Page 17 of His for Christmas
Okay, so maybe the crush wasn’t that far-fetched considering.
Still, I shouldn’t be thinking about saying anything else to him. Not even goodbye. I left a quick note for Christy letting her know the work I’d done, so she’d know where to pick up. Then I grabbed my purse and headed for the elevator.
I refused to look back at the office. Refused to care. I made it inside the elevator. The doors slid shut behind me… until a hand pushed in to stop them.
Mr. Thompson.
“Going down?” he asked.
I averted my eyes and nodded. Outwardly I remained calm and collected, but inside my senses went haywire like they did every time he was nearby. The size of him, filling up every spare inch in the elevator. The heat of him, making my skin tingle.
The musky male scent of him, turning me to liquid. God, I need to get out of this elevator.
Either that or I needed never to leave it.
Out of the corner of my eye I watched him step inside and press the button for the lobby. The elevator began moving.
“Do you have plans?” He cleared his throat. “For Christmas Eve?”
I blinked. Why was he making small talk after avoiding me for two weeks? And how embarrassing would it be to tell him no, I didn’t have any plans?
I was saved from that embarrassment when the elevator shuddered to a stop, well before we would have reached the ground floor. The lights flickered and went off. I blinked as low yellow lights appeared from the bottom of the walls, giving me just enough illumination to make out the shadows.
The elevator doors didn’t open.
“What’s going on?” I whispered. Something about the darkness made it seem like I should be quiet.
He pressed the buttons, but they weren’t even lit. “The storm must have taken down the grid.”
Crap, just what I needed, to be trapped with the man I had an inappropriate and completely unrequited crush on. My heart began beating faster, as if this was some kind of private makeout session instead of just bad luck. “Security will know to look for us, won’t they?”
“Yes.” A beat passed. “Maybe not. There aren’t many people with access to this elevator. And most people leave early on Christmas Eve. In fact, why are you still here?”
“I don’t have any family in town.” I didn’t have any family at all, but he didn’t need to know that. My daddy hadn’t responded to my letter from jail, and maybe that was all I deserved after running away from home, for not trusting him enough to stay. Stupid girl, he’d called me.
Sometimes I thought running away had been the smartest thing I’d ever done.
“I see,” Mr. Thompson said.
And I thought that, somehow, he may have figured it out. Who spent the night before Christmas filing papers for a boss who didn’t even like them? I did, apparently. Who stuck around at the end of a temp job because they didn’t want it to be over? Me again.
Stupid girl.
I’d always believed I’d prove my dad wrong, but I never had, and days like this, I thought I never would.
Mr. Thompson pulled out his phone. Light from the screen filled the elevator with a blue glow, making it feel more intimate, more wrong. And more clear, as the faint light lit his face. “Damn,” he muttered. “Signal is shit in here. Try yours?”
“I—I don’t have a cellphone.”
He glanced at me, and I felt his surprise overcome his frustration. “Why not?”
A blush heated my face. Thank goodness it was too dark for him to see the proof of my embarrassment. At least I hoped so. I certainly couldn’t see the tan color of his skin or dark mahogany of his hair. He was all angles and shadows to me now, more a dream than reality, which made it easier somehow to tell the truth. “I can’t afford one.”
I expected him to look away. I wanted him to look away, to give me some relief, but instead his gaze sharpened even further. And I knew he was taking note of my clothes that didn’t quite fit or the winter jacket with holes in it. “How long have you been working temp jobs?”
Oh God, was he going to find out now? At the very end? It wouldn’t matter if he fired me, but if he found out I’d lied and told the authorities, I could be put back in jail.
“This is my first job out of school,” I said vaguely, desperately, hoping it would be enough.
“Have you applied for permanent positions?”
“Um. Yeah.” I’d applied to a hundred positions, both permanent and not. Each time disclosing my criminal record. And then, when I’d gotten hungry enough and scared enough, I’d skipped the disclosure. And the HR person for Thompson Industries called me the next day. “Haven’t found one yet.”
