“I’m on it, Mandy. Before we leave today.”
She arches a brow. “You better. Tim and I have dinner plans, so we’re leaving at quarter of.”
“Of course.”
Tim is Mandy’s boyfriend who works in the logistics department here at Pierce & Horn. He’s rude, brash, obnoxious, and has overtly hit on me no less than ten times in the two weeks I’ve been here.
Suddenly, there’s the sound of a door, and the whole party looks up at once. The door to the dark, glassed office opens, and Herb, from sales, walks out — white-faced and looking terrified. He quickly and quietly shuts the door behind him before he scurries down the stairs to the mezzanine level, and then down to the main floor. A few coworkers go over to him, and he nods quickly, still white-faced as he smiles weakly and answers their flurry of whispered questions.
“Well, looks like Herb made it.” Mandy shrugs, nodding. Another guy from sales slips a flask out of his jacket and passes it to poor Herb, who smiles another shaky smile and takes a big gulp as his friends pat him on the back.
“Made it,” as in “not fired.” Apparently, something big is amiss at the firm, and Brock and Seamus are determined to get to the bottom of it. Today.
That’s the rumor swirling through the holiday party. It’s the reason for the dour mood at what should be a warm holiday celebration. I mean, I don’t have anywhere else to be, personally. My family lives on the other side of the country, and I’m new enough in town that I don’t really have many friends. No love life to speak of.
But the rest of these people are sitting here worried for their jobs when they could just be going home early to families and loved ones, on Christmas freaking Eve, no less. I glance back up at the darkened office, shivering at the thought of what those two gorgeous devils up there might be talking about.
“Well, personally, I think it’s Kim,” Mandy hisses under her breath in that obnoxious gossipy tone she always uses. “You didn’t hear it from me, but apparently, she’s having some trouble with her man at home, if you know what I mean. I bet it’s her. That’s my gut feeling. And I’m going to tell them that if they call me up there.”
She turns and shoots a dirty look at a scared-looking Kim, standing by the cheese plate.
I try not to roll my eyes. Whatever Mandy’s “gut feeling” is, it’s probably based off something petty like Kim taking the last cup of coffee from the break room pot.
“You really think they’re going to fire someone today?” I half whisper, pushing a strand of my dark brown hair behind an ear and tucking it under the frame of my glasses. I know I haven’t done anything, but who knows? Who knows how the two brooding, enigmatic men who run this firm operate? There’s always that saying, “last in, first out,” after all.
Mandy shrugs, grabbing yet another cupcake. “Probably. And I’ll laugh when Kim gets escorted out.”
She turns and sees the pale look on my face. “Oh, hon,” she says in that patronizing, fake-friend way. “You’re new here. You’ve got nothing to worry about. Besides, you’re friends with me, remember?” She winks. “Membership has its privileges, hon,” she says. “And anyways, I doubt they even call you in—”
“Noelle.”
The deep, honeyed baritone voice booms out my name, and a hush goes through the crowd. I shiver, trembling as I force myself to look up, towards the big glass office.
“Noelle Healy.”
My eyes drag up, higher and higher, until my heart clenches in my chest.
Brock Pierce’s eyes blaze into me, even from two floors away looking down at me. He’s got his jacket off, wearing a dark vest and a tailored white shirt with the sleeves rolled halfway up his bulging forearms. His squared, chiseled jaw clenches and ripples, and his eyes just burn right into me.
I swallow, panting as he raises one hand. He turns his hand palm up, and without a word, he just crooks two fingers, beckoning me.
And just like that, he turns and strides back into the office, leaving the door open.
Oh fuck.
There are hushed, whispered words and furtive and sympathetic looks as I slowly walk towards the stairs.
“You’ll… you’ll be fine,” Herb says with this fake cheerfulness in his voice. “It really wasn’t bad.”
Him taking another huge gulp from his friend’s drink doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.
I tremble as I climb the stairs, feeling the eyes of the whole party on me as I make my way up to the mezzanine level, and then up the single staircase to their office.
It’s darker up here, chillier, and I swallow as I hug my arms around myself before I force them to my sides.