The Project

“You’re late,”came the absently mumbled announcement as soon as Devyn reached the front doors of the Carta Hotels building to once again find his newest assistant sitting on the ground nibbling on another bacon sandwich.

“My apologies, Miss Dawson. It won’t happen again,” Devyn murmured dryly as he reached down to help her up, only to frown when she placed a large coffee tumbler in his hand. At his questioning look, she said, “I made you coffee,” as he stood there, swallowing hard while he stared down at the tumbler in his hand as he tried desperately to fight back memories of the grainy concoction that left him tearing apart his bathroom in search of an antacid yesterday, only to bite back a sigh of relief when she added, “But I couldn’t seem to get it right, so I picked this up on the way,” with a sad shake of her head.

“Thank you,” he said only to swear that his life flashed before his eyes when she mumbled, “But I’ll figure it out soon,” as she popped the last bite of bacon sandwich in her mouth right around the time that he made the decision to take making coffee off her duties since she had more than enough to keep her busy.

“Why are you waiting outside?” Devyn asked, deciding to move on to a safer subject as he reached down with his free hand and helped her up.

“Security took one look at me and decided that I was too dangerous to be allowed inside,” Andi said with a helpless shrug.

“I can see why,” he murmured, taking a sip of coffee as his gaze flickered to the Mickey Mouse lunch bag that she had clipped to her backpack.

“It’s a curse,” Andi said as she dusted herself off.

“Did you tell them who you were?” Devyn asked as he gestured for security to let them in.

“I did, I really did, but that only led to pitying looks, mumbled apologies, and an explanation that I wasn’t on the list,” Andi explained with a sad shake of her head as he opened the door for her.

“I’ll have your name added to the list,” he promised, making a mental note to put her name on the list if she was still here at the end of the week.

“That would make things easier,” Andi murmured absently in agreement as she reached over and pressed the call button.

“Already sick of the cafeteria?” Devyn asked, gesturing to her lunch bag with his coffee before taking another sip.

“I felt that it would be in my best interest to avoid the cafeteria for the time being,” Andi said with a firm nod that had him frowning as they stepped into the elevator.

“Did something happen?” he asked, pushing the button for their floor as he waited for an answer.

“They found out that I worked for you,” Andi said with a sad shake of her head.

“And?” Devyn asked even as he couldn’t help but wonder if they’d tried to scare her off with the bullshit tales that had been going around since he took this job. It wouldn’t be the first time that his assistant had been scared off, and unfortunately for him, it probably wouldn’t be the last time. He still wasn’t sure who’d started the bullshit tales that were making his life harder, but whoever it was had done an amazing fucking job of scaring off his assistants.

“There was pity in their eyes. It was concerning,” she said, nodding solemnly as he pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked over today’s daily list.

“Sounds it,” he murmured absently and nearly fucking sighed when he saw the first item on the list and realized that this might be the thing that pushed her into quitting. But he didn’t have a choice. Not if he wanted to pull this off and there was no way in hell that he was about to risk losing everything after he’d come this far.

“We should probably go over what’s expected of you,” Devyn said as he scrolled down the list.

“That would probably be for the best,” she murmured in agreement before asking, “Are you ever going to tell me why everyone keeps sending me pitying looks?”

“You’re about to find out.”