My phone had been silent all day. No messages. Nothing.
Unready to process the events of last night with anyone, not even Jane, I had thrown myself into doing whatever I could to put the haze of last night firmly out of my head. The first thing I did when I woke up was to join a gym, and I spent the rest of the morning in the pool, swimming away my hangover and my shame. When my furniture was delivered that afternoon, I unpacked my clothes, color-coded my closet, and set up my belongings. I covered the piano with a throw blanket until I could decide what to do with it, but everything else (my new bed, a desk I had found at a different consignment shop, and the matching bureau and nightstand I'd found on craigslist) eventually found their homes against my new blue walls.
Still, it took me several hours and several recruitments of my irritable, hungover roommate to move around the furniture until I was halfway satisfied with its placement. Nothing seemed right; everything seemed out of place no matter where I put it.
By the end of the day, while my insides still felt like they had the strength of a blade of grass in a windstorm, I felt like I had done everything I could to stabilize everything I could. I was due in my new offices tomorrow morning to sign my new hire paperwork. I couldn't afford to be a basket case on the job.
Just before going to sleep, I steamed one of my new outfits from Bubbe and hung it on the closet door before taking one of Eric's a sleeping pill. I couldn't afford to stay awake with my thoughts, staring up at a ceiling that would undoubtedly reflect a certain thousand-watt smile and pair of dimples. I had a big day in the morning at my new job, and I wasn't going to fuck that up.
~
"Great suit."
Kieran looked the same as always, dressed in a minimalist black suit and shiny black loafers. Her dark shoulder-length hair was pulled back into a severe ponytail, and her face was unadorned except for a slash of red lipstick. Her eyes, sharp and unflinching, flashed as I stood up from my seat outside the HR offices.
I looked down. Out of all of the pieces that Bubbe had insisted on, this one was my favorite: a dusky, light-olive silk from Calvin Klein that was perfect for spring. The color made my green eyes glow, and it fit me like a glove. The jacket was collarless and set off against a crisp white blouse, while the matching pants tapered at the ankles above a pair of whiskey-colored pumps. I'd pulled my hair into a no-nonsense bun and foregone contacts in favor of my tortoise-shell glasses. I looked professional and chic. It was oddly satisfying.
"Thanks," I said with a confident smile, although I was incredibly nervous.
I had just finished signing the paperwork needed to start officially working at Kiefer Knightly, but this was the first time I was facing Kieran. Having served as my mentor at a family law clinic last semester and being instrumental in getting me this position in the first place, she was someone whose opinion mattered to me very much. Did she know what had happened with Brandon and me? Two months ago? Two weeks ago? Or even two nights ago?
As Kieran led me back through the firm, again I mentally thanked Bubbe for the wardrobe updates. This was a law firm, so no one was too flashy or avant-garde, but the attorneys at Kiefer Knightly clearly made some money and dressed like it too.
Kiefer Knightly took up two floors of a large office building near Copley Square, just a stone's throw away from the bustling downtown area of Boston's business district and three blocks from Brandon's firm, Sterling Grove. It was a full-service firm that did a lot of business in family law, my intended specialty and something that Sterling Grove barely touched, which was likely why Brandon wasn't using in-house attorneys to handle his divorce. That, and I suspected that Kieran was the only person he trusted with the intimate details of his marriage.
Kieran steered us past the main reception area down a hallway lined with offices on one side and a long conference room on the other. All of the walls were glass, although I noticed that some of them looked like they were covered in a thick layer of fog.
"All of the walls in the office are equipped with privacy glass," Kieran said, tapping a fingernail against one of the frosted walls we passed. "But FYI, the partners prefer associates to keep their offices transparent when they are not with clients. Makes it easier for Big Brother to watch, right?"
Kieran wasn't one to wink, but she gave me a wry smile to let me know she thought the practice was ridiculous. I followed her down to the end of the hall, where she turned right into a small office on the interior side. She held out a hand.
"Your office. Hey, at least you get windows, right?"
I smirked at the joke. Like every other office, all the walls were windows, but every one of them looked out to another office. It was basically just a glass cube.
I shrugged and set my briefcase down on the empty desk. "I can't complain. It's a job. Really, Kieran, thank you so much for helping me here and for showing me around. I know it wasn't easy."
"It'll be worth it," she said. "The button for the windows is on the far side of the desk. Even though we'd like you to focus on passing the bar before you really start work, we had the paralegals make you and the other new associates copies of the files for a case that's going to trial soon. There will be an associates meeting about it today, so you should stick around for that. It's in the main conference room at eleven. In the meantime, Chris in HR will be here in a few to get you registered for your bar exam class."
I nodded and sat down behind the desk, eager to get started. Kieran looked at me for a moment, then nodded back.
"Right then," she said. "Well, welcome."
Without a word, she disappeared down the corridor of glass, a feat I would have though impossible considering most of the walls were transparent. But that was Kieran, I supposed. No muss, no fuss.
I turned to my computer and started to click through the log in instructions. It was nice to have something to do, things to do that would distract me. It was nice to feel productive.
"Excuse me, Ann-Marie told me that Kieran was––oh!"
A familiar deep voice froze my hands over the keyboard. No. This wasn't happening. Not on my first day and not in a building with transparent walls through which everyone could see my equally transparent features. Fuck. How had Kieran said to frost the walls?
"Skylar?"
Goddamn it. The real problem was that someone like him was bound to attract attention, if he hadn't already. And I couldn't look down at the plastic keys forever.
"Skylar?" he said again.
This time he left the "r" off the end of my name, and that familiar tell just about killed me.
I looked up to find Brandon leaning confidently in the slim doorframe, dressed in a beautifully fitted gray suit and pale pink shirt. It was a far sight from the wrinkled T-shirt and baseball cap he'd worn on Saturday, with his blond curls styled elegantly and face cleanly shaved. He looked like a model, not a brilliant business and legal mind. Basically, he had no business being seen by any woman who hadn't been lobotomized. Me, in particular.
Behind him, I caught more than one female associate glancing over their desks with hooded, yet covetous looks, most of them aimed somewhat lower than his back.
I sighed and forced myself to stare at my empty email inbox. "What are you doing here?"
He frowned and pushed off the doorframe to enter the room. "I was looking for Kieran. What are you doing here?"
I looked around at my desk, feigning confusion. "I work here."
Brandon blinked. "What?"
I tapped my fingernails on the Cherrywood desktop, focusing on my breathing. I really didn't want to blush in front of my colleagues, although I could already feel it coming. Come on, Crosby, think of things that don't get you excited. Dad's old bathrobe. Tort law. Yanni.
I looked up again to find Brandon glaring at me, and all my efforts were completely wasted.
"What?" I affected innocence. "Yes. I told you I had to take a job in Boston. I can't pay you back otherwise, nor can I pay for my dad's continued treatment."
"You can't pay me back..."
The words trailed off under his breath as Brandon shook his head. Brandon wasn't given to blushes like I was, but I knew his other tells, one of which was the hand currently tugging at his nicely combed hair. Well, what used to be nicely combed.
He exhaled, long and deep, then looked back at me with eyes like fire. Electric blue fire. Without saying anything else, he marched into the small room while the door swung closed behind him. He continued around my desk and leaned over me, forcing me to sit far back in my chair while I gripped the arms of the desk chair.
"What are you doing?" I hissed, trying to keep my face still despite the fact that it was now likely a brighter pink than his shirt.
I tried not to observe how amazing he smelled that close, but failed miserably. A few of the associates were watching through the glass walls with open curiosity. I was mortified and turned on all at once.
Brandon still said nothing, just reached around me and pressed the button Kieran had pointed out on the side of my desk. He clearly knew his way around these offices. Immediately all of the walls and the door turned icy white, and more importantly, opaque.
He stood up, leaving me still gripping my chair arms for dear life and breathing much harder than I wanted to be.
"We're really supposed to leave the walls clear unless we're with clients," I whispered, to which I received another withering scowl.
"I am a client," Brandon said as he pulled off his jacket and practically hurled it, along with his briefcase, on one of the chairs in front of my desk.
His chest heaved. I watched warily as he loosened his tie and unbuttoned the top button of his collar. What did he think he was doing?
"You're a client," I repeated, half-mesmerized by his actions as he stalked toward me again. "What, are you getting another divorce today?"
Another glare. This time I didn't look away.
"Well, you're not my client," I continued, more boldly than I really felt.
"No," Brandon growled, "I'm not."
Before I could say anything else, I was bodily yanked out of my seat and into a kiss so searing that I felt it in my toenails. My body reacted instinctively, hands grabbing at his mussed waves while his tongue twisted unforgivingly around mine. We both grunted and wrenched at each other, echoing the same urgency from the back of his car, except it was nine in the morning and sober. I felt everything that much more acutely.
Finally, during a quick breath, I remembered exactly where I was and pushed him away.
"Fuck!" Brandon yelped, hopping around like he had been burned.
"Shh!" I pointed to the blocked windows. "They can hear you!"
I hastily fixed the back of my blouse, which had become untucked under my jacket. My hair had completely fallen out of its pins, and my glasses were now somewhere on the floor.
"These walls are soundproofed," Brandon said darkly as he handed me the thick frames. "Kiefer Knightly takes confidentiality very seriously, maybe even more than Sterling Grove. So I can say or do pretty much whatever the FUCK I want, as loud as I want."
I shoved my glasses back into place and scowled at him. He scowled back. We seethed like spitting cats for at least a minute before I broke first and looked away, suddenly preoccupied with re-twisting my hair into its bun.
"You should leave it down."
"You should just leave," I snapped. "This is completely inappropriate. I really have to–"
"Where did you go the other night?" Brandon interrupted sharply while he re-buttoned his collar. "I looked up, and you were booking it out of there. You literally left me with my pants down."
"I had things to do," I said lamely.
I sat back down in my chair and scooted so my navel was pressed tight against the desk. I braced my feet against the wood. I had no intention of being manhandled again for another impromptu kiss––if you could even call that mauling a kiss. Whatever, Crosby, you liked it.
"Things to do?" Brandon squatted in front of my desk so we were eye to eye. "So that's how it's going to be? Just give me a BJ on your roof and run away? No excuses, no apologies? Nothing?"
I didn't say anything, just watched the moving screensaver on my computer screen as I bit back tears. This wasn't fair. It really wasn't.
"When were you going to tell me you worked here, Skylar?" Brandon asked, this time a bit more softly. But only a bit.
"I don't know," I said sullenly, still unable to look at him. "Maybe I wasn't."
"Did you think I wasn't going to find out?"
"I don't know."
Brandon blew a long, thin stream of air through his teeth. "You're acting like a child."
Finally, I looked up. "Says the man who just barged into my office and grabbed me."
He stood up then and came back around my desk.
"Oh, no you don't," I said, scooting my chair away, which did effectively nothing as Brandon rolled me back out to face him.
He pulled me out of the chair again.
"Hey! I didn't want to get up!"
"I need you to talk to me like an adult!"
"No!" I pushed him away. "Stop grabbing at me! Jesus, didn't anyone ever teach you about consent?"
“Stop it!” Brandon growled, holding both of my wrists in vise-grips and pinning them to my sides. “Will you just fucking stop?! Calm down!”
Even though he had said the glass was soundproofed, it was the thought that people could still possibly hear us that finally made me quiet. My arms went limp, and Brandon dropped them. I wanted to skewer him.
“You can’t do this,” I gritted through my teeth as I skittered around him, out of his considerable reach.
He glared at the chairs that now stood between us, but stayed where he was.
“This is my place of work,” I continued in a low, even voice that belied my rage. “You can’t just bang around in here like a caveman."
“I’m this firm’s most important client,” Brandon retorted. “They wouldn’t care if I took you ten different ways on top of that desk.”
“Yes, but they certainly would care if I did, you arrogant twat!” Now my own smothered Brooklyn accent was coming out. “This is my career, my reputation we're talking about, Brandon! You don’t have to worry about yours because it’s already made!”
We silenced, caught in another interminable standoff. This time I won when his shoulders eventually drooped in acknowledgement. Brandon blew out a long sigh, covered his face with his hands, and groaned, loud and long, through his fingers.
“All right,” he said finally. “I’ll leave. On one condition.”
“What’s that?” I asked. I probably would have agreed to tap dance down Commonwealth Avenue if it meant getting him out of my office.
“You come to dinner with me tonight. And stay. And talk. The whole time. I deserve at least that from you. I deserve answers, Skylar.”
Honestly, I would have preferred the tap dancing. "I don't have time for that tonight. I start a bar prep class tomorrow, and I have to catch up on what I've missed being here today."
"Tonight," Brandon repeated. "Otherwise..."
"Stop bullying me!" I spat, slapping a hand onto the leather edge of the chair in front of me. "I don't know if you forgot what it's like to be a new associate, but I don't have time for this shit! I can't afford to fuck up this job, Brandon!"
For a third time, we were caught in a faceoff, fingertips white with the tension as we gripped at the chair and the desk. But I wasn't going to break first this time. No way.
“Fine," Brandon finally relented, with at least enough courtesy to look a little contrite.
Ha, I thought. Two out of three.
He stood up, adjusted his tie and straightened his collar once more. "What about this weekend?"
I didn't say anything, just shot him a dirty look. I wasn't ready to just roll over and play nice.
He sighed. "Goddamn it, Skylar, please?"
I exhaled slowly. "Fine. Friday, I guess. What time?"
“Seven-thirty. I’ll pick you up.”
“No, I’ll meet you there,” I said.
I didn’t want him to know my actual apartment number, even though it was probably only a matter of time until he charmed the information out of HR. That stupid smile got him just about anything he wanted.
Brandon rolled his eyes, but nodded in faux-acquiescence. “Whatever you say, Red."
I flinched at the casual nickname. As common as it was, he had always used it with fondness and so I had come to love it. A few unexpected tears welled up, and I looked down at my empty chair, blinking them away.
"I’ll have Margie text you the reservation."
"Fine."
Brandon picked up his briefcase and jacket off the other chair. He walked around me in a conspicuously wide circle to leave, then stopped in the doorway. Chewing on his lip, he looked dangerously like he wanted to tackle me all over again.
"Friday. Seven-thirty," he said, pointing a finger like Uncle Sam. “You promised.”
And then he turned abruptly and disappeared down the hall. Somehow, I made it back to my desk, where I collapsed in my chair and buried my face in my hands. So much for a clean start.
~