I hold Chrissy’s gaze with mine, shaking my head as I watch a tear form in her eyes.
“Chrissy, don’t tell me you actually believed him?” I ask her. “Don’t tell me you actually think…”
But I can’t finish, it’s too much to even comprehend.
That someone as dumb as Mike Collins could leave such an impact on Chrissy, my Chrissy, within seconds of me leaving her alone with him.
“And what about my dad?” Chrissy asks. “Where’s he gone now? Promoted?” she asks with a sudden note of bitterness in her sweet voice.
I run my hands over my face, forcing air into my lungs in an effort to calm myself down.
I don’t want to startle Chrissy with my anger for Mike or the board right now.
Not her problem.
I just want things the way they were five fucking minutes ago.
“Chrissy, I do want to promote your dad, to PR instead of accounting. He handled himself very well at that press conference. I told Campbell just now to go show him around the department and later on… I thought later on… I’d have a meeting and offer him a better position here at Logan.”
“Because of me? So you can…?” She starts to say.
“I want you, Chrissy,” I tell her again. “Only you.”
Her eyes dart to the door and her breathing quickens again, but this time for all the wrong reasons.
Damn that Mike prick. I’ll break his fucking neck myself!
“I think maybe I’d better go find my dad,” she chokes, making my chest ache with a pain I thought I’d never know in this life.
“Chrissy…” I start. “We can go somewhere else, just the two of us, anywhere you want,” I tell her, wishing I’d taken her away from this place to start with.
This damned building, full of rats and cutthroats all trying to bring me down while kissing my ass all day.
“I… I’m not sure what I want anymore, Logan,” she nearly sobs, and without looking at me again, she stands up and makes for the door, which I unlock with the flick of a switch.
It’s the hardest thing to even think of letting her go, especially right now but I can’t keep her here if she doesn’t want to stay.
“Chrissy, please,” I hear myself saying, but she won’t even look at me.
She’s shaking, doesn’t even know where to go once she gets outside my office.
I fight the urge to run over, to grab hold of her and make her stay.
The phone rings as I watch her make her way to the elevators out in the corridor, pushing a button before she finally looks back to me as I pick up the phone.
I mouth the word ‘mine’ to her, pleading with my eyes one last time, but she’s choosing to go.
She steps into the elevator and I feel my heart sink.
“Mr. Parker? Sir?”
The voice on the line, it’s Campbell. Public Relations superstar.
Know it all asshole and soon to be tasting the end of the shit stick that is Logan Parker having a bad day.
“You’re fired, Campbell. Clean out your desk, security will escort you from the building in five minutes.”
I can hear him gasp, then groan then snarl. He takes a breath to try and say something that will make a difference, but it’s too late.
“Five minutes, Campbell,” I remind him, checking my watch. “There’ll be an independent inquiry regarding your conduct here at Logan too, don’t leave town. Legal will be in touch.”
I hang up without another word, punching security and telling them to throw Campbell’s ass outta my building.
“I want his hard drive, block his email, and phone accounts. Anything he did while in this building, I want it, and I want it looked over, find out what he’s really been up to and have a report for legal within forty-eight hours,” I say mechanically.
“Right away, Mr. Parker.”
I should feel better. A little anyway.
One down, a hundred assholes to go, right?
But I can only make a croaking sound. A painful, dry sound escapes me where the sounds of our arousal were just a few minutes ago.
Chrissy.
Shaking my head, I stand up and start to pace. I gnaw at my lip and clench my hands as I start doing laps in my office.
Logan Parker is a man who knows what he wants. He always gets what he wants.
But with Chrissy.
She’s the one thing I can’t just pluck from the tree of life. She has to come to me, she has to want me as much as I want her.
I thought she did, she does, she said it herself!
Fuck!
Mike Collins.
The name is painful to me now, but nothing compared to the pain I swear he’ll feel himself before this week is out.
I punch security’s number in again.
“There’s a young lady, Chrissy Foster… she was with me at the press conference earlier. She’ gone and got herself lost, just stepped into the elevator on my floor.”
The voice on the other end lightens a little. “We’ll find her, Mr. Parker, make sure she gets to where she needs to be.”
She needs to be with me.
“Her dad’s in PR now, maybe see she gets to his floor? Thanks.”
I have to hang up, barely able to speak now as I hear myself giving orders for anything that doesn’t bring her straight back to me.
As long as she’s still in the building.
My building.
As long as I can see her, know where she is, I’ll have another chance.
I’ll make damned sure I have another chance.
Just leave her to settle down for a while.
Take stock, clean house, Parker.
Then take what’s already yours, claim what’s coming to you…
Chapter Nine
Chrissy
It still feels like a dream, but one that’s turned into a nightmare.
What the hell am I doing?
I want Logan and I know he wants me.
It’s like that Mike guy put some evil spell on me, right at my most vulnerable moment when I was so worried about seeing my dad. Right after Logan…
My god, he’s so perfect. His mouth on me… making me come like that.
What the hell have I done?
It’s
