Then her cell rang and she stopped, gaping at the number. There was no way she was seeing the correct return address on the caller ID. That was the most insane thing in a life suddenly filled with batshit craziness.
Her first reaction was to ignore it. But then, feeling her heart flutter with anxiety, she picked up her phone and answered.
Please don’t be sending me some court summons soon. God, please…
“Oh Addison, how nice to finally be speaking with you,” Clayton said.
She rolled her eyes at his theatrics, relieved he couldn’t see her. Of course he’d be annoyed that she’d picked up on the fourth ring. After all, it was Mr. McDermott’s world and she just lived in it. He needed answers on the first ring, but she didn’t work for him anymore.
“What can I do for you?”
“I wanted you to talk. Can you please come to my office? I’d much rather discuss matters in the office and try to find a private way to settle everything than drag you into court. It’s not as if I can get any money from you anyway.”
She paled, and even when she spoke, her voice came out as a high squeak. “But the coffee didn’t even burn you, and I paid to replace your suit.”
“No, Miss Morgan. There’s that sticky issue of the nondisclosure agreement you signed. I know that you had to be the leak for Amun, and I’m not pleased. If you don’t want to be sued into oblivion, then you need to come to my office, and now. Don’t think I won’t end what’s left of you. Now get down here.”
She shuddered to herself long after the phone clicked off. It seemed that no matter what she had done or hadn’t done that her life was always circling Clayton McDermott. She was always under his thumb. It wasn’t enough that Zahir had played with her heart and torn her apart. Now she had to deal with Mr. McDermott’s wrath.
“Perfect, freaking perfect,” she muttered to herself and then rushed to get showered. If she were going to get served, at least she’d do it with clean hair, damn it.
Chapter Nine
It occurred to her that things seemed very odd as she entered the office. Most everything was darkened and there was no one else currently working on the floor. That made no sense. Even on Saturdays and Sundays, he had the executive pulling ninety-hour weeks. Hell, she’d had more than one weekend ruined by him forcing her to come in because he “just needed” something covered ASAP. This place was now a ghost town, and it made the goose bumps rise on her skin.
But she did see a light coming from his office. Steeling herself for yet another harsh confrontation with her former boss, Addison walked up and knocked on the door. His cold gaze regarded her, yet something was very different about him. His suit wasn’t quite so crisply steam cleaned and he had a day or two of scruff over his chin, obscuring that famous dimple of his.
What is going on here?
Mr. McDermott stood up and bowed a bit, and who knew actions could be so sarcastic?
“Miss Morgan, how nice of you to join me.”
She glared up at him but crossed the threshold anyway. “Look, I’m having a really terrible, well, life, and if you and I could find a quick way for you not to sue me, then that would be really great. I don’t want to do theatrics, and this place is so creepy and feels shut down. I honestly don’t get it.”
He quirked his head back at her, even as he shut the door behind them. “Do you not get it at all? You shot your big mouth off to Zahir, and he used that as leverage with so many of his buddies in the UAE I’d screwed over. I’ve been sued into oblivion. There’s nothing left of my steelworks, at least nothing that I own. Zahir was sure to swoop in and buy the controlling interest. You’ve ruined me. Over a decade of hard work and it was blown out by fucking pillow talk.”
She stiffened at the way he phrased that, her heart pounding even harder than before. It was then that she noticed the drained handle of Vodka and the discarded container of orange juice on his desk. It wasn’t just his clothes that had been through the ringer. Mr. McDermott was a complete mess.
Who gets drunk dialed by their boss?
Suddenly, it occurred to her that it was a very bad thing she’d come here without telling her brother that she was going
to be back at the office. She’d been so hopeful she could maybe avoid being sued with some vigorous begging that Addison had wanted to keep the truth from him. And if the office were open as was usual, that would have been fine. But she was keenly aware of how utterly isolated she was in this moment.
How alone and vulnerable.
“I didn’t know,” she said. “Zahir threw us both. I didn’t even realize what I was saying.”
“Lies,” he said, and he was so fast then, stalking across the room and pinning her against the wall. He reeked of Vodka and stale cigarettes, and she wanted to scream. She even tried to but he covered her mouth with one hand, even as his body pressed her closer to the wall. It was so tight that her back hurt from the pressure. “Oh no, you’re not going to scream. You’re the one who ruined me, and I’m not an idiot. I set your salary for so long. You don’t make anything, like me now. But I have to get my money’s worth somehow, have to make you feel as ruined as I do.”
She tried to say anything, but when she opened her mouth, she tasted the gross salt on the palm of his clammy hand. Still, she tried her best to buck against him, to whine through her throat. Maybe there was a stray maintenance worker…anyone who might help her if she made some noise.
“No,” he said, reaching out to yank hard on her hair even as his hips and the heft of him kept her hopelessly pinned to the wall. He pulled her hair again, and she saw stars. “I’m definitely going to have to get something from you, and I think we both know what that is.”
Suddenly his hands were pawing at other places, trying to get her T-shirt off even as she struggled. Tears were running down her face and she was so scared—frightened enough to close her eyes for a moment even as she tried to fight him off. And then…
There was no weight on her at all.