Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 114284 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 571(@200wpm)___ 457(@250wpm)___ 381(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114284 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 571(@200wpm)___ 457(@250wpm)___ 381(@300wpm)
I kept an eye on Lane while I pretended to write things down, and I didn’t miss how he swallowed hard and dropped his stare back to my feet.
Come on, baby. That could be our future.
A tightness spread in my chest.
I still couldn’t believe how much he’d changed shit for me during our one week in Florida, but he fucking had, and I knew what was happening. This was the guy I was falling for. This was the guy I wanted to get serious with.
It was only day one, though, and I was already making progress—before I’d served ice cream. I had to consider that a win.
Seven battles to win the war?
Or however many. I wasn’t going anywhere.
MadCo Sec, my other future. I shut the car door and walked toward our hangar. An actual hangar once used by an agriculture business with their own crop duster plane. Colt had taken one glance at the listing and said, “This is it.” And he was right. We’d had the whole structure painted black, and you could see the large white lettering of our logo from the highway.
The vaulted sides of the interior were now narrow, two-story fish-tank offices enclosed by bulletproof glass; you could see out but not in, and the high ceiling was dotted with spotlights and fans. ’Cause boy did it get hot in the summer.
The massive sliding doors allowing a plane to come in and out had been welded shut, effectively killing Colt’s dream about us having a private plane one day. Sorry, pal, it wasn’t happening. We provided security, not luxury travel.
I headed inside and was greeted by the sight of Colt and two of our employees shooting hoops on the hangar floor.
“Glad to see y’all workin’!” I hollered. If they set the bar, I was game. I wasn’t sure I’d get much done today after the text I’d woken up to.
Distract me, distract me.
Distract me till three o’clock.
We still needed to do something about the main floor. Our little reception desk took up virtually no space, and we had no use for a waiting room. Lunch area in the back with couches and a kitchen setup, not to mention a heavily used coffee machine.
“I had to show Andre I could keep up with the kids.” Colt jogged toward me and snatched up a stack of papers as he passed our unattended reception booth.
“Could you?” I asked.
“That’s what I’m tellin’ Luke and Kit when I get home, anyway.” He stopped next to me and ignored my chuckle. “This is for you. Four new orders of the elite program—and the latest website stats. We’re seein’ a steady increase in visitors on these pages.”
I accepted the documents and eyed the list. This was good. This was why we were currently working to hire guards. It was our next launch, now that we’d gained a solid foundation with alarm systems and all the tech I was in charge of. I nodded along with each item on the list. Lot of corporations went all in—camera surveillance, private guards, software, and so on.
“I get why Fischer wants us to up the numbers, stat,” I murmured. “I guess you have more applicants to interview.”
“Whole day’s packed with ’em,” he chuckled. “Fischer’s stoppin’ by at lunch too. We have the meetin’ about permits for the basement.”
Finally. It’d only taken us seven months so far, but hopefully by the end of this year, we’d have expanded the already huge basement—previously used for storage—and turned it into a shooting range.
“At long last. I’ll be in my office.” I clapped Colt on the arm and proceeded toward the left-side stairs. “Andre! I need you to help me with the transmitters for the new security doors. Either something’s wrong with the software, or we need bigger magnets.”
“Got it, boss,” he replied. “You want me to bring Claire?”
“We need her workin’ on the glass-break detectors.” Colt answered for me. “We’re behind on those.”
Ten minutes till Lane was due.
I leaned back in my chair and rocked it a bit, and I drummed my pen against the edge of my desk.
Today could go straight to hell. I’d had the attention span of a toddler since lunch, and I’d checked the time more than anything else.
The main floor was empty. Colt was on the other side conducting interviews, and my crew was holed up trying to fix a code that was giving us problems. I had no idea about the details, frankly. From right here, I could see the entrance through the glass walls, and I was just grateful nobody could see me. They’d find the most unproductive boss.
I grabbed my phone and read Lane’s first journal entry instead. For the tenth time. He’d texted me shortly before four AM, so I’d seen the messages this morning.
I’ve been trying to come up with what to write for the past three hours, something to describe my own thoughts about tonight, but I keep coming back to you, Sir.