standing there waiting for you to get back into the car. And then I dropped the phone before I could even thank you…”
“Shhh, do you always talk this much? There is no reason to overthink it. I’m just going to give you a lift home, so why don’t you take a deep breath and jump in the car?” He nodded gently, as if trying to spoon feed a toddler for the first time.
I started to relax for the first time all day. His voice somehow calmed me, even though his mere presence completely captivated me. For a split second, I felt human again, but then I got into the car, and the speechless, childlike fool took over again. This was amazing; with a car like this, why would anyone want to get out? I ran my hand over the buttery leather seats, which felt unbelievably smooth to the touch. I looked up at the lights in the roof, which seemed to adapt to the lighting outside. They probably had a remote sensor switch. I was taken aback by the fact I was in a car and not a hotel room.
It dawned on me that this sort of luxury would become the norm for me from now on. I needed to prepare myself and not look on with wide eyes every time I saw something like this limo. “Would you like a drink?” Mason asked.
I squinted as I realized there was a minibar in the car. How cool was that? Sure, I knew they existed in limos, but until you climbed into one and were offered a drink, it was impossible to understand the implications. I mean, a fully-stocked fridge in a car?
“Should I take it as a no?”
Learn to speak, you can do it. He’s just a shifter. And a wealthy one. Speak woman, speak.
“Yes, please. I’ll have a Coke,” I said. I was thrilled I managed to say something. I’d even been polite and courteous. I just hadn’t looked at him when I said it. That had to be the trick. Maybe we could have a whole conversation if I just learned to avoid those emerald eyes.
“Zero, light, caffeine free?”
“Sorry?” Damn, I looked at him, and now I was the stumbling fool once again. I watched him take out a glass and fill it with soda. He handed me the tumbler and, as I started to drink, I realized we were moving. This whole time, I had thought we were at a standstill. He must have given the driver my address before I even got in the car.
“Look,” he blurted out. I turned to face him, confused about the line of conversation and why we had gone from soft and gentle to demanding. “I’m your boss, yes, but I can´t take it if you´re going to behave this way with me. What I am trying to say is—if you’re going to live in my house, you need to be able to act naturally around me, like you did earlier,” he smirked.
“About earlier…” I started but he cut me off.
“Let’s just pretend that earlier didn’t happen ok? You are my employee now, and most importantly you are the tutor to my son, and he is what is most important to me.”
I stared at the floor, processing his statement, and realized he was right. Completely right. He was undeniably a fine-looking specimen of a man, but I would have to get past that. He was now my boss. I was just having a hard time dealing with the change in my circumstances, as evident by my complete lack of judgement earlier. I was a teacher at heart, and I would be the sole person providing his son an education. It was an important job, and I couldn’t let myself forget that. I needed to stop allowing myself to believe these people were better than me.
“Let´s start again.” He took the glass from me and put it into one of the cup holders. He reached out a hand and said, “My name is Mason Johnson. Nice to meet you.”
I laughed and said, “My name is Emma Jackson, and the pleasure is all mine.” As our hands touched, an electric shock coursed through my body. I shot my eyes up to his, and I could immediately tell that he felt it too. He opened his mouth to say something, and suddenly his cell started to ring. His hand quickly dropped my mine, and in an instant, our strong connection was broken.
He picked up his cell quickly and answered in a very business-like tone that I was not used to. I leaned back into my leather seat and listened as he conducted his business call, wondering what he was like in the boardroom, whether he dealt with employees and other business contacts in that same authoritative manner.
Yes, he seemed like a person who could and would switch into business-mode at any moment. One thing was for sure: I knew from the conversations I had with Elizabeth that he was—and would always be—a workaholic.
I knew from the news stories that he had taken over the family business. When the family drama hit the news, he made it clear that he was the new leader of the business and that he would not let anyone make a disaster out of it. And truly, no one could. He’d grown the business, to ten times its former size. The problem was that it was unwieldy for one person to manage such a large empire—he needed to be everywhere all the time.
“So, where were we?” he asked after he got off the phone. I was busy looking at the view as his voice pulled me from my thoughts.
“You were about to tell me about Liam.” I smiled as I reached for my Coke and started to drink it in small sips.
His slow smile spread across his lips. “No, I wasn´t. But I would love to tell you more about him. What would you like to know?”
Is he as good-looking as you? Why is he so reserved, what happened to make him behave that way? Oh, but the main question I wanted to ask was, why is your sister such a bitch?
Instead, I asked, “What does he like?”
“I don´t know.”
Did he say he didn’t know? No, I just imagined it. I looked back into his deep emerald eyes and saw a hint of sadness there. I could tell that he truly loved his son, however, if I were to guess, his work and family responsibilities came first. I was about to open my mouth to ask him what he meant when he pulled out his phone to make a call. Moments later, his laptop appeared, as if by magic, and he started speaking in another language with whomever had answered the phone.
Was it Japanese? Mandarin?
Seeing as I spoke neither of them, I decided I’d ask when he got off the phone. The problem was that he never did—even when we arrived at my front door an hour later. He seemed to retreat further into his shell every time I glanced at him. He would ignore my gaze and carry on with his meeting or work in general.
Without meaning to, I had touched a nerve. I wondered why I had.
As the door opened for me to get out, I tried to get his attention. He signaled for me to get out and waved.
I needed to learn to keep my big mouth shut.