Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 63311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 317(@200wpm)___ 253(@250wpm)___ 211(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63311 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 317(@200wpm)___ 253(@250wpm)___ 211(@300wpm)
“It wasn’t just about me, though. He betrayed his wife…with me,” I yelped. “That makes me a horrible person by default.”
“Does it?”
“Yes. I should have put the clues together. I should have asked probing questions. I should have known I was being used. Maybe I did. Ignoring reality is my specialty, but I never meant to hurt anyone,” I finished in a barely audible tone. “I swear.”
He let silence gather and this time, I was grateful for it. If I hadn’t just spilled my guts and revealed my deepest regret, I might have been tempted to fill it with my usual stream-of-consciousness chatter, but it felt like too much work and I just didn’t have it in me. I sat quietly instead and tried to connect the dots.
I mean…seriously. How did I get here? My one-night stand turned out to be my boss. Again. Except Graham was nothing like Damian. He was a tall, suave, handsome, and powerful executive, not an ordinary-looking academic with a god complex and an aversion to the truth. If anything, Graham was brutally honest.
And intense.
His sharp gaze was unnerving. I couldn’t read him at all, but that was okay. He knew the worst of me now. There was a very good chance I’d never see him after tonight, so I wasn’t sure why I’d bothered with uncomfortable truths. On the other hand, it felt nice to set my burden down for a minute.
“You’re hard on yourself, aren’t you?” he asked, ripping me from my reverie.
My eyes snapped to his. “I…maybe a little.”
“More than a little,” Graham hummed. “Anyone can get lost in ‘should haves’ and ‘would haves,’ but what’s done is done. There’s no point in punishing yourself. You’re here now…and you still haven’t told me why you conned your way into an executive assistant position. At my firm, no less.”
I winced as I briefly glanced away. “I was desperate to get as far away from LA as possible, and London won. My best friend Winnie’s sketchy brother-in-law owns the law firm I told you about. I asked Milo for an extra-fabulous referral and wound up getting one so good that it convinced Julia to hire me. And…here we are.”
Graham’s lips twitched as he lifted his teacup. “It’s not quite so simple, is it? Julia is a smart woman. If Bernadette suspected you weren’t who you claimed to be, Julia would’ve known it for well over a week now. Any idea why she hasn’t fired you?”
I wrinkled my nose and sighed.
“Well…I think she felt kind of silly for hiring me in the first place. Maybe a little guilty too, since I made a huge move to another country. She’s giving me a fast-track training session, and don’t worry…she’s also looking for a better replacement. But this isn’t her fault. This is on me,” I assured him emphatically. “All of it.”
“Hmm. What are your actual qualifications?”
“Research and analysis,” I replied quickly.
Graham perked up. “Oh?”
“I specialize in historical research. I have an art history degree, and I’ve always sort of had a thing for European and ancient Egyptian history.”
“Oh,” he deadpanned.
“But I’m a fast learner and a hard a worker. Long hours don’t bother me. I’ve done the receptionist thing, and I can file with the best of them. I’m kind of hoping to stay in England. Is there an assistant job at another office nearby? I can fit in anywhere. I can even fake a British accent. I’ll just…talk like you.” I cleared my throat. “Aye, mate. It’s a smashing time to do something brilliant, eh?”
Graham snorted in amusement, signaling for the check before regarding me in that cool, measuring way of his. “I do not sound like that, and neither does anyone else in all of England. No one holds being American against you. The problem is—and please take this the nicest way possible—you don’t fit at The Horsham Group, Raine. It makes sense now that I know you’re an academic, not a financier.”
“Nah, I’m not really an academic,” I admitted. “I just like history. And research.”
He waved his hand in my direction, and to his credit, looked a tad uncomfortable as he added, “To be blunt, you don’t look the part of an executive assistant. There was an iron mark on your shirt this morning. I’ve never seen that outside a cartoon. Ever.”
“Me either! I swear, that was a first.”
Graham chuckled. “I’m sure that’s true. Ours isn’t the laid-back atmosphere you might have enjoyed in academia or in your other assisting capacities. We have unspoken rules that you’re unfamiliar with—even in our US offices.”
“So…to stay on at your company, I’d need to change my personality and get a new wardrobe. Is that right?”
Graham scribbled his name on the check and pushed the leather binder to the edge of the linen-clothed table. “Don’t change, Raine.”
I nodded slowly. “O-kay…”