Lip Service (Private Relations 2)

Responding back, she said, “Agreed. They’re much less adorable when you’re down wind.”

Flipping through the rest of her album, she noticed that Chris had liked the picture she’d taken of them at the steering wheel.

She smiled, and closed her laptop.

She really hoped that Deacon wasn’t going to be pissed at Chris.

Chapter 6

Chris was glad that he didn’t have to be out of town this week. He was starting to get sick of all of the travel. He was looking forward to being able to sleep in his own bed all week, and not being in an airport. He made it to the office a few minutes early, stopping for some coffee and a bagel at the downstairs commissary.

It was just after 8:30 when he stepped into his office. He had just booted up his computer when Deacon stuck his head in the door.

“Hey. Got a minute?”

“Yeah. Sure. What’s up?” Chris asked.

Deacon stepped inside and closed the door. He looked at Chris intently for a moment.

He must have had a slightly confused look on his face, because Deacon finally said, “So, I saw a picture of you and my sister on Facebook. You were looking pretty cozy. I hate to be that guy, but I have to ask. What’s going on?”

“Honestly, I have no idea.”

Deacon continued to stare at him, waiting for him to elaborate.

Realizing that Deacon wasn’t at all satisfied with his answer, he said, “I’ve liked her for a little while, but always considered her off-limits. What you saw in that picture was a recent development. I’m not even sure what it was, really.”

Deacon rubbed his hand over his face as he took in Chris’s response, then nodded, saying, “I’m not going to insult you by making a big deal out of this. You’re both adults and you can do what you want.”

“I appreciate that,” Chris said, feeling a profound sense of relief.

Pausing for a moment, Deacon continued. “But I am going to tell you, if you hurt her, then we’re going to have a problem.”

Chris said, “I don’t want to intentionally hurt anyone. Ever. Least of all your sister. Before any of this stuff, she was my friend. I’ll be careful.”

Nodding as if he was satisfied by that answer, Deacon said, “Then everything is cool. Gonna go do work stuff now.”

He opened the door and left, his familiar smirk now back in place.

Chris exhaled deeply. That was probably as close to a green light as he was likely to get. Deacon didn’t seem angry.

Settling in to the work, he opened on the proposal for Innova. Last week’s meetings had gone really well. He had a firm understanding of what they were looking for, now. He was meeting with Jim a little bit later in the week to fine-tune things for next week’s meeting.

This time they were coming down to the JDC offices to discuss dollar amounts, specifics, and hopefully sign on the dotted line. They’d get them commercial time on TSN, GamerChannel, and also some well-placed ads in sports magazines. They could reach some of the younger audiences too, by buying up some commercial time on children’s networks and cartoon channels. All of which JDC had open access to.

The next few days flew by in a flurry of activity. Chris had gone over his proposal with Jim. He and Deacon had ended up going out one night to Greeley’s without any strangeness between them. The week was shaping up pretty well.

When he got home Wednesday evening, it was almost eight o’clock. He’d gone to the gym after work, and was utterly wiped out. After making himself a sandwich, he grabbed his laptop and lay in bed. Seeing he’d missed a bunch of notifications on Facebook, he was surprised to see a message waiting for him from Peter Tennison, Chloe’s ex.

Making a face, he wondered what Peter could possibly want from him. Clicking, he immediately raised his eyebrows. Peter accused Chloe of cheating on him with Chris when they were together, called her a whore and then told wrapped it all up by telling Chris to enjoy his sloppy seconds.

Chris shook his head in disgust. Blocking him, he deleted the message from his inbox and lamented the fact that Peter hadn’t been dumb enough to say any of that in his presence. He really would have enjoyed kicking his ass.

After going through the rest of his notifications, he saw Chloe was online so he shot her a quick message to ask how her week had been so far.

A few seconds later, she responded. “Hey you! It was good. Busy so far, though. Can’t wait for the weekend. What about you? Having a good week so far?”

Smirking, he replied, “Having a strange week. The picture of us on the boat sparked a couple of conversations. Can I call you?”