His eyes narrowed and her heart slammed against her ribcage hard enough to bruise, if bones could be bruised. Tha-thump. Tha-thump. Tha-thump.
She gave herself a mental shake to keep from losing herself in those flat blue eyes with the little grey flecks. It didn’t hurt to remind herself, that if the rumors were true, Blaze probably would win dick of the year award, until his dick fell off. Gross.
“Well, here you have it. The app that made the most money over the past two weeks stretch- and this really was a blow away and a surprise, considering how mundane and bland the idea was- is…”
Asshole.
Despite her uncharitable feelings for the man that ran all of their lives, the devil they all ultimately served at the end of the day, Colette shifted nervously, as did the rest of the staff assembled. She swore she could smell smoke, and no, it sure as shit wasn’t her panties on fire. And no, that wasn’t because they were so wet, they were completely drenched, either.
Those blue orbs swept around the room, wilting females in their tracks, and making men squirm under their scrutiny. They did a full once over before they came to rest, shockingly, back on her.
“Congrats, Office Baby. Looks like your boring trees won you this round. Come to my office at the end of the day to discuss your prize.”
CHAPTER 2
Blaze
Corporate life could be boring as shit. Ask anyone. They’ll tell you the same thing.
Blaze knew he didn’t really have to be at the office, day in and day out, but he wanted to be. He never wanted to be that entitled prick that didn’t even know what was going on in his own company. And with Matt being a silent partner, or at least, silent enough most days, things were pretty much left up to him to run. Matt didn’t give a shit about apps. What he gave as shit about was having money to invest to make more money. If the apps weren’t selling, it was lights out for HBAD and despite what the world at large actually thought, Blaze did have a conscience.
Letting people go and pay cuts weren’t exactly on his list.
It wasn’t that the company was struggling. They were actually doing fine, leading the market, as usual, in app sales and ratings.
If he was pressed to admit it, and he would have to be really pressed because he’d never admit a thing like that to another living soul, he’d created the office competition because he wanted to have a little fun. Spark up the boring, mundane, nine to five shit.
Sure apps were great.
The ideas that his staff came up with, the coding, programming, drawing, all of it was high quality shit. It wasn’t that. He just…
Was. Bored.
He wanted to see what everyone in the office could come up with if pressed. Truth be told, he might have wanted to pit them against each other to see who would rise to the challenge and who would founder like a sinking ship beneath the pressure.
As it turned out, he’d been genuinely surprised. No one had sputtered and gone under. Sure, a few of the ideas had been generally shit, but even they had enough redeeming qualities to sell well enough.
The real shocker had been Office Baby. Colette. Whatever.
God, Blaze hated her.
Rather, he hated what she stood for.
Temptation. Raw, unadulterated temptation. Temptation that was so thick and sensual, it was like a smack to the face every time he had to be in the same room with her. She wore her beauty and charms like a mantle about her. Not that she would have known, but then again, there was nothing sexier than a woman who didn’t know she was sexy. Or beautiful. And Office Baby seemed to be blissfully unaware of both.
Office Baby.
He’d termed her that when she’d started at HBAD two years ago. She’d been eighteen, fresh from high school and could code and draw like someone twice her age, with twenty years of experience under their belt.
He wouldn’t have hired her. He would have taken one look at her and selfishly turned her ass out the door, just so he could run after her and offer to buy her lunch, pursue her relentlessly, and screw her out for a week straight.
HR, on the other hand, being operated by senile nitwits who seemed to do a good job hiring but didn’t actually have eyes didn’t give two shits about the sensual temptation they were inviting into their midst. Case in point, Ashley Hedingly. She was gorgeous. Twenty-five, stacked, and blonde. She was like a delicious popsicle just waiting for the entire office to lick her.
He was pretty damn sure at least half of the office already had.
Another HR nightmare.
Unfortunately, they hired based on smarts and capabilities and not on looks- case in point, Del, although maybe that was a bad example because he was definitely not all that smart. Creepy yes. Artistic, yes. Smart, no.