Shark (Wall Street Beasts 1)

She really didn’t understand why she couldn’t force herself to go up to those glossy glass doors. She was just standing on the sidewalk, staring up at the building which bore four of the most powerful letters in the English alphabet when combined in that order: A P E X

The word was on every brand of every product she’d ever used in her life. Everything was a subsidiary of Apex. People who’d never heard of Apex were guaranteed to have a hundred Apex products in their homes. Working for this company was the modern equivalent of working for…well, there wasn’t an equivalent. There had never been an organization this powerful in the history of history.

Nobody else shared her excitement. People streamed by the monolithic building as if it wasn’t even there. There were lots of big buildings in the city, and many of them contained important people and organizations.

DING! DING!

A ringing bell heralded a cycle courier who had skipped off the road and onto the sidewalk.

“ON YOUR LEFT!”

Sophie stepped to the left, and then sharply to the right when she realized on her left didn’t mean she should go that way. That made her shoulder barge a tall suit. He didn’t move, but she staggered backward and would have ended up on her butt if he didn’t reach out and grab her by the lapels of her blazer in two big hands. She felt herself being hauled back from the tipping point of oblivion, set upright on her feet like a small child.

“Oh, I’m sorry!”

The man who'd saved her scowled at her so ferociously her heart skipped a beat. It was such a benign and pedestrian encounter, but Sophie felt the hand of destiny on her in that moment. She also felt the two big hands of the rakish stranger who was not at all pleased to make her acquaintance, but was still hanging onto her, as if he didn't trust her not to immediately go flailing into traffic.

“You should look where you’re going,” he stated the obvious.

“I was looking. I was looking not to be literally fucking run over.”

She looked down at his hands. They were perfectly manicured and probably getting some kind of allergic reaction to her polyblend suit. She’d wanted to wear cashmere, but cashmere was not within reach of the previously-unemployed-fresh-out-of-business-school.

“You’ve got an unprofessional mouth on you,” he noted dryly. “I’m assuming you work at Apex?”

“I do. But my mouth isn’t what got me hired.”

That was a pretty good zinger as far as she was concerned. The guy didn’t agree. He just raised a brow at her, as if he didn’t appreciate her sass, and slowly unfurled his fingers from her lapels.

She found herself staring up at him longer than was probably appropriate. He looked sort of familiar, but not in a really familiar way. Like maybe a movie star from the early 2000’s.

A thick dark brow rose as the implications of what they’d both just said rolled over them both.

He really looked vaguely familiar. Like a toothpaste model, but far more vicious. He was wearing a very expensive suit and a scowl. That described more than half the men on the street, but he was a more intense version of all of them rolled into one.

“You’re going to be late for work,” he said.

“Won’t you be late for work too?”

“Yes,” he said. “I may be, but the consequences will be worse for you.”

“Maybe I don’t start until 9.30.”

“Given how long you’ve spent staring at the building, I’d say there’s a very real chance you won’t start until closer to twelve. Do you have a fear of tall buildings?”

“I don’t have a fear of anything.”

His lips quirked, as if he found her amusing.

“Then, come in, Miss….”

“I’m sorry. I don’t tell strangers my name.”

“Good girls don’t talk to strangers,” he smiled, his lips curling into a faintly mocking expression. His words reflected hers, and in that reflection she felt about five years old.

Goddammit. This guy was making her flustered which was ridiculous.

She had to consider that he might work at Apex too. There were over a million employees worldwide. Probably more than a million. So there was every chance that this guy was a manager there. But she was a manager too, technically, so…

“I’m Alex Roth," he said, offering her his hand, and making her die inside at the same time.

Oh fucking hell.

Alex Roth. She knew she should have known his face. She should really have known his face. It had been on television multiple times, usually on the business channel.

But he was so much more handsome in person. So. Much. More. Handsome. Not that he wasn’t telegenic, because he was hot on tv too. Just a different kind of hot.

“Oh! Mr. Roth! It’s such an honor to meet you!” She was gushing like a broken water main, all previous snark washed away in a torrent of horrified adoration. She couldn’t help herself. She could barely believe that a man like him was walking around on the street.