From Now On (2 page)

             
Emily had been devastated. She swore she never meant to hurt Jo. And Jo believed her, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt each time she thought about it.

             
“Tell me what’s going on,” Jo said.

             
“Nico’s overbooked and they can’t give us the room on Saturday. So they’ve moved it to Friday.”

             
“But that’s like, the day after tomorrow.”

             
“I know. I’ve already been on the phone with everyone we invited. Most of them can change their plans. And the wine delivery was for that night anyway, just so we could be sure the champagne would be on time. But I know this puts you in something of a bind with work and everything.”

             
Yeah, Jo thought. It meant that she would have to sneak out of the office before five. Kathleen Thompson, while a fair boss, did not look kindly on employees who wanted to leave the office early on a Friday. It suggested frivolity, something Kathleen definitely did not promote.

             
“I’ll work it out,” Jo said.

             
“You are the best, Jo,” Emily gushed. “I don’t know how I would get through all this without you.”

             
“You would be fine.”

             
“No, I don’t think so.” Emily sighed. “So tell me what’s going on with you.”

             
“Not much. Nothing ever changes in my life.”

             
“Sure it does.”

             
Jo thought about Mark and smiled. “Well, there is a little something. There’s a new guy in IT.”

             
“Really? Is he cute?”

             
Jo thought about Mark’s dimple and his well-defined physique. “He’s not bad looking.”

             
“Oh, Jo, you should check him out before one of those other shrews gets their nails into him.”

             
“Guys like that don’t go for girls like me, Emily.”

             
“Because you don’t put yourself out there.”

             
“And how do you suggest I do that?”

             
“Just talk to him.”

             
Jo scratched her scalp, the idea of approaching Mark cold made her nerves tingle uncomfortably. “I’ll think about it.”

             
Emily sighed, clearly exasperated. “I worry so much about you. You should have gotten married long before me.”

             
“Emily—”

             
“I know.” She sighed again. “So, on Friday, there’s one other thing.”

             
“What’s that?”

             
“Ryan’s going to help you set up because I have a hair appointment with Mom.”

             
Jo tightened her grip on the phone, half hoping she heard Emily wrong. She hadn’t seen Ryan in months, not since he quit BerCo in favor of a better paying job. It had been a relief for Jo to not have to see him every day, knowing that people were talking about them behind their backs. And it had meant no more Emily coming to the office, all giddy and in love, to see him instead of Jo.

             
Being alone with Ryan now was really the last thing Jo wanted.

             
“I’m really sorry, Jo,” Emily said. “If there was any other way…”

             
“Don’t worry about it. He’s practically family now, anyway.”

What else could she say?

             
“You’re the best, Jo.”

Jo smacked her hand against the side of her computer monitor. Of all the days for it to decide to freeze up on her. She’d called IT more than twenty minutes ago, and of course they weren’t there yet. A glance at the clock only increased her panic She had less than an hour to do three hours of work before she had to leave for Emily’s engagement party.

She tried again to get the frozen cursor to move by typing randomly on the keyboard, but again there was no response.

“That won’t help,” a voice from the open doorway stated.

Jo looked up and forgot her urgency for a moment as Mark walked into the room. She couldn’t help but admire the way he moved, the easy confidence with which he carried himself. And the smile he offered her that made her heart skip a beat.

“So we meet again,” he said.

“Yeah. I guess it was inevitable with these old clunkers.”

Mark laughed. “I’m beginning to realize that.”

Jo got up and made room for Mark to sit behind her desk. At first she stood behind him, enjoying the smell of his cologne and the vision of his large, muscular hands on her keyboard. Her thoughts began to turn more to the erotic, but the sight of the pale white mark on his ring finger, where a wedding band should have been, made her realize she did not know enough about him to have thoughts of that nature.

Jo moved restlessly to the front of her desk and watched in silence as he did one thing after another to coax her computer to properly function. He glanced at her once or twice, but otherwise seemed unaware of her presence. It was awkward, to say the least.

To make the situation worse, voices began to float into the room from the hallway. The gist of the conversation was soon very clear and Jo froze solid, imitating the actions of her antiquated hard drive.

“Can you believe she’s throwing the engagement party? First the humiliation of losing her boyfriend to her sister—”

“I would have died.”

“But its Jo we’re talking about. She would sit back and let anyone walk over her.”

“True.”

“Remember when she had that thing for Sam up in legal? She was like a—”

The door slammed.

“Nothing I hate more than gossips,” Mark said as he quickly returned to her desk.

Heat again rushed to Jo’s face, a growing habit around Mark. She turned away, staring out the window at the Dallas cityscape as though it was the most interesting thing in the world. She couldn’t help but wonder what he thought about what he’d heard. Did he think she was a doormat like her coworkers did? Did he think she was weak and stupid? She couldn’t imagine why he wouldn’t.

“I should have this working again in a few minutes,” Mark said.

“Thank you,” she said, risking a quick glance in his direction. He was watching her, a sadness in his eyes that touched her deeply. But then she realized he felt sorry for her and she turned away again.

“Funny the things you have to put up with for a paycheck,” he said after a few moments of silence, nodding at her computer monitor. “Hard to adjust to these antiquated machines after the state of the art stuff we had at my last job.”

“Where was that?” Jo asked, hoping to change the subject.

“Mason’s Electronics across town. Would still be there, but the economic downturn forced layoffs.”

“Is that where you learned to do all this?” she asked, gesturing at her computer.

“No. Learned it in the Army.”

Jo turned and regarded him with more interest. “You were in the Army?”

“Twelve years,” Mark said proudly. “Wanted to put in my twenty, but things change.”

“Were you injured?” Jo asked, trying to imagine where the injury might be. Again her thoughts began to go in a direction she didn’t want them to go.

“I was one of the lucky ones. Never injured.” He paused his hands on the keyboard, his head tilting slightly as he studied something on the monitor. “It was a family thing. After my first deployment to Afghanistan, my wife gave me a choice: the Army or her.”

“Oh,” Jo mumbled, disappointed at his confirmation of what she had already guessed. He was married.

He was quiet for a minute and Jo turned again to stare out at the city, but she didn’t really seeing anything. That was always the way. Whenever she met a guy she really liked, either he was already in a relationship or he was more interested in glamour and sophistication.

Disappointed as she was, she was still curious. So she asked quietly, “Do you have kids?”

“Two. Missy is eight and Dillon is five.”

There was pride in his voice. Jo could imagine him showing pictures to all his coworkers down in IT with a proud story for each. For some reason, the idea didn’t seem all that out of character to Jo. Mark struck her as the type to pledge to a lifetime of faithfulness and responsibility.

Too bad, Jo thought. He was everything she had ever imagined for herself.

“Okay, I think I got it,” Mark said suddenly.

Jo moved behind her desk and was relieved to see the report she had been working on back and functioning on her computer screen. “Oh, wow, thank you,” she gushed.

“No problem.” Mark pointed to a couple of keys on her keyboard. “The next time it happens, push these all together. This box will appear and just click this,” he pointed to the screen, “and it should fix the problem.”

“Okay,” she said, leaning forward slightly to get a better look at the dialogue box. “They tell us not to try to fix things ourselves, so I didn’t think—”

“It’ll save you some aggravation with these old machines.” Mark stood, causing them to suddenly be close enough to touch. “But I’ll be happy to come back anytime.”

Jo smiled, suddenly feeling brave with him so close. “I’ll be sure to ask for you specifically,” she said with what she hoped was a light, flirty tone.

“For you, I will take that as an honor.”

Mark touched her cheek lightly, brushing a loose curl that had escaped her braid from her face. She looked up at him, afraid to move in fear that she might fall forward. She was suddenly dizzy as she looked into his eyes and thought she saw a longing not unlike her own. Her hands shook. She pressed them against her chest, unsure where else to put them. In the back of her mind, she knew he was married, knew he was just being friendly. Yet there was something about his touch, about the soft smile on his lips. Hope bloomed in her chest despite everything. And when his thumb brushed across her chin, reality just seemed to fall away.

He cupped her jaw in his hand, lifting her face higher to force her to look at him as he might have done to a child. “Don’t let them hurt you with their junior high antics. They are just unhappy people who get pleasure from hurting someone else. Don’t give them that power.”

Tears briefly flooded Jo’s eyes. “I won’t,” she whispered.

Then he was gone and Jo was left wondering if she had simply imagined the whole thing.

She was late.

Jo rushed into the restaurant, fifteen minutes late, and charged into the private room where the party was set to take place in less than an hour.

“I am so sorry,” she told Ryan as she dropped her bag and rushed to join him in unpacking the decorations.

“Kathleen give you a hard time about leaving?”

“No. My computer crashed again.”

“They still haven’t updated the equipment?”

“I don’t think they ever intend to. It costs too much.”

Ryan shook his head. “It would save them millions a year if they weren’t paying their employees to sit around and wait for IT.”

“Tell them that,” Jo sighed. “Lord knows I’ve written enough reports on that exact issue.”

“I know you have,” Ryan said.

Jo turned away under his gaze and carefully lifted floral centerpieces that she and Emily had put together out of their boxes. They had held up well, she was pleased to notice. After removing the last one, she turned to Ryan to ask where he thought they would look best. He was still watching her, a thoughtful expression on his face.

“I guess we should put these on the refreshment table, right?” she asked, trying to ignore the heat his gaze caused to rise to her scalp. “Or maybe we could put one on the bar?”

“I’m glad we have this time alone, Jo,” Ryan said quietly.

“Why’s that?” she asked, her voice quivering slightly.

“I never really got a chance to tell you how sorry I am.”

Jo turned her head, looking across the cavernous room, imagining how the centerpieces would look at each alternative site. “I think we should put one on the bar,” she said, in an awkward attempt at changing the subject.

“Jo.” Ryan knew better. He knew what she was doing, but he was clearly determined to get out what he wanted to say. He laid his hands on her shoulders and made her turn. “I never meant to hurt you.”

“I know.”

“I love Emily. I want you to know that, to know that I plan to make her very happy.”

“I know that, too, Ryan.” Jo bit her lip, trying to keep it from quivering. He loves her, not me, she thought. That’s always the way it goes.

“You don’t have to do this,” she muttered, staring down at her shoes instead of into his green eyes.