Twice Smitten (A Modern Fairy Tale) (7 page)

And it said a lot her mind had decided to take a stroll through that land mine. The attraction to Drew wasn’t wrong in and of itself. He had an appeal that made those primitive genes of survival sit up and hum. Acting on the primitive urge would be unwise, which is why she wouldn’t.

Drew flipped to the last page and began to nod. She put her mind back where it should be—work.

“Ok.” He breathed out. “You need to call a meeting on the Lancaster account. I want to see you guys at work.”

“It’s my smallest account,” she said and then bit her lip. Defensive was not professional. “Let me get the team together,” she corrected.

A smile blossomed. “It’s killing you, isn’t?”

“Excuse me?” Her fingers twitched above the phone.

“Drives you crazy to follow orders. I don’t think it’s just me, but following along behind anyone.”

She placed the phone down, willing to appease him with conversation. “I’m a natural leader.”

“Translation: I like telling people what to do,” he said. “I’m here to watch and then help.”

Abigail sucked her teeth. “Your job is to watch, but then tell someone everything she is doing is wrong. And maybe put a couple of people out of a job.”

“She?” A laugh was in the word.

“I had to choose a gender to make my verbs agree. And currently,” she added, “you’re preventing me from helping you.”

“How?”

“I was going to call my team to set up a meeting. I know Janice and George are out, but they could wrap up what they’re doing in an hour.”

“Everyone has a company cell phone hooked up to their e-mail account. You could send an e-mail. You can keep better track of responses and a loosely put together schedule. Lastly, I don’t want to get anyone on your team fired, if I don’t have to.”

“I don’t micro-manage my team.” This time she couldn’t help the defensiveness, because the earlier comment had been a potshot he sidestepped easily.

“Not saying you should. What you do with your team currently works, but I’m suggesting a small change. It would be more efficient than taking twenty minutes to call everyone. Or, having your assistant call everyone and then try to remember where everyone is located and their ETAs. I do believe you have a program on your computer you’ve seriously neglected that can do everything you’re about to attempt.”

If she disagreed it would be for argument’s sake. She liked the personal contact with her team. E-mail, though faster and efficient, put up a distance she didn’t want. It’s why she wasn’t at a bigger firm, in a large city. The best ideas came when you were sitting face to face, but she would still have personal contact during meetings.

Abigail moved her hand from the phone for a moment. “I’ll bring it up during the meeting.”

She punched the intercom and told her assistant to get everyone together within the hour and to bring all they had for the Lancaster account. She continued to ignore Drew. He had reopened the packet. Abigail pulled up what she had on the Lancaster account on her laptop and printed out a copy. The silence thickened. She stole a glance at him. Drew wasn’t pretending to be engrossed. He was making notes and frowning down at the pages as he read them.

He usually filled up the silence. She cleared her throat, and still he didn’t look up. The hour would tick by slowly with him sitting there quietly. Maybe starting a conversation wouldn’t be so bad.

She picked up a pen, twirled it around and decided to go easy. “How long have you been a consultant?”

He made another notation and then glanced up. “When you first met Greg, I was doing what you do. A few years later I hung out my own shingle, because I worked better on my own, and I hated the constant fast lane.”

Abigail couldn’t help herself. “So, you like to hit it and quit it?”

“You should be banned from using slang,” he said, but laughed. “No. Like I said at the wedding reception, I get paid an ungodly amount of money selling things to people. What I happen to sell is my advice on how they should sell themselves and the products they advertise.”

“And what do you do when you’re not selling yourself?” She even managed to keep a straight face.

Bemusement glittered in his gaze. “Who’s insinuating now?”

“I’ve tried to be professional with you.” Abigail found herself smiling and stopped. “But it’s hard because I know the real you.”

“You think you know the real me.”

“You’re the average man.” Abigail waved one hand in a dismissive manner. She tapped the pen nervously with the other. “You like money, women and probably fast cars.”

“You like to put me in a square peg.” He closed the packet. “Why? Does it make you comfortable to be around me if you can?”

To herself Abigail could admit she couldn’t peg him and that drove her a little mad. She couldn’t predict his next move and prepare a parry. He flew under her radar, and she didn’t like it, but she wasn’t going to confess to him.

“You like to think of yourself as mysterious. You’ve let your family believe you do only God knows what for money, and that you have a bunch of little Drew’s walking around. Why?” She threw back at him. “You led me to believe it, too.”

Drew stretched out his legs, crossing them at the ankle. “They assume I’m something I’m not. Wouldn’t it be a sign of insecurity if I go around reassuring them of who I am? If they can’t be bothered to know me, then I’d rather not be bothered with them, period.”

Drew sat in her office, and not in the one Jim had offered as a loan. He wanted to be bothered with her. The idea chaffed…and sent a flutter of excitement through her. He wanted her to know the real him. It meant he had a long game stashed somewhere in that devious brain of his. But why did it matter to Drew what she thought of him? It was the part that chaffed, because it meant she didn’t know him. Again, flying under the radar and driving her mad.

“See,” Abigail said, “I think you get a kick out of misleading people. Doesn’t make any sense why you would. Be you. Everyone else can take it or leave it.”

He pressed his tongue against the inside of his cheek for a moment. “Are you exactly who you act to be?”

“I don’t act.”

He sighed and gave her an exasperated glare. “Yes, you do. Ever since I showed up you’ve wanted to question me about everything in my professional and personal life, but you’re hesitant because asking means something you can’t begin to define.” He shook his head. “Not to mention, before yesterday, you couldn’t fathom me holding down a steady job. Much less an honest job. Though you were intrigued and probably charmed by the idea of me teetering on the brink of the unrighteous side of law. You, like many women, have a thing for bad boys.”

Abigail actively ignored most of his statement. “What else was I supposed to think when you tell everyone you’re in sales?”

He straightened, leaned forward. “Most people would think I was in advertising or marketing. Door to door salesman. You think drug dealer. That says more about you than it does me. And,” he scoffed, “Greg used to tell me what you did with your friends. You’re not the responsible, staid adult you act to be.”

He had her there. “I can have facets,” she said.

“So do I. But like I said, you’d rather stamp square peg on my forehead and march ahead with the assumption. Why?”

Cautious, she answered, “At the time, when I was with Greg, I didn’t want his right hand man to be someone he’d have to bail out of jail in the middle of the night.”

He tilted his head. “That has a bit of the truth wrapped around it.”

“What truth?”

He hesitated and then nodded. “You couldn’t believe Greg, the perfect man of your dreams, would be best friends with someone like me. It screwed with your ideal of the man who wanted to marry you.”

A pang of regret strummed through her chest. Drew hadn’t said the man you wanted to marry as though the engagement happened to her. Like being struck by a car when you cross a street. Damn, if he wasn’t right. The proposal had thrown her, and it shouldn’t have. From the outset Greg had never lied about his intentions of getting married one day. It had never occurred to Abigail she might be the one Greg wanted to marry. After the shock had worn off, it felt wrong. Not just him for her, but her for him.

Drew picked up on the indecision and said what she’d feared. Even if he hadn’t, eventually Abigail would have seen agreeing to marry Greg was a mistake. But when would she have seen it for herself?

God. She desperately wanted to be the woman who wouldn’t kick out the ex-fiancée crashing the wedding. Invitation or no, showing up had been crashing. No one had expected her to actually come. And if the shoe was on the other foot? She’d kick the ex out faster than the wind could blow. She wasn’t kind or soft, and probably would never be that kind of a person. That kind of person could be what someone else needed. It sucked. It made her head and heart hurt, and she wouldn’t be thinking this morosely about her personality if Drew hadn’t brought the past up. They had a meeting to go to where she would have to encourage her team to come up with stellar ideas for the Lancaster’s account. She had to put on the face of confidence. Abigail knew it was irrational, but she would lay blame at Drew’s feet.

He sat back in an insolent yet relaxed position. “Forget it.”

“What?” Abigail never said she wasn’t contrary.

“You’ve got that look like everything’s my fault. You had it when I pointed out you weren’t really happy with Greg. You wore it on Saturday when your friend Sasha kept flirting with me.”

“You make it sound like I’m deranged.”

“In denial. You said deranged.”

She couldn’t muster up enough righteous anger and the laugh spilled out unguarded. “You do, you really do get a kick out of acting lazy and a lush, but you want to talk about me being in denial? I’m starting to think—”

“Don’t.” He shook his head. “Wait until you know more about me before making any assumptions. I thought that’s what this conversation was about. What you believe me to be and how it’s wrong.”

“I thought this conversation was about how you believe you know everything about me.”

He shrugged a shoulder. “But, I do, Abby.”

His statement wrapped around her and felt deliciously warm. She was attracted to the certainty in not only his words, but him and the possibility he did know the real Abigail.

Bad, bad,
bad
idea.

The intercom buzzed. “Everyone’s in the conference room ready and roaring to go.”

“You don’t have to impress him,” Abigail said. “That’s my cross to bear.”

Her assistant snorted and cut off the intercom.

“You have a way of making a guy feel welcome.”

Glad the moment had passed, she smiled at Drew. “I know.”

Chapter Six

Drew stopped at the door to the conference room. “I should tell you I’m going to break up the team into two. Since I’m fair, I’ll let you get first pick.”

“What?” she rasped.

He answered by walking into the conference room. She passed him, and in a harsh whisper said, “You could have told me.”

Drew pretended to be affronted, but kept his voice low. “You were too busy
maligning
my character. You looked like you were having fun. Didn’t want to interrupt.”

Bitterness filled his mouth, and he couldn’t wholly direct his anger at Abigail. She’d seen Drew as he needed her to see him: the loafer, the lush, the womanizing cousin. The persona ensured and strengthened the boundaries that should never be crossed. A few days couldn’t undo a few years work. The honest truth, the man he let her see back then had a basis in truth. Yet, the type of person he could have become as a teen had nothing to do with the man he was.

He sighed, brushed the matter aside for the moment and took in the room. A good portion of her team was made up from advertising along with sales and the creative team. The last two were part of marketing and promotion. Six all together, he knew three were on loan, all looking at him with wary expressions. He strode to the front of the room and let his smile start the process of putting them at ease.

The first lesson he’d learned in consulting, never start the conversation with a grim expression. Plus, it was simple common sense.

“Good afternoon. I haven’t been introduced to some of you, but I’ll start first. I’m Drew Carter and I’m a consultant. What I’ll be doing here for the next couple of weeks will improve your sales and client satisfaction.”

He left out the part about possible layoffs. Information like that never gave you the person’s best work. What you usually received was crap produced out of desperation. So, Drew nodded to the man closest to his right. Older, a mustache covered most of his face and he’d gone without a jacket. A drawing pad sat open in front of him. “Michael, Creative.”

From there the rest of the room followed. Janice, Creative. George, Advertising. Stephen, Marketing. Abigail had situated herself in the chair behind Nancy from Advertising, but she only watched him. Her impassive features told him nothing. The pin-straight ebony strands glossed in the fluorescent light. The angular jawline softened at her chin. He smiled to himself. Probably the only soft thing she allowed anyone to see. A crazy thought to have while people waited to hear his brilliant plan.

He cleared his throat and dropped the bomb. “The best way to know your strengths and weaknesses is to work against them or make things work in spite of them. You’ll be split into two teams. I’ll be the leader of one and Abigail will be the other.”

Stephen leaned back with a grin. “What’s the prize? Has to be one.”

Young, ambitious and cocky. The man’s entire closet probably cost more than he made in a year. Stephen would like the idea of winning.

“The campaign the client chooses will win bragging rights.” The people in the room groaned, and he laughed. “Also, a grand each from my own money.”

With that announcement Abigail leaned forward. “You must be quite sure of yourself.”

“I am,” Drew said. “You pick first.”

Leslie, from promotions spoke up. “I’m the only one for promotions.”

Drew shrugged. “You’ll work in tandem with both teams. Think of it this way—you’ll be getting a guaranteed grand. If, which isn’t likely, my team loses, they won’t get a dime, but you will.”