When my phone rang again, I looked up, startled to see that I'd actually spent the last half an hour being productive. Unreasonably proud of myself, I grabbed the receiver. "Celia Gilbert!" I chirped.

"That's not your name, now is it love?" came the slow, Scottish-accented reply.

Immediately, I ducked down behind the walls of my cubicle. "Ewan!” I hissed into the phone, looking wildly around me. "What are you doing calling me?"

He chuckled. "You gave me your card, lass," he reminded me.

"Oh."

"So," he said. "I was just wondering if you were going to be there in Queens tonight?"

I took a deep breath. "Ah, yeah!" I said, my voice unnaturally bright and false. My throat was dry all of a suddenly and I unscrewed the top of my water bottle, ready to walk over to the fountain to refill it, but I couldn't seem to stop talking. "August called me first thing this morning. It's on my calendar." My heart was pounding and I looked wildly around again, certain that someone was behind me, eavesdropping. I was praying he wouldn't say anything inappropriate while at the same time I longed to listen to him say every inappropriate thing he could think of in that lilting accent of his.

"Well then," he sighed. "Guess I won't be skipping it then."

I sat up a little straighter. "Why would you skip it?"

He exhaled, a long slow breath that went on forever. "Just seems like everything's coming together too well," he finally said. "I don't like neat packages. They're usually hiding a pretty shitty gift."

My heart did a strange little sideways flop at that. "Well," I laughed. "That's a pretty bleak outlook if you ask me."

"I'm from the British Isles, lass. Bleak is what we do best."

"Strange," I mused, tapping my pen against my scratch pad, my father's words echoing in my head. Lead him to the answer and let him think he came up with it himself. "Because I'd think this would be a pretty exciting time for you. You're getting your music out there. The world needs to hear you, Ewan." Appealing to his ego. That was a masterstroke and I knew it. What musician could resist being told he was a genius?

Ewan chuckled and fell silent. I waited for him to speak up and agree with me, that he needed to be heard. "Don't you think?" I prompted.

"I'd be pretty thrilled to just sit in a room and play for you," he said softly.

My heart thudded, slamming into my ribs. "For me?" I squeaked.

"You know what I'm picturing?" he asked.

"No."

He laughed again. "Oh come on. You have to have a bit of imagination in that brainy little head of yours. I can picture it right now. Me on the couch..."

"What couch?"

"Any couch, really."

"What color is it?"

I could hear his amusement crackling like electricity through the phone line. "It's a green couch, Celia, you like that?"

"Helps me to picture," I deadpanned. "I don't have much of an imagination."

"Very well, I'm on that green couch, playing my guitar and you're sitting across from me...wearing those sexy little glasses."

My throat was suddenly bone dry. Gagging, I flailed out for my water bottle and promptly knocked it over. "Fuck!" I shouted into the line.

"CeCe?" Ewan barked. "You okay?"

"Oh dammit," I moaned, looking around for paper towels, tissues, anything to mop up the puddle of water that now soaked my desk. How on earth could the few mouthfuls left at the bottom of the bottle be such a deluge when overturned? "My water spilled. I think I just ruined my laptop."

"Quick," he said, suddenly all business. "Power it off and then turn it on its side, like an open book, yeah? Set it on the side you spilled on."

"What, why?"

"So you don't fry your processor, love."

"Are you a computer guy as well as a guitar guy?" I wondered.

"Nah, I've just destroyed more than my fair share of laptops in my day." He chuckled. "Usually it isn't water that I'm trying to mop up."

A small laugh squeaked out of the side of my mouth. "Does your laptop smell like Scotch then?"

"I never spill my Scotch," he retorted.

I laughed again. Normally when I did something clumsy like this I would spend the rest of the day dying of secret shame, certain than everyone was secretly judging what a catastrophe I was. But being on the phone with Ewan made it seem like...no big deal, really. Just something silly to laugh about. "There," I said, setting my laptop on its side. "My laptop is propped up. Now what?"

"Now you let it dry."

"How long will that take?"

"No idea."

"But I have to work!"

"You're talking to one of your artists right now. You're working."

I felt my cheeks heating up. "I haven't signed you yet," I reminded him.

"Right. You have conditions."

"Right," I exhaled in a barely audible whisper. I felt like my whole body was in flames. Talking to him was a rollercoaster, whipping me back and forth between easy laughter and inner fireworks just by the change of tone in his voice. "Conditions."

"Right now I'm not too concerned about meeting your conditions, love." His voice had gone a pitch lower, a cocky note entering his smooth baritone. "Right now I'm more concerned about blowing your mind."

I swallowed, the fireworks in my body bursting in their final salvo, a Fourth of July, 1812 Overture crescendo. "Blowing my mind?" I squeaked. It was disturbing just how real the picture was in my brain. Ewan Boyd kneeling over me, his dark hair hanging in his face as he grinned that wicked grin, deep dimple blazing as he inched downward, nudging my legs open with his knee. "How...?"

I could hear the grin in his voice and it made my toes curl even as his words made me blush right up to the roots of my hair. "In the studio, love. After you sign us."

"Oh, I uh..."

His chuckle faded into a growl. "Why, what were you thinking about just now? Tell me exactly, please."

"I have to hang up now."

"Then hang up."

My grip on the receiver tightened instead of loosening. Why did I have no willpower at all when it came to him? "I'm going to."

"Mmhmmm. I don't think you want to. I think you want to tell me what you were imagining when I said I wanted to blow your mind. How was it, love? Was I good?"

"I have to hang up," I repeated robotically.

His voice dropped. "Because however good you've imagined it, I promise you it'll be even better." And with that he hung up the phone.