I balled my hands into fists behind the desk. "Well she isn't in my office," I said through gritted teeth. "So where the hell is she?"
I found her twenty minutes later in a large open room with rows of cubicles where the paralegals and secretaries clattered away on keyboards. I grabbed the gossip magazine from her hands and bit back my rage as she smiled up at me pleasantly, sticky sweet. She was leaning back in her chair, legs propped up on the desk like she was on vacation in the Caymans.
"Morning, boss," she said.
"What are you doing here?" I hissed.
Abbi feigned like she didn't understand exactly why I was fucking upset. "I thought you gave me my job back," she said, shaking her head a little as a small, confused frown made her the picture of innocence.
"What you doing here," I repeated, giving the wall of her cubicle a smack.
Abbi looked around the little workspace and said, "At my desk?"
I pinched the bridge of my nose, already feeling a headache coming on.
"Your desk is outside my office, Ms Miller," I said, feeling my jaw clench.
Abbi pulled her feet from the desk, slipped back on her pumps, and swung her purse onto her shoulder.
"Oh my, Mr O'Sullivan, I am so terribly sorry," she said, standing beside me and pushing back in her chair. "You must have been waiting for hours at this point."
I gritted my teeth and forced myself to remain silent as I led the way out of the cubicle farm and down the hall.
"I can't believe it's my fault that you wasted all that time," she continued as we rounded the corner toward my office.
I wouldn't stoop to her level. I wouldn't.
"I guess you should just be more specific next time, you know? Just think how easily I could destroy your productivity if you're not careful."
We were almost to my office when I whirled around. I stormed toward her, forcing her to back up against the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the mountains. My breath was hot and my lungs were gasping as I jabbed a finger at her.
"Don't threaten me, Ms Miller."
Abbi didn't flinch from my glare. Instead she lifted her chin and pressed herself against me till I could feel the swell of her breasts against my chest. "Or what?" she whispered. "You'll fire me?"
The raise of her eyebrows was a challenge. I glared down at her, fighting back the urge to spin her around, raise her form-fitting black pencil skirt, and take her from behind for the whole goddamn city to see.
I sucked in a steadying breath and tried to keep my voice calm. "This is the last time this kind of insolence will be tolerated. I expect only the best from myself, Ms Miller. Therefore, I expect only the best from my personal assistant."
Abbi was silent as I lowered my lips toward hers till they just barely grazed against hers.
"Now go get me a fucking coffee."
Abbi was gone for three goddamn hours before she finally knocked at my office door and entered with a to-go cup. In the three hours she'd been gone I'd tugged at my hair so much that it was a messy rat's nest, pieces poking up in all directions. In the three hours she'd been gone I'd fidgeted with everything on my desk till my frustration boiled over and I knocked it all onto the ground. In the three hours she'd been gone I'd unbuttoned half the buttons on my shirt, loosened my tie, and thrown off my jacket to keep myself from hyperventilating. And suffice it to say in the three hours that Abbi was gone I did not manage three seconds of work.
"Only the best for the best," she said cheerfully as she practically skipped into the office. "Boy, is it a beautiful day out there."
I was brimming with so much frustration that I couldn't even spit out a word as she set the coffee down on my desk in front of my white knuckles that shook and quivered.
"Good thing you have such high standards, sir, or I wouldn't have had the opportunity to drive all the way to Boulder for the best coffee in the state and enjoy those bright blue skies."
I glared at her mischievous, daring, victorious smile.
"That is what you said, isn't it?" she asked. "Only the best?"
Her eyes flashed with fire. The heat felt like a memory, a memory of a warm breeze on a hot summer day in the mountains. For a moment I saw her—I saw the wild, fiery, unstoppable girl from nine years ago.
I said nothing.
Abbi saluted me and then spun on her heel to leave. I raised the coffee to my lips and spit it out when I found it tepid and stale.
"It's fucking cold," I called after her.
Abbi poked her head back in to say, "Well, yeah, it was quite a long drive back. And I drove extra slow so as not to spill it. Only the best."
She winked and closed the door after her. I dumped the coffee into the waste basket and stewed angrily in my chair. I was letting her get under my skin too easily.
I needed to regain some self-control, the kind of self-control that had gotten me to where I was. I needed to strip away all the emotions she stirred up inside of me like some kind of tornado. I needed to approach the situation rationally, clear-headedly, logically: she was just lashing out. I got her fired and she wanted her little piece of retribution. That was all. She'd nipped at me like a rambunctious puppy and now it was out of her system. She would settle into her role and we could go on as professionals, as adults, as if nothing had ever happened between us.
