Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 61440 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 307(@200wpm)___ 246(@250wpm)___ 205(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61440 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 307(@200wpm)___ 246(@250wpm)___ 205(@300wpm)
Rictor grunts out a laugh as he crosses to the fridge. “Don’t even think about it, bro. She looks like a firecracker, but under all that ginger, she’s cold as ice.”
“Excuse me?” I turn to him with a frown.
“Getting in her pants,” Rictor clarifies, his voice low. “It’s a no-fly zone down there, I promise. Better men than you have tried.”
My jaw drops. I can’t believe he’s taking the conversation there not thirty seconds after meeting me—and with six other employees, most of them women, standing less than four feet away at the coffee machine.
I’m still trying to figure out how “Eric” responds to stuff like this, when my butt begins to vibrate. “Barbie Girl” by Aqua blasts from the speakers, filling the break room with a sugary-pink pop song so girly I might as well rip off my pants and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that I’m in possession of a vagina.
I struggle to pull my phone from my tiny back pocket, sweat breaking out beneath my fake ’stache. Finally, I wrestle my cell free and silence the pop-abomination amidst giggles from the women stirring creamer into their coffees a few feet away.
“Got a thing for Barbie, huh?” Rictor casts serious side-eye my direction.
“My neighbor’s daughter must have done that last night,” I say as I decline Spencer’s call. I’m not ready to give him a breakdown on project Trojan Mustache just yet. “She borrows it to play Scrabble and then changes my ringtones to the most embarrassing things possible. It’s part of a prank war she started when she was eight and decided a wo-working, um…” I clear my throat with a nervous laugh. “A working guy living alone needed a kid influence in his life.”
Shoot, I almost said “woman living alone.”
I almost blew it five freaking minutes into my first day!
“Prank war, huh?” Rictor grunts. “I think it’s safe to say the kid won.”
“Well, I think it’s cute,” a rosy-cheeked brunette I don’t remember meeting last week pipes up from near the snack machine. “It’s sweet that you’re good with kids. Shows character.”
“I don’t know that I’m good with kids in general,” I confess. “But Sonia’s a good friend. Her other dad passed away a few years ago, and since then our whole floor has chipped in to help Spencer out. Being a single parent isn’t easy anywhere, I’m sure, but it seems extra hard here in the city.”
More murmurs of appreciation fill the air and one woman presses a hand to her heart as she announces, “That’s it. I’ve got my new favorite broker. Anything you need, Eric, you let me know. I work support for Bruce Maddox and Kyle Hershman, but I can always fit you into my schedule.”
Cheeks flushing with embarrassment, I thank her and excuse myself, fleeing the room without coffee while Rictor glares at me with thinly disguised contempt for my less-than-manly display. Back at my desk, I settle in with headphones and the Seyfried & Holt orientation video queued up on my computer, determined to get back on track and stay under the radar.
I’m here to blend in, bear witness, and bring back observations from the front lines of the gender-inequality war, none of which is going to happen if I blow my cover on my first day.
Thankfully, the rest of the morning passes peaceably, and I spend my lunch hour in a booth at the back of a nearby Russian bistro, eating spine-strengthening red cabbage soup and steeling myself for another five hours of manliness.
But I probably should’ve eaten two orders. By the time the two o’clock meeting rolls around, I’m already drained.
I’ve underestimated how exhausting it would be to micromanage every move, every breath, every word and non-verbal response, from the way I laugh to the sound I make when I bang my knee—hard—on the metal leg of the conference table.
My high-pitched yip of agony goes mostly unnoticed in the chaos as people settle in for the meeting, but Jack’s sharp green gaze shifts my way, his lips twisting with disapproval. I smile reflexively—my usual anxious, Jack’s-in-my-vicinity grin—before I remember to be manly and take my grinning down a notch.
But the anxiety triggered by Jack’s glare remains.
It’s the first time I’ve seen him since our one-on-one time in his office yesterday, and for some reason I can’t stop staring at his hands. At his fingers, to be precise, those strong, capable fingers that so gently pressed my mustache into place while Jack’s body heat made my skin flush beneath my ill-fitting suit and Jack’s unique scent bloomed in the air around me, a heady mix of eucalyptus, fennel, and a spicy, clean scent that makes my mouth water.
The man smells good enough to eat.
Or at least to lick.
To lick all over, up and down, until I’ve explored every inch of his tanned, toned, utterly delicious—