Malcolm Blackberg is beautiful from afar, but up close he’s heart-splittingly hot, full of dark allure with his regal, bird-of-prey nose and dark-rimmed eyes the color of iced tea.
I squat down to gather my things.
Much to my surprise, he squats down and helps. I’m nearly hyperventilating from what a larger-than-life presence he is—and madly muscular, too, judging from the way his pants tighten around his thighs.
This—this is my chance to say something. But my mind is blanking.
I place my things deftly in their exact-right slots in my bag, because even when I’m freaking out, it’s against my hyper-organized heart just to slam everything in.
I look up and again our eyes meet. He regards me with a look that sears me to the core, and then—slowly—his eyes lower to my neck. What does he want with my neck?
He’s staring at my dorky bow tie, of course. God, why did I not listen to Francine on the bow tie? What is wrong with me?
He has my phone in his hand, and he tucks it into the designated phone pocket of my bag.
I gasp, pulse racing.
How did he know?
And then I smile, because I can’t help myself. “Bingo,” I whisper fervently.
And then I think, did I just say “bingo” to Malcolm Blackberg? But it was just incredibly perceptive of him. And sweet, too.
I stand, clutching my bag. “Thank you, you’re very kind,” I blurt.
He just regards me and my neck all fierce and scowly, and somebody behind him sniffs, and he turns and goes.
Leaving me shaking in my worn brown loafers, awash in his powerful masculine energy.
Only too late do I realize that I just blew my chance to speak with him. I try to catch up, but the elevator doors close quickly. I look for the button, but there’s just a blank pad.
“That’s not a public elevator, miss.” It’s the bushy-bearded security guard again. He gestures toward a different set of elevators.
“Oh. Thank you.”
“Second floor.”
I nod.
2
Malcolm
In Medieval London, they put heads on pikes as a warning to people who might venture across the bridge. Beware. Watch your step. Figure out the customs and follow them.
Or else.
The heads sometimes belonged to criminals, though sometimes they were simply unlucky members of the unwashed rabble in the wrong place at the wrong time—such was the system of the day.
At any rate, heads on pikes. As signage, you really can’t do better than heads on pikes, can you? When you have heads on pikes, there is no need for words. There is no need to spell out even a single word. Beware, for example. There would be no need to spell out such a thing when there are heads on pikes in the vicinity. It’s a perfect communication, really, suggesting to all who come to stay out of people’s ways. And by people, I mean me.
“You’re very kind,” my assistant Ted echoes dryly as the doors shut.
“So very kind.” Lynette says. “Wrong building, Riding Hood.”
I look down at my phone, spinning through messages, feeling unsettled.
Kaufenmeier joins us on four, and the elevator continues.
“So very, very kind,” Lynette says again. She’s one of my lawyers, one of my best, but still. I give her a dark look because I heard her the first time around. The smirk disappears from her face.
“What’s going on?” Kaufenmeier asks.
“Mal had to rescue a damsel in distress,” says Ted. “A little gray bird flew into him and dropped all of her feathers.”
“And Mal helps pick them up, and she goes, ‘You’re very kind,’” Lynette says. “Didn’t recognize him, I guess.”
“Very kind,” Kaufenmeier says, also finding it amusing. “Kind like the big bad wolf, maybe.”
“Kind like the scorpion while he’s getting his turtle ride,” Lynette adds with a quirk of her brow, managing to make her reference to the fable sound utterly filthy.
“Do I not pay a small fortune for guards to keep the public out of the lobby?” I grumble. “How about somebody checks on what their policy is for letting people roam around down there without a clear purpose.”
“Get right on it,” Ted says.
I stare down at my phone, but I’m back to the girl in the lobby. She was annoying, not watching where she was going, but Ted has her wrong when he says she didn’t know who I am. She knew precisely who I am.
I stay out of the spotlight as much as I can, but people still recognize me at times; I can always tell from the way they turn guarded, expression hardened. It’s a small click on the dial, but one I know well, having seen it so often.
Sometimes it’s in their posture. Sometimes they actually back up a step, unaware they’re doing it.
People rarely know what they’re doing. They rarely see what’s in front of their faces. It’s why I’m so rich and why everybody else is so pathetic.
So the woman. I saw the recognition in her eyes, but she just stayed there with a kind of wide-open and frank gaze. She didn’t shut it down even when I got close to her, knelt close enough to overwhelm her.
You’re so kind.
It was hardly kindness. It’s just that she was so buttoned down and tied up, right down to the bow around her neck, scrabbling her scattered belongings into just-so order. I had this overwhelming sense of her—I can’t quite describe it—but I was driven to grab her phone and I knew instinctually that pocket is where she’d want it, a theory I proceeded to test. And naturally, I was correct.
I like to stay sharp about people. It’s how I win.
A test of a theory; nothing more. And her, she was an open book, barely guarding herself from the likes of me.
You’re very kind.
Lack of survival skills. Not a good look on a woman.
With this I dismiss her.
Though I have to say, my colleagues’ assessment of her as a gray bird is off, and shows how woefully inaccurate their reading of her was. A gray bird is a common bird and she was anything but. What’s more, they had the color palette wrong; this woman was more like sandstone, pale and subtly golden, her hair just a shade darker than the freckles that cover her face like dusky constellations. Her nose curved just so, the faintest shape of a ski slope. And the quick, efficient way she moved her strong, slim fingers—they wouldn’t have noted that. Her scent—something raspberry coconut. Probably shampoo.
And really, the prim little bow around her collar. For one long, strange moment I imagined undoing it.
Undo the bow. Undo her. Like opening a guileless little gift. Unwrapping her neck, pale and bare. And then a button. Another button. Freckled skin flush with heat. Fingers on pale skin, scattering every last one of her little secrets out of every last one of her hidden little pockets.
You’re very kind.
What would it take to undo her? What would that frank, wide-open gaze look like all heated up?
More to the point, why am I still thinking about her? I have a million things to think about, and they don’t include her. I need to be thinking about a certain merger right now—I actually budgeted this transit time for that.
I put my phone in front of my face. When I have any kind of screen in front of my face, that’s a sign not to speak with me, my own version of a head on a pike. Because the other secret to my success is rigid time management.