Chapter 5
Aria
“He sounds amazing, Aria!” Stacey said the next morning when I went home. “Swoon, baby, swoon. Can’t even imagine how you feel.”
“Amazing.” I hadn’t been able to wipe the huge grin off my face no matter how hard I tried.
“You already said that,” Stacey chuckled. “Like about five hundred times. In the last hour.”
“I know. But you don’t understand. He’s so—“
“Amazing?” she offered.
“Yes. And sexy. Did I tell you he’s getting my paper published?”
“Yep. More than once. And I’ll have to butt in here and remind you that you got your paper published. He simply geared it towards the right direction.”
“But it wouldn’t have happened without him.” I sounded way more defensive than I had intended. “And he even helped me research it. You know how confident I am about my work, Stace. Not at all. I would never submit my work to an influential journal. I kind of owe him a lot.”
“I’m sure he thinks you don’t, since you seem to be already returning favors,” she said and winked.
I hit her with a pillow. “Shut up, Stace. And it’s more of a favor to me anyway.” Trying not to blush, I changed the subject. “So what’s new with you, anyway?”
“Nothing in the scale of enthralling romance with a handsome billionaire.”
I rolled my eyes. “Thanks for completely ignoring my attempt to change the subject.”
“You’re welcome, anytime. And you know I’m just teasing, right? I am happy for you. I’ve never seen you this excited about a guy in all the time I’ve known you. One might even say you’re in looove.”
I gasped. “I wouldn’t go that far.”
“Yeah, I don’t really think you are either. I’ll probably know fir
st since I know you better than you know yourself. I am going to make a wild guess and say that you are beginning to fall for him.”
“Yeah…I am so screwed,” I said, burying my head underneath the pillow on the couch. Was I really beginning to fall for him? I couldn’t be! I didn’t even know him very well. I mean I did, on principal – I knew what he did for a living and I knew where he went to college. I knew all these random facts about him. Me and every other girl in the world with a magazine and internet access.
Plus everything he’d done for me since the contract.
Zayden Sinclair was an absolute pleasure to hang around. I could be myself with him, I realized to my own surprise. I never pretended or put on a face; I always said the first thing that came to my mind and he found my lame jokes funny, and enjoyed my company, just the way I was. Being with Zayden – around Zayden – was comfortable, easy, and natural. The fact that we seemed to get along so well was incredible given the differences in our social status. Yet this did not seem to matter at all when we were around each other. We were always just two people, enjoying each other’s company, and no external factors about who he was and who I was seemed to ever matter.
Stacey was right. I was falling for him. I was in trouble.
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By the time I got to work that day, I was still reeling thinking about Zayden and last night. Every customer and coworker could sense my giddiness from a mile away, I was sure, and it didn’t bother me at all. Every chance I got, I looked over at him through his glass doors, feeling wonderful. There was nothing like watching Zayden hard at work. His passion shone through the distance between us, and I had noticed that any time he was frustrated, he would screw his nose in the most adorable way and crush his stress ball. It made me wish I was his stress ball.
At some point I saw him loosen his tie in what I assumed was frustration and I just wanted to go over and put my arms around him, kissing his forehead. Unfortunately, we had an audience to worry about. Things would be so much easier if we weren’t doing this in secret. At the same time, I wasn’t sure Mrs. Brian’s judgmental looks were entirely welcome, and I didn’t want people to think there was any favoritism going on.
Not that this affected my job in any way. I still had the same shitty hours and the same shitty pay, and I was glad about it. I wanted to earn any career advances I made; however, people loved to talk and they would somehow manage to make me feel like I was getting special treatment—like extra-long bathroom breaks or something.
But more importantly, I wasn’t sure Zayden wanted to make our – I wasn’t sure what to call it, not relationship in any case – dalliance public just yet. Or ever, I realized with a sinking feeling in my heart. One of these evenings I would have to bring this up with him: yes, it was a contract, and yes, I knew where this was supposed to go all along. But things had obviously changed for me, and I wondered – and hoped more dearly than I liked – that they had changed for him too. He had taken me out in public, after all! And brought me a present from New York. Though that was hardly saying something. I had yet to even see the inside of his apartment. He had hinted a few times at taking me over there, but somehow we almost always found ourselves confined to his office. I mean, to be fair, we had both always been too eager to take each other’s clothes off the moment we were alone together. Still. It would be nice if he asked. I would like to feel more like a part of his life and get to know more about him like his family, friends, hobbies, and all that jazz.
And I would like to learn more from him. A lot more. One of the greatest unimagined benefits of our tryst had been just how much I had learned from Zayden. More than I had from most teachers. He was always willing and eager to talk me through the basics of management in the banking industry and whenever we talked about this stuff, his teasing persona would completely vanish. Solemnly, he would get into telling me details about his own experiences during his MBA, and getting into everyday examples from his job as CEO. When we were “studying,” he would even ignore my playful sexual advances, leading me to believe that he actually took me seriously. Coming from a misogynistic philanderer, it surprisingly meant a lot.
I couldn’t wait until everyone went home and I would walk into his office with all these new questions that I had been thinking about. With my shirt off. I would challenge him to keep his serious tone and make it very difficult. It would be amusing. Then, after we walked through all my questions, we would get back on his couch. Or maybe he would even invite me home…if we managed to keep our hands off each other through my long list of questions, after all, we could manage another few minutes to his house. I wondered what it was like. Probably bigger than any place I had ever seen. His bedroom was probably the perfect Martha Stewart representation of the Alpha male. Dark sheets and curtains. A drawer full of kinky things, I could bet. Things I would have no idea the purpose for. And he would probably want to show me.
“Aria,” I heard a male voice say, breaking me out of my embarrassing day dream. I looked up hoping to find Zayden, and was disappointed to find Dick’s face smiling down at me gleefully. Rick. I forced a smile.