“Um, well, good luck with that,” I told her. “Hurry back.”
She laughed. “Why? Will you miss me?”
I scowled. “No. There’s work to be done.”
“You know I need days off, right? No one works seven days a week.”
“I do,” I shot back.
“The amount of procrastinating you do nullifies the fact that you attempt to work every day,” she pointed out.
“Bullshit. Even with all of the goofing off, can you honestly tell me I don’t work at least ten waking hours every single day?”
She mulled it over. “Yeah, that’s true. You do manage to spend a surprising amount of time working considering how much time you spend doing the most random things I’ve ever seen, and all without ever wearing a shirt.” She smirked as she said the last bit.
“Are you ever going to let that go?”
“Probably not. As a matter of fact, if you don’t get 1k words done while I’m at church, I’m going to make you wear a shirt for the day.”
“What’s up with your obsession with me putting on clothes?”
“Why do you hate clothes so much?”
I glanced down at my bare chest. I worked my ass off to get as lean and muscular as I was, and I’d literally never had a woman complain about seeing it before. “Can you honestly tell me you don’t enjoy the view?”
“I’m not sure your ego could handle the truth,” she retorted, heading for the door.
I couldn’t hold in a laugh, but I didn’t believe her for one second. She could say whatever she wanted, but I’d caught her stealing looks at my built chest and shredded abs more than once. Perhaps that was why I’d taken to wearing a shirt even less than usual since she’d moved in.
I walked her out to her car, opening the door for her.
She shot me an odd look. “Bye,” she said, reaching for the door handle.
“God bless!” I called out, waving. She tried to hide her smile at that, but I saw it.
I watched her car drive away, wondering what the church thing was all about. Maybe I should have gone with her, I mused. For research.
My phone dinged a text at me, and I glanced at it.
My eyes widened, rolled, and I put it away. I hoped to God Ro never got a look at some of the things women sent to my phone on a daily basis. It’d be the kitchen sixty-nine thing all over again. Another stain on her innocence. Another crack in her wholesomeness that I didn’t want on my conscience.
She was gone for four hours, not that I was counting. And I wasn’t waiting for her in the front drive when she finally made it home. It was totally a coincidence that I was out there.
“Welcome home,” I said casually as I opened her car door for her.
She eyed me suspiciously. “What are you doing out here?”
I glanced around. “I was plotting a complete overhaul of my shrubbery. I think my curb appeal is off.”
“I don’t think that term applies when your house is hidden behind huge walls and no one can see it.”
“I can see it. It’s curb appeal for myself.”
“I can’t tell if you have too few hobbies or too many. Or maybe you just need different ones.”
“It’s not just for me,” I said defensively. “I’m having a big party soon,” I improvised on the spot. “I want things to be just right. How was church?”
“It was good.”
“Why were you gone so long? I thought you said it was only an hour.”
One of her brows went up in question, her eyes squinting at me adorably. She was like a curmudgeonly old woman trapped in a twenty something body.
“Were you timing me?”
“Of course not. I just happened to notice. So where’d you go for four hours?”
She gave a long suffering sigh. “I have family that lives in town. I stopped by to see them.”
I recalled. “Oh. Your cousin Candy, right?”
She rolled her eyes but nodded. “Yes, her and her sisters and my aunt and uncle. And she has a name, you know.”
I did know, but I couldn’t for the life of me remember what it was. “Yes, of course she does. How is she?” I asked. Not because I cared, but more because it felt like something I should ask.
Her cousin, Candy per my naming habit, had worked for me a few years back. She’d been a horrible assistant, and we’d had a brief fling after she quit, and oh yeah, she still liked to send me naked pictures out of the blue, but I really had no clue (or cared to know) what she was up to these days.
“She’s fine. She didn’t want me working for you. In fact, she was adamantly against it.”
I couldn’t help it. I was offended, and I didn’t try to hide it. “Why the hell not? We’re getting along great and you’re gaining plenty of insight into the book world.” I didn’t miss the fact that I had no real right to be offended, Candy and I were hardly friends, but that wasn’t stopping me.
Ro shrugged. “It’s nothing to do with the job. She just doesn’t like you.”
“Oh, well,” I couldn’t argue with that. “I guess that’s fair. She’s no peach, either, you know. But what does that have to do with you? She doesn’t have to deal with me anymore.”
“She thinks you’re going to corrupt me.”
She said it blandly, and I threw back my head and laughed. “That is rich. Is she trying to say that I corrupted her?”
I got a small smile for that bit of sass. “No. You can say a lot about her, but she’s never pretended to be an angel. I just don’t think she believes that you and I could work well together, but I’m going to prove her wrong. Whatever you’re lacking in moral fiber—”
“Hey!” I said, trying to muster up some righteous indignation.
She mowed right on, “—will not affect the fact that you need an assistant with my focus and efficiency, and I need a creative workplace, not to mention the perk of a mentor with your mastery of the field.”
Well I couldn’t, and didn’t particularly want to, argue with that.
We fell into a nice pattern quickly. I knew I was a challenge to work for and with, but with Ro it was actually quite effortless.
I was chaotic and had a tendency to leave jobs half done. She was organized, neat, and never left any damn thing unfinished. She cleaned up my messes and added periods to my unfinished sentences.
Relinquishing my work load was the only potential snag in our seamless flow, but she cut right through even that, taking things over before I could so much as protest.
“Hey! Ro! Have you seen that Brazil contract I signed a few days ago? I’m supposed to mail it out by today!”
She poked her head into my office. “I sent it out less than five minutes after you signed it. Who do you think you’re talking to?” She disappeared.
“You complete me!” I called after her.
“Name a better duo,” her sarcastic voice drifted back at me.
I couldn’t stop smiling. That was happening a lot with Ro around. I got a kick out of her sense of humor, and she seemed to get mine before I finished the joke. She didn’t even mind when I harassed her about every random little thing for no reason whatsoever. I think she actually liked it.