Natalie’s beautiful, saucer-round eyes widened. “You. Want. My. Job?”
“Well, no. Not if it’s still your job. But if you’re done with it—really and truly can’t take any more—then it’s got to be worth a shot?”
Natalie shifted sideways in her seat and grabbed my shoulder with her wine-free hand. “No, Sofia. It’s not worth a shot. He’s awful. Truly awful. And what he does for a living? He basically ruins peoples’ lives. And you help him ruin people. It’s really not worth it.”
I loved Natalie. But she’d grown up in a wealthy suburb in New Jersey. Not trust-fund wealthy, but definitely no-student-loans wealthy. We-have-great-healthcare wealthy.
Natalie’s mother hadn’t worked one job since she and her brother were born, let alone three. I didn’t resent it. It was just a fact that she couldn’t understand what it was like to be truly desperate.
“Natalie, I’m running on empty and at this rate I’m going to have to go back to New York with less than I left with. And when I get home, my mom is still going to need a knee replacement I can’t pay for. I still won’t have managed more than an awkward ‘How’s things’ phone call with my father. I’m a tough cookie. I’m sure I can handle Andrew Blake for a couple of months. Until I find something else at least.”
Her gaze hit the floor like I’d just told her that her cat had died.
“But seriously, I’ll only go for the job if you’re really done with it.”
She sighed. “Honestly, I’d almost rather go back than have you exposed to the horror. But I don’t think I can take one more day with that man.”
I was sure I could deal with one day with Andrew Blake. I was sure I could do three months. Maybe even a year. Whatever it took to keep me in London long enough to build some kind of relationship with my father and get the money I needed to fix my mother’s knee. I was just going to have to suck it up.
Two
Sofia
The sky was as black as it ever got in a big city. If the darkness didn’t give it away, the chill in the March air trumpeted that it was way too early to be standing outside the Blake Enterprises offices.
It was five fifteen in the morning.
Natalie had said that she once got into the office at six and that Andrew looked like he’d been there a while. I needed to catch him arriving. From what Natalie said, it wasn’t going to be easy to get access to him if I didn’t. That’s why I’d already been here for twenty minutes.
When I’d finally convinced Natalie that me going for her job wasn’t the worst thing that was ever going to happen, she pulled up a picture of Andrew so I’d know who I was accosting in the middle of the street. At first I assumed that she’d pulled up the wrong shot, because how could anybody so handsome be such an asshole? He was better looking than every male member of the Avengers cast—combined. Like someone had stuck John Kennedy Junior’s hair, chin, and signature smirk on Chris Hemsworth’s bod. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, if I hadn’t wanted a job from the guy, I think I’d still be outside his office at five a.m. to catch a glimpse.
I stood on my tiptoes, trying to see down the street for the flash of headlights coming in my direction. Nothing. Not even a delivery van. Across the street, an early-morning runner headed in my direction in a gray hoodie, his face obscured by the hood. A car going by caught my attention and when I looked back to the jogger, he was crossing the street toward me.
Adrenaline pushed into my hands and I got out my cell. Shit. I was out here on my own. I was just about to press call on Natalie’s number when the runner stopped and pulled down his hood.
I’d seen that pretty face before.
“Andrew Blake?” I didn’t need to ask. It was obvious. His John-Kennedy-Junior-had-a-baby-with-Chris-Hemsworth thing was in full swing. He was just missing the smirk—and thank God, or my vagina might have caught on fire. The man was even more gorgeous in the flesh.
He snapped his head around at my question and met my gaze, his disapproving frown burrowing under my coat and heading between my legs. He was still hot, even when he looked like he was about to bite me.
“I’m Sofia Rossi.” I held out my hand.
“So?” Ignoring my hand, he pulled out a bunch of keys and unlocked the gray door I’d been waiting in front of.
“So I’m a graduate of Columbia University. I’m a hard worker. I’m creative and organized and super flexible. And I want to be your assistant.”
“You’re American,” he said, almost spitting the words out as if he couldn’t possibly fathom a worse idea than having an American as an assistant.
“New Yorker. I’m tough as nails and ready for anything.”
He unlocked the final lock. “Not interested.” He pulled the door open and went inside.
I wasn’t giving up that easily. I caught the door just before it closed and followed him up the stairs, glancing at the elevator and wondering why we weren’t using it.
What was it about guys’ asses that they always looked at least thirty percent better in track pants? It was all I could do not to reach out and cup his perfect butt cheeks to see if they were as rock hard as they looked. “I heard your assistant quit. If you hire me, you don’t have to go to the trouble of finding someone else.”
He didn’t respond.
We stopped at the second floor, where Andrew bent to unlock the bottom lock of the double glass doors.
“I’m here, ready to work immediately.”
Still ignoring me, he unlocked the top lock, pushed through the doors and then switched on the lights, revealing a white, bright lobby area. I glanced around, taking in the clean, modern furniture that looked like it had never been sat on.
“I’m an early riser and—”
Andrew headed left into a small office, which seemed a bit cramped for a dick-swinging life destroyer, but as I followed him in, I realized there was a door on the other side of the desk he was heading toward. I chased after him.
But he disappeared behind the second door just before slamming it in my face.
Okay, that could have gone better.
But at least I was in his office. And he wasn’t trying to escort me off the premises.
I leaned on the desk in the outer office and caught sight of Natalie’s raspberry cashmere scarf on the coatrack behind the desk. She could afford cashmere, given her salary. All money I could use to get myself off her couch and into an apartment of my own. I wasn’t about to be beaten by Andrew Blake’s bad mood. No sirree.
I took a seat behind the desk and switched on the computer, then looked around at the papers on the desk. Some of it was covered in squiggles that looked remarkably reminiscent of a cartoon Natalie holding a cartoonishly large chef’s knife. There was a small stack of research on a magazine called Verity, Inc. At the bottom of the pile was a paper calendar. How charming. I pulled it open and found the right page. It didn’t look like Andrew had any appointments until noon. So what was he doing in the office at this hour?
I resolved to hang around until he came out and I could convince him that hiring me was the best decision he would make this week.
I stood, pulled off my coat, and hung it next to Natalie’s scarf, took out a notebook from my purse and started to look around. The first thing I could do was tidy up. Not that the place was a mess, but judging by the fact that the entrance lobby looked like it was ready for open-heart surgery, I guessed that Andrew liked everything just perfect. Yes, I’d show him, not just tell him, how helpful I could be. Prove to him that there was no task too menial.