Page 101 of Breaking All The Rules
“Okay, then.” Austin nodded and smiled, and suddenly everyone was smiling, and it felt like the best kind of omen. He turned to Winona and Tucker. “You guys are going to have to get out of my way. I have things to organize.”
Tucker practically leaped out of the booth, and Winona wasn’t far behind. “Good luck,” she said as Austin slid out and got to his feet.
“Thanks.” Hopefully he wasn’t going to need it, but he’d sure as hell take it.
…
Two days later, Austin was striding into the funky converted warehouse building belonging to Greet Cute while a herd of elephantine butterflies stomped around inside his belly. He’d rehearsed his speech over and over in his head during the flight from Denver, and he was as ready to make his case as he’d ever be. He’d had no idea where Beatrice was staying now, but he knew with a high degree of certainty, she’d be at work at one thirty on a Thursday and, thanks to Facebook, he knew the corporate address.
Riding the elevator to the third floor, he stepped out and asked a woman in jeans and a Greet Cute T-shirt streaking past where he could find Beatrice. She did a bit of a double-take before pointing to the far corner, to a big glassed-in office.
“Thanks,” he said and headed in that direction.
The fact people stopped and stared at him as Austin made his way across the large, airy space barely registered. He supposed in his jeans, boots, and Stetson, he didn’t exactly look LA chic, but he only had eyes for the redhead who was staring intently at the monitor in front of her.
By the time he was a few feet from her door, Austin’s pulse was beating thick and slow through his temples and his neck and his groin. This was it.
This was the time to leave it all on the field.
Her door was open and Austin slowed, stopping under the frame and leaning his shoulder into the jamb, just watching her for a beat or two, engrossed in her work. She looked good. Her red hair was still as vibrant as he remembered, and it was loose around her shoulders. She was wearing the same kind of T-shirt the woman near the elevator had been wearing.
And if there was any doubt he loved her, that it had been merely fondness or pining or missing their sexy times instead of love, that was all put to instant rest. He knew without a doubt he would go to the ends of the earth for this woman. If she’d have him. Hell, even if she wouldn’t.
She’d only ever have to call and he’d be here.
“Did you get those figures, Jaz?” she asked, not looking up from her screen, a little V of concentration pulling her brows together.
“It’s not Jaz.”
Her head snapped up and she pierced him with those green eyes. “Austin?” she said, her voice disbelieving as she pushed to her feet.
He didn’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing that she was suddenly standing, but her eyes were roaming all over his body and not in a sexual way, in a just-making-sure-it’s-really-you way. It didn’t seem hostile, and it set his pulse pounding through every inch of his body.
“Surprise,” he said, shoving his hands in his pockets in case he did something ill-advised, like opening them, inviting her in, only to have her stay behind her desk. He didn’t want to come closer until he was asked.
“I…” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to see you. To…talk to you.”
“Oh. Right.” Her voice was still faint, and she looked like a deer caught in headlights.
Oh crap…a spike of unease lanced right through his middle. He shouldn’t have come. He should have done this over the phone. Like she’d done. Part of him wanted to turn around and keep on going, taking her stricken look as a statement about her feelings. But he didn’t. He hardened his resolve. He was here now.
It was showtime.
“Well…come in,” she said, awkwardly gesturing him to the chair on the opposite side of her desk. Like she was a doctor and he was the patient she’d been dreading seeing all day because she had bad news to impart.
Crap, crap, crap.
“Shut the door.”
Austin shut the door, noticing the keen interest outside as everyone, it seemed, eyed Beatrice’s office. He ambled toward the desk, but he didn’t sit. And neither did she. They just stared at each other, him with his hands in his pockets, her hands hanging loose, her fingertips absently touching the desk. She was wearing jeans, he noted, and to her right there were three Cranky Bea prints that had been framed and hung on the only non-glass section of wall.
“How are you? How’s Princess?”
Oh God…they’d been reduced to awkward chitchat when once they hadn’t been able to stop talking. “I’m fine. She’s fine. She misses you.” He clenched his jaw, biting down on the urge to say I’ve missed you, but damn it, it was a good lead-in to the conversation he was here to have. Why beat around the bush? “As have I.”
He watched the slow bob of her throat as she swallowed. “Austin.”
