Owen's eyes, a cool pale blue, did not change. "There wasn't. Kieran operates on his crazy terms and chaos. It's usually effective." He left the wall and took a step toward her. Not threatening. But he was rather assessing the girl.
"The woman with the plant. Penny. You knew her?"
"No. I'd never seen her before."
"But you stepped in. Between her and the guard."
Nadia thought of the man's strong hands, the poor woman's fragile wrist. "He was hurting her."
"He was doing his job."
"That was a bad job."
A glint of something crossed his face. Was it amusement? Was it irritation? But, unfortunately, it disappeared too quickly. "You made a mess of his bad job. You turned a minor incident into a scene."
The elevator went on going up. The numbers above the door quietly showed: 42, 43.
"She got scared," Nadia said and the words got out more strained than she intended.
"There is no one who is not scared of something," Evans replied while his eyes were going down the portfolio in her hands. "Tell me, what's the file?"
She held it more tightly. "My resume. Writing samples. References."
"It's dirty."
"The plant fell."
"So it did." He reached out. Not for the portfolio. And his large fingers brushed the back of her hand where she gripped her resume. A brief, shocking contact. His skin was warm and she felt it, "You're shaking."
She wasn't, until he said it. Then a fine tremor started in her wrists. "I'm fine."
"You're not." He withdrew his hand. "But you stood your ground. That's the part that matters."
The elevator chimed. The doors opened.
The fiftieth floor was nothing like the lobby, everything was different. The interior was warmer and the lights were softer and more golden, giving the spacious reception room with its enormous vacant desk a lively appearance. The visitors could also have a stunning view of the city through the large glass windows. The afternoon sun was shining in brightly too.
There was no one there and everywhere was utterly silent.
Owen exited the elevator, his shoes making no sound as he stepped on the thick, cream, colored rug. "This, " he said, pointing simply at the empty desk and spotless area, "is the problem."
Nadia followed, her high heels too sinking into the plush pile. "Where is everyone?"
"Fired. Quit. Driven mad." He didn't smile and walked toward a set of double doors made of the same pale wood as the desks. "The last one lasted a week. She left a resignation letter written in eyeliner on the bathroom mirror."
He pushed the doors open, revealing his own master office.
It was less an office and more of a command center. The window view was even more staggering. Inside, there was a long desk with three monitors, both dark in color and everything was spotless and tidy but for a laptop, a closed file folder, and a single tea mug. A glass coffee table was placed between two low sofas that faced one another. Near the corner was a modest minibar with sophisticated crystal decanters was located close by.
Her eyes also noticed the suit jacket which was carelessly thrown over the back of a chair. With a child's brightly colored hair clip sat on the edge of the desk too and several financial journals were fanned out on the coffee table, one splayed open as if dropped mid-sentence. An empty, high-end baby bottle rolled slightly on the floor near a wastebasket.
Owen walked to the window, his back to her, looking out at his kingdom. "Kieran thinks I need a gatekeeper. Someone to answer phones, manage schedules, keep the… debris… from reaching me." He glanced at the hair clip. "What do you think?"
Nadia remained montionless in the doorway, holding her portfolio like a shield. She then looked around the room. Taking in power and the disorder it represents. The ruthless efficiency of this man and the heartbreaker reputation he possessed was all true. This was the chaotic world she'd heard about. It wasn't glamorous chaos.
'But it feels so lonely here.' Nadia wanted to screamed her thoughts at him but held it together.
"I think," she said carefully, "you need someone who isn't afraid of the mess."
And immediately, Owen turned from the window witj the sunlight following him, casting his face in the day light shadow. "Are you afraid of it, Nadia Adams?"
Her name in his mouth sounded different. Formal. And undeniably sexy.
"I'm afraid of not being able to pay my tuition," she said, the honesty ripped out of her. "I'm afraid of going back to a diner where the manager stares at my ass all day So, this?" She gestured around the office. "This is just a complicated room."
He didn't smile at her answer. Instead, Owen left the open window with the sunlight leaving him too, and the whole of his attention was laid on her as if it were a tangible thing. He walked like a cat that had caught its meat and was now going for the kill, slowly and leisurely, walking around her, but also not too close to her. His eyes were examining everything, the white knuckle grip she had on her portfolio, the slight lift of her chin, the way her shoes were practical, scuffed on the floor and were planted firmly on the expensive rug.
"A complicated room? Hmm," he repeated, his voice a low rumble. He stopped by the coffee table, nudged the splayed journal closed with his foot. "Most people see the view. The art. The money." He picked up the child's hair clip, a butterfly with glittering wings showing her. He turned it over in his fingers showing her. "They don't see this."
"What do you see?" The question was out before she could stop it.
He gave her a serious glance at that moment, and Nadia sensed it as if he were touching her. Owen began a slow, deliberate scan from her well packed ponytail to the modest neckline of her blouse, down to her shoes and then his eyes went back up. The look wasn't lewd, rather it was an assessment. And it left a trail of heat on her skin.
Oh god!
"I see a system in failure," he said, "matter of fact." He tossed the clip onto the desk where it skittered next to the empty mug. "I see missed signals. Uncontrolled activities. Emotional debris clogging the operational pipeline." He took a step closer. Then another. "Kieran sees a personnel problem. I see an infection."
"Those women don't seem to leave me alone." He added, laughing a bit.
He was close enough now that she caught his scent. Not normal cologne but clean soap and sharp linen. And underneath, something warmer, lived-in. His Male authority.
Gosh! This man screams ruin but she knew otherwise than to say it out loud.
"You're not hiring a secretary," she said, her voice steadier than she intended. "You're hiring an immune system."
And she could feel the intense gaze in his eyes. Almost like approval. "Can you be ruthless, Nadia Adams?"
"I told you what I'm afraid of..."
"That's not an answer."
"Yes."
He studied her face, searching for the lie. She let him. The air between them grew thick, charged. The low, steady noise of the building's air conditioner disappeared into a barely noticeable sound and now Nadia could only hear her own heartbeat in her ears. At that time, his gaze shifted to her mouth as she noticed the gold spot in his left eye.
Her lips parted, as if to breathe silently in and when his eyes quickly returned to hers, and now they seemed even darker. A heat, a fleeting heat, a raw flash of want so intense that it literally stole her breath away had emerged from behind the cold, impersonal exterior of the professionals they were striving to maintain.
The feeling was too much for her. She felt her tummy tighten, as though it were there. The moisture in her crotch surprised her. Her nipples became painfully rigid against her bra's lace. It was beyond her control.
A primal response to a predator's focused hunger. She saw the exact second he registered it. Not in her face, but in his own body.
His shoulders tensed. One of the muscles in his cheek twitched. For a moment only, his eyes sank again to the top of her shirt, in front, where now you could see her blush,the peaks hard against the thin fabric. Then his own body gave him away. The smooth wool of his trousers barely hid the sudden, thick bump of his erection, the material stretching over the hard, obvious bulge of his manhood.
Each of them noticed it and at the same time both stopped breathing.
The fact of it was hanging in the tense office atmosphere, intense and undeniable. He was hard. She was wet. In the middle of a job interview. In his complicated, powerful, lonely room.
The violent moment on his face could hardly be mistaken, annihilation, self, disgust. He instantly stepped back sharply, thus breaking the spell. Turning his side to her, he was hiding the physical signs of what had happened. Without saying a word, he held the back of his desk, chair with a white, knuckled grip.
"The job, " he said, the words it strained out, "is ninety percent of that, of saying no. To people. To requests. To tears, to threats, to seductions disguised in twelve, thousand, dollar dresses. It's a wall. Can you be the wall?"
Nadia's entire body felt alive with energy. The pain she had deep down her legs was like a slow and steady throb. The sensation of his intense gaze on her still lingered in her skin. To distract herself, she focused on his facial view, then to the sharp outline of his back. She realized the question was no longer about the work. It was about this. This electric, inappropriate current that had just arced between them.
He was inquiring whether she could overlook it. If she could build a wall right through the middle of this electrified space.
Her hand rose, nearly automatically, and her fingers reached the base of her throat. The skin there was extremely hot. She could even feel the throb of her pulse pressed against her fingertips.
He watched her movement. His gaze followed her hand, the fair fingers against her skin. There was anger and disgust on his face, but there was a deep, intense attention below it. He was expecting her reply.
"Yes," Nadia said. The word was a scrape of sound. She cleared her throat, trying to find the woman who had walked in here, the one with a rent check due. "I can be a wall."
A humorless, sharp sound escaped him. Not a laugh. A puncture. "Can you."
A challenge, not a question, was what it was.
At last, he turned fully to face her again, and his movement was very deliberate. The evidence of his arousal being his fault was still there, an obvious, fact, but he made no further attempt to hide it. He leaned back against the edge of his desk and crossed his arms over his chest.
The pose was casual, but every fiber in his forearms was tightly muscularly visible to her.
"Give me one example, " he said. His voice was low demeanored, completely lacking its previous CEO's refinement. This was Owen, unfiltered.
"You're there at a party. A lady stunning, high, profile, and wearing very little, puts her room key to my jacket pocket. She also whispers something to me in my ear. You see it. What do you do?"
Nadia's mind blanked. All she could see was the phantom woman, the slide of a key, the whisper. All she could feel was the violent, irrational slice of jealousy that followed the image. She swallowed. "I… retrieve the key. After she leaves. I return it to you with the rest of the evening's business items."
"Wrong." He didn't move. "You intercept her before she gets within three feet of me. You take the key, you thank her for her interest in Evans philanthropic initiatives, and you direct her to the press liaison. You are a human firewall. Nothing gets through to me unless you vet it first. Understood?"
She nodded, almost unable to breathe. The wetness between her legs was her secret shame, a raw, aching betrayal of the professional she was supposed to be. He locked his eyes with hers, and she realized that he was aware.. The atmosphere was laden with the understanding of their shared wrongdoing.
He went on, "The personal is professional here, " his eyes briefly lowering to the coffee cup that she was still holding."My phone, my calendar, my home. You will have access to all of it. You will manage the flow. That includes turning away anyone who does not have a scheduled, vetted appointment. That includes women. That includes family. That includes anyone who thinks a past… intimacy… grants them a door."
The way he said "intimacy" was brutal. It sounded like a contaminant.
"Why?" The question left her before she could stop it.
His head tilted slightly. "Why what?"
"Why would you want a wall?"
She made a vague gesture first to the room and then to him. "You seem perfectly capable of saying no yourself."
For a long moment, he just looked at her. The mask of the impatient billionaire was gone. In its place was something weary, something starkly real.
He walked away from the desk without looking at her and went towards the window before whispering, "Because I'm tired," so quietly that she almost missed them, then he turned to her, and the pitiful expression vanished as if it had never been there.
"And because of the fallout from my… capabilities… creates messes. Messes that cost time and money. You are a cost saving measure, Miss Adams. A buffer."
It should have felt like a demotion. A buffer, he said she is, a piece of furniture. However, the manner in which he had glanced at her just a moment ago, the way his body had responded, didn't help things as it only made the term feel like a lie they were both agreeing to conceal.
"The salary is one fifty, plus a discretionary bonus tied to performance and discretion. Benefits. A car service after eight PM. You'll need to be on call, but your class schedule will be accommodated. Within reason." He listed the terms like a surgeon listing instruments. "You'll start Monday. Kieran will provide the paperwork and the non-disclosure agreements. They are comprehensive. You breathe a word of what happens in this tower, and I will not sue you. I will bury you."
He was offering her the job. After all of that. The shock of it held her still.
"You're hiring me."
"I am employing a solution," he corrected, moving back toward his chair. He finally sat, the powerful lines of his body settling into the leather. The strained front of his pants was still very obvious, He made no move to conceal it further, as if acknowledging it would show more power than he was willing to grant. "Do you accept the terms?"