He froze at his door and then a few seconds later glanced over his shoulder at me. “I don’t.”
I slumped back into my chair as he slammed inside his office.
The hope shattered, slicing me to ribbons.
So this is what this feels like.
“Your schedule is on my computer, as are all your contacts, and notes from recent meetings that are relevant to matters that are still in progress.” I put a USB drive on his desk. “I’ve put them all on there for you because it’ll be better for your new PA to start with fresh information. If he or she has those notes it’ll confuse him or her, and that could be inconvenient for you. I kept notebooks on my daily duties along with instructions, as well as your personal preferences. There’s everything from standard e-mail and invite responses to your favorite dry cleaner.”
I looked up from my notepad and locked eyes with a contemplative Caine.
“Thank you, Alexa. That’s extremely helpful.”
The careful politeness between us made me want to scream, but somehow I managed to curb that instinct, along with my inclination toward smart-assery. I wanted to end things between us with dignity. Not sarcastic shrewishness.
“You’re welcome.”
He looked down at the papers in front of his desk. “Do you have any prospects for a job? I can put you in touch with the temp agency I use.”
“No, thank you,” I said quietly. “I think I’m going to take some time to reevaluate my career.”
“That sounds like a plan.”
I just managed to stop myself from rolling my eyes. How could it be that I’d had sex with this man on his desk (more than once), and now we were acting like two complete strangers?
That horrendous ache seemed to have taken up residence in every part of my body and it threatened to overpower me. I shook it off. “We have a meeting with Jeremy Ruger in forty minutes,” I reminded him.
His gaze sharpened. “Ruger is obnoxious. You don’t have to go to that.”
I knew Ruger was obnoxious. He was also the CFO at Winton Investments, a company that had gone from being small potatoes to a major player in the financial district in the last two years since Ruger took control of the company’s finances.
When Linda, Caine’s CFO, had surprised him by announcing she was pregnant again and she and her husband had decided he should go back to work and she’d take some time to be with the kids, Caine started his search for a new CFO.
We’d met Ruger at the party on Saturday night, and financial genius he might be, but he was also a grubby little sleazebag who spent most of the night chasing attractive wait staff.
I didn’t have to go the meeting. The truth was I probably never needed to go to more than half the lunches and meetings Caine attended. But I suspected, like his peers who also always had someone with them, he brought me along to relax the atmosphere. He always said people who were relaxed were more amenable to persuasion.
“I always come with you,” I reminded him. “And honestly I want to be in on this. I have to see what’s so special about this guy that you would put up with his crass jokes.”
I thought Caine might protest at my being there because it would mean more time spent in my company, but he didn’t.
We were leaving the building at lunchtime rush hour, and since the meeting was at a restaurant on Congress Street, we were walking there. In those crowds it would be easier to pretend that it was natural that we weren’t talking to each other.
It didn’t start off great. We greeted colleagues who were packing up to go out for lunch and they chatted to us as we headed for the elevator. When Caine awkwardly guided me into the crowded box, I flinched at the feel of his hand on my lower back. He must have felt me tense, because he removed his hand with whiplike speed, as though he’d just dipped it in invisible fire.
We stood together, our bodies touching because there was no way of avoiding it, and I gritted my teeth against the tension between us. Caine and I practically dove out of there when the elevator doors opened and we refused to look at each other.
Taking the main exit, Caine held the door open for me and I muttered my thanks, stepping out into the dreary day. I walked into the busy sidewalk by our building and realized I was alone. Caine had been delayed at the door, talking to someone I didn’t recognize. It was a big company—I couldn’t keep tabs on who absolutely everyone was.
Someone bumped into my shoulder and I stumbled back, attempting to move out of the way of the oncoming traffic of pedestrians. I looked over at Caine, saw he was on his way back to me, and stepped out onto the main sidewalk again.
The blur of a body in black brushed right up against me.
This sharp agonizing burn tore through my gut, the pain radiating throughout every nerve in my body.
Stunned, I was incapable of processing anything but the pain.
“Alexa?”
The voice penetrated and I blinked, the unfocused vision of Caine’s concerned face appearing before me.
Along with the pain I suddenly became aware of this wet warmth leaking on my belly. I looked down, my hands trembling as they sought out the problem.
I felt the blood before I saw it.
“Lex—what the …” I heard Caine’s voice.
My legs buckled, my vision flickering out.
“Lexie!”
His panicked features blinked in and out of the darkness.
“We need an ambulance! Call nine-one-one!”
The darkness swam toward me.
“Lexie, baby, hold on. Fuck, hold on.”
To what? I thought before I floated away from the agony toward safety.
CHAPTER 26
There was tightness around my legs. I couldn’t move them freely and it felt like I was suffocating—too warm, needing air.
I kicked and the covers around them began to give way.
“Hey, hey,” a deep, soothing voice said in my ear, “Careful.”
Caine?
The beeping sound in the distance suddenly grew louder as I forced my eyes open. I blinked against the brightness of the unfamiliar room. I was in a bed. One much smaller than my own.
At the foot of it stood my grandfather. “Grandpa?” I croaked, and then pressed my tongue against the roof of my mouth. It was so dry.
Grandpa’s hands curled around my foot. He looked tired. Disheveled. Not at all himself. “You’re going to be okay, sweetheart.”
“Lexie.”
I moved my head to the side and found Caine sitting at my bedside. He held my hand between both of his and he was leaning in so close his face was inches from mine. He looked exhausted too.