In the Eye of the Storm (11 page)

How did she expect to really go back to the way things were with all of this emotion inside of her?  Holly was not like Stephen; she felt things.  Relationships
meant
something to her and no matter how you looked at it, she and Stephen had a relationship.  Actually, they seem to have a multi-leveled one and it was going to be a battle to forget about the physical one.   She cried for all that she had in just that short weekend and for all that would never be.  She cried in confusion of what it was that she wanted for her own life and how she was going to make things work come tomorrow afternoon. 

Kicking the blankets off of herself, Holly walked to the bathroom for a tissue and took a long look at her reddened face in the mirror.  “You are a fool,” she said to herself.  “You just
had
to sleep with him, didn’t you?  You just couldn’t stay in bed that night, could you?  You had to have a piece of chocolate…”  Disgust covered her face.  Chocolate.  All of this happened because she had a sweet tooth.  She was pretty certain that they would have controlled themselves if they had not seen each other in that moment Saturday night. 

Turning on the faucet, she splashed cold water on her face, dried it, and gave herself one last look of deprecation before turning out the light and heading back to bed.  Lying in the dark, it was a long time before her mind shut down enough to let her sleep. 

****

The parking garage was filling quickly at noon on Tuesday.  There were still many patches of puddles and it was cold and damp, but for the most part it seemed as if the worst was over.  Holly climbed out of her car and met up with some of the girls from the accounting department and headed across the street to Ballinger’s; each telling their tale of the harried weekend storm and how it had taken them all by surprise.

Oh, if only they knew!

Once up on the eighth floor, Holly found Stephen to already be in his office and on the phone.  She went about her normal routine and got the coffee up and running while her computer warmed up and then went about listening to the voicemails that had piled up over the long weekend.  Weeding out the important messages, she organized them all and headed back to the small kitchenette where the coffee was now steaming and ready.  Fixing Stephen’s mug, she headed back through to her desk, scooped up the messages and headed in to his office.

If she was afraid of it being awkward, she was disappointed.  Stephen was fully immersed in ‘work-Stephen’ mode; he barely acknowledged her presence at first as he talked on the phone to a client in Texas who was having problems with their security system due to a storm that had blown through their area.  She placed his coffee on his desk, laid out his phone messages and went back to her own desk, relieved that their first meeting held no drama.

Two hours later, Stephen was finally off of the phone and called Holly in to his office to tell her how to handle each of the messages left upon his desk plus what needed to be done to fix the problem with the client in Texas.  His tone was impersonal, as if he were addressing a practical stranger.  He never once even looked at her.  Holly wrote everything down and as she was making her final notation, Stephen stepped around the desk to inform her that he was heading out to a meeting with Frank Gideon and that he probably would be out for the rest of the day.  He reminded her to call it quits at five o’clock and before she could comment, he was gone.

Okay, fine; this was a
lot
less personal than what she had been expecting but at least she knew that for today they were fine and more than capable of working with one another.

That pattern of business and behavior continued through the end of the week.  By Friday afternoon Holly had come to the conclusion that their weekend together had clearly meant more to her than it had to Stephen because there had not even been a
hint
of anything personal between them.  If anything, the man treated her as if she had the plague.  There were no times that they were alone where the door wasn’t open or someone wasn’t on speaker phone with him; they had barely made eye contact.  Well if that’s the way that it was, than so be it.  Holly could move on just as easily, too.

At five o’clock on Friday afternoon, Holly walked in to Stephen’s office and handed him the contracts that she had spent the entire day working on and placed then on his desk and wished him a good weekend as she quickly turned back towards the door.  As usual, he was on the phone and merely waved a hand without looking at her. 

If she slammed her desk drawer with a little more force than usual, no body seemed to notice.  If she scowled a bit on the elevator ride down to the lobby, people chose to say nothing.  She was muttering under her breath as she made her way out the main door out on to the sidewalk about how rude and inconsiderate of a man she worked for and what a completely self-absorbed bastard he was when she walked directly in to someone.  At the moment of impact, two strong hands came and gently grasped her upper arms to steady her.  She looked up and saw that it was Will.

Great.

“Hey,” he said, mildly chuckling, “are you okay?”  He had a great smile and brown eyes that twinkled and lit up his whole face.  Holly really had always liked Will and she hated that her first reaction to seeing him was to feel her stomach pitch and roll with unease.

“Oh, hey, Will,” she said with forced cheeriness.  “I’m fine; I guess I just wasn’t paying too much attention to where I was going.  Sorry for slamming in to you.”

Will left his hands on her arms for longer than was really necessary and examined her face.  She looked about as happy as Stephen had sounded on the phone earlier.  He hadn’t heard back from Stephen after their phone conversation on Saturday night but being that Holly was still here and working for him he could only imagine how the rest of the weekend had gone. 

If they hadn’t slept together that would explain why Holly was still here; Stephen must have put his sexual feelings for her aside in favor of the company’s needs.  That would make a man miserable for sure, especially if it meant not getting involved with a woman as beautiful as Holly.  However, the misery on her face was a mystery.  And if there was one thing that Will knew for certain it was to butt out of this situation before anything like last weekend happened again.

Deciding that he was staring for an inappropriate amount of time, he remembered to speak.  “Kind of early for you to be getting out isn’t it?”  He finally released her arms, too.

“What?” she asked, mildly confused, and then remembered her new hours.  “Oh, yes, well…we’re trying something new.  I’ve been leaving at five o’clock with everyone else.”  She looked at him and his eyebrows were raised as if he was waiting for her to continue. 

“It still feels weird; I feel like my day isn’t done quite yet but it’s nice to be able to go home and cook for myself and relax a little before having to come back here in the morning.” 

That made him laugh.  “Well, I hear that you put the boss in his place last weekend.  Good for you!  It’s about time that someone reminded Mr. Workaholic that some of us enjoy having personal lives.  I’m proud of you, Holly.”

“Thanks.”

They stood there for a moment with nothing to say before Holly felt the need to escape.  “Well, I guess I should be going.  Have a nice weekend, Will.”  She went to walk around him when he placed a hand on her arm, gently, one more time.

“Is everything okay, Holly?”  His forehead was creased with concern and the question was asked softly so that no one walking by would hear.  But one look in his eyes and Holly knew that his concern was sincere.  She only hoped that Stephen had not shared any intimate details of their weekend together.  He watched her chew on her bottom lip nervously.  “I’m not trying to pry or anything, it’s just that…well, I like you; I think that you are an amazing woman.  I also know that you and Stephen fought a lot last weekend and yet you’re still here.  I just wanted to make sure that you were okay.  That he’s treating you all right…”

“I’m fine, Will.  Thanks.”  She sighed.  “It’s a little awkward right now; I kind of wish that I hadn’t opened my mouth to begin with.  I know that Stephen is trying to make everything all right between us but it’s been like walking on egg shells all week.  Honestly, I’m just glad that this week is finally over.  I feel like I can relax at last.”

He smiled sympathetically at her and she returned it.  “Give him time, Holly.  Stephen’s not used to anyone standing up to him but he’s smart enough to know that he couldn’t run this place without you.  He’s built this company up from nothing and he’s had no one to rely on except himself.  It’s probably a new experience for him to have to take someone else’s feelings in to consideration where business is concerned for a little while.”

“I know,” she said softly, the wind starting to whip up around them, leaves blown off trees over the weekend swirling around them.  “I just never thought it would be this…weird, you know?”

He nodded in agreement and wished her a good weekend and watched her walk away.  Will wasn’t the only one watching, however.  Up on the eighth floor, from his wall of windows in his office, Stephen had witnessed the entire scene; his emotions running wild.  He had said goodbye to Holly and then stood by the window in hopes of getting one last glance of her before she disappeared in to the parking garage.  He had not expected to see Will.  Stephen had watched their whole exchange down on the sidewalk and wanted to bang on the windows and demand that Will take his hands off of Holly.  It wasn’t right that his friend could just casually touch her while he was having to practically sit on his own hands, day after day, since returning to the office on Tuesday. 

The week had been pure hell.  In his attempt to keep things as professional as possible, all Stephen had accomplished was making himself more miserable than he’d ever been in his life.  Holly was the only one being professional around here; she still came in with a smile and asked all of her usual questions regarding any project he handed her.  He was the one that couldn’t bring a smile or even a polite word to his mouth.  Damn.  He had no trouble running in to ex-lovers and being cordial, polite and down-right witty.  Why then, was this so damn difficult?  Sure, he never had to see his ex-lovers on an everyday basis but there was a difference between them and Holly; he and Holly had already had a strong relationship.

Every time she was within his range of vision he would watch her but as soon as she turned his way, he made himself look busy.  She wasn’t playing any games, wasn’t trying to get his attention, and that was making him crazy.  Honestly, Stephen had expected Holly to at least
mention
their weekend together.  But she hadn’t.  He had expected to have to be the one to remind her that they were only working associates; but she hadn’t given him any reason to.  For four long days Stephen had to sit back and watch her go on with her life and her job as if nothing had ever happened – which was what he had wanted.  Until he had it. 

He hated watching Will make Holly smile and have her meet his eyes when he had done his best to barely look at her, lest she see the heat and longing in his own eyes.  It was madness!  It was torture.  Stalking away from the windows, he walked out to the kitchenette to grab himself a drink while waiting for Will’s arrival.  He had not been expecting a visit from his friend but why else would Will have been out on the sidewalk if not here to see him. 

Trying to seem casual and as if he had no idea of his friend being there, Stephen walked back in to his office, took a seat behind his desk and flipped open the file of contracts that Holly had placed there earlier and pretended to read until he heard Will’s knock on his office door.

“Oh, hey!” Stephen said, feigning surprise.  “Come on in.  What are you doing here?

Will walked inside, shook Stephen’s hand and had a seat in the leather chair facing the desk.  “Well, I know it sounds cliché, but I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d stop by and check on you.  I haven’t heard from you since our phone conversation Saturday night and I’ve got to be honest with you, buddy, the curiosity was killing me.”

Stephen nodded and took a drink from the can of cola he was holding.  “Is that right?  What’s got you so curious?”  If Will noticed the slight snarl in Stephen’s words, he chose to ignore it.

“I ran in to Holly outside, so I take it she didn’t quit,” Will began, leaning back in the chair and crossing his legs at the ankles, making himself more comfortable.  His smirk was irritating Stephen, he could tell, and decided that if he did not tread carefully, there would be a repeat of last Friday night.

“No, she didn’t quit,” Stephen said.  “We talked about it and decided that the whole situation had just gotten out of hand and so there was no reason for her to leave Ballinger’s.  Of course, it would be helpful if Derek didn’t come around for a while.”

“Helpful to you or to Holly?” Will asked and Stephen’s eyes narrowed at his.

“Something on your mind, Will?” Stephen said with a calmness he did not feel.  It really was last Friday all over again because suddenly he found himself wanting to lunge over the desk and tell his friend to take his smug smile off of his face and then pound him until he promised to never,
never
lay a hand on Holly again.  Instead of raging, however, he merely took another sip of cola and waited for Will’s response.

Sensing Stephen’s barely concealed rage that only came from years of friendship, Will thought it best to clear the air and be done with it.  “So you told Holly about Derek’s theory and she’s probably embarrassed, am I right?”  Stephen nodded.  “I don’t know about you, but he won’t return any of my calls.”

“I haven’t even tried to call him again. We spoke, cleared the air a bit and I’m not interested in talking to him right now; I’m interested in not having Holly upset.”

“Because you don’t want to lose her as an assistant, right?”  It was an innocent enough question if it had come from anybody else.  Coming from Will, Stephen knew what his friend was fishing for. 

“You want to know if I slept with her?” he snarled.  “Fine; yes, we slept together.  It was great; it was amazing.  It was quite possibly the greatest sex of my life.  But at the end of the weekend we decided that that was all it was going to be – a weekend.  Holly knows that the company always has and always will come first and that I’m not looking for a relationship so it was agreed upon that she’d return to work, see how things go and if she feels that people are gossiping about her or us, then she’d give me suitable notice.  There, are you satisfied?”  Stephen jumped up from his chair and kicked it aside, turning his back on Will and placing his palms on the windows behind him, glaring down at the street and beyond.