“Andrew,” Sofia said, and I snapped back into the present. Loaf of bread. She’s a loaf of bread. “Bob Goode returned your call.”
Fuck. How had I missed that?
“When?”
“About an hour ago.”
“Fuck. You should have put him through.”
“Are you actually kidding me? You’ve glared at me like a fucking cobra for daring to disturb you at eleven fifty-five. If I came in here an hour ago, you might have cleaved my head off.”
Did cobras glare? What a weird analogy.
And cleave? That was an oddly poetic expression. Why not just say bite?
Also, did she just use the F-word with me?
This woman was—where was my focus? “Get Bob back on the phone.”
“Okay. For future reference, if he calls while you’re doing your morning downward dog—or whatever it is you do in here from six to twelve—what should I do?”
Downward dog? She was off, but not by much.
“Just put him through. Bob is the only reason I’m to be disturbed before midday.” I turned back to my desk.
“I’ll make sure everyone else takes a seat. Even your mom. Figures.”
I didn’t even want to know what she meant by that. I got the gist. She wasn’t dishing out compliments. But she could keep the attitude in check. What she thought of me rang out loud and clear. Again, I didn’t care so long as she did her job.
The door slammed on her way out and I waited by the phone. Bob Goode calling me back. What could be made of that?
Without so much as a cursory knock, my door flew open again.
It was Sofia, her cheeks burning red and her blouse now done up, right to the top button. “He’s busy. I’ve left a message for him to call back.” She held one of those Starbucks insulated cups with the word “London” around the rim.
I nodded but kept my eyes on my computer screen.
“And—Unbe-fucking-lievable.”
I snapped my head up at the profanity. Sofia had apparently thrown the entire contents of her drink all down her shirt.
She clenched her jaw and pretended that whatever was in her cup wasn’t dripping down her front and onto her shoes. “I just wanted to say sorry about my blouse.”
She didn’t say any more, just shut the door, which was just as well, because I had unbreakable rules. I didn’t need to think about her peeling off her shirt and toweling down her body and—
I jumped at my mobile ringing. It was Tristan.
I swiped accept. “For once you have good timing. What do you want?”
Eight
Sofia
I groaned and lowered my forehead to the shiny mahogany bar. What a day. I finally had money for a fancy cocktail and now I had no one to drink with. Natalie had left the country and I was officially friendless in a foreign land. But there was no way I was not having a cocktail. Not after a day like today.
Noble Rot seemed like a very strange name for a wine bar, but it was two blocks from the office and boasted an inventive cocktail menu, which meant it fulfilled all the necessary criteria. I passed the place every morning on my way from the tube, and I’d always wondered what it was like inside. Turned out it was a perfect place to drown my sorrows.
Alone.
The bar only had three stools at it and I took the one on the left. At least the place had a buzz about it as people congregated around the small wooden tables set out on the dark, planked wooden floor to celebrate the start of the weekend. Thank God for the weekend. Two days of not seeing Andrew after I flashed him.
I groaned again.
“It can’t have been that bad,” Tony, the barman said, taking away my empty glass. I’d drained my Vivian Leigh cocktail a little quicker than I’d planned. It was just so good. Probably because I hadn’t had a cocktail in about seven weeks. Not since I’d left the states.
“It was worse.” I lifted my head. “Get me another. Quick as you can.” I needed to blur the edges of my truly horrible day.
“Same again?”
I squinted at the menu. “Next one down on the list.” Mixing my liquor seemed to be the easiest way to oblivion.
“So you said the F-word in front of your boss. Who cares?”
“It wasn’t just that I dropped an F-bomb. I did it naked.”
Tony chuckled. “If you went into your boss’s office naked, then swearing was the least of your problems.”
“Not completely naked. Just semi-naked. And it wouldn’t be so bad if he wasn’t the best-looking man I’d ever laid eyes on. His ass is so . . .” I lifted my hands and made a squeezing motion with my fingers. “Tight. And hard. And he looks like John Kennedy. I mean he’s fucking on-fire hot.”
“Surely better to flash a good-looking man than an ugly one. And if that’s your deal, I’m happy to volunteer my services as your flashee. Anytime. Any day of the week.”
I smiled. He was trying to make me feel better, but it didn’t lift the utter humiliation that had cloaked me since I’d come out of Andrew’s office and looked down to see my boobs on display.
He must have thought I was a lunatic. Either I couldn’t dress myself or—I groaned again. He wouldn’t think I’d done it on purpose, would he? Like I was coming on to him? Sweet baby Jesus, I needed a do-over. Tony put the fresh cocktail down in front of me and I scooped it up, barely tasting the flavor but feeling the burn of the alcohol as it slid down my throat. Please make it better. I sent up a silent prayer and made the sign of the cross before finishing the last of my cocktail.
“I think it wouldn’t be so bad if he’d said something. Like, ‘you’re having a wardrobe malfunction’ or ‘your blouse seems to have come undone.’ But he acted like nothing happened, which is ten times worse.”
Tony shrugged. “Is it, though? I mean, sounds like he was being professional.”
I guffawed. “Are you kidding me? This guy is not professional unless you mean he’s a professional asshole. He’s an absolute dick.”
I put my head back on the bar, wondering how I could salvage the situation. I should call Natalie when she landed and see if she had any ideas. The only problem was I didn’t want her to be right. I wanted to nail being Andrew’s assistant. She’d warned me against taking the job and I’d honestly thought I could handle it.
But I had to admit, he was getting to me.
Tony picked up two drinks and headed out from behind the bar.
“Do you know he can go days without uttering a word to me?” I called after him. My mom tried to tell me that Andrew not talking to me was better than him yelling at me, but I wasn’t buying it. The silent treatment must have been thought up in some kind of prison camp—a form of torture. It was like pouring salt on a snail. It made me shrivel up into my shell and start questioning everything. Was he mad at me? Had the research I’d done disappointed him? Had I missed something? Should I be doing something I wasn’t? I’d turned into a paranoid freak who walked around with her shirt undone, throwing drinks on herself. The more I assured myself I was doing a good job, the more doubt kept creeping in, and the louder Andrew’s silence became. It was like two summers ago when I swore off cannoli for three months. I ended up eating double the amount I usually would because all I could think about was cannoli. The more Andrew didn’t speak to me, the more I thought about what he wasn’t saying. And, apparently, the more idiotic I became.