My Everything - Seth & Amber (35 page)

He looked more than a little put out at her
request, not to mention suspicious, but he did supply the card.
Raiza examined it closely, taking her sweet time just because she
thought it was funny to get his goat. The card was legit. She
pulled out her driver’s license and passed it over to him. As soon
as he saw her name, his tune changed yet again.

Dude, she thought, bi-polar much?

“Oh Ms. Diaz, yes,” he said checking her name
against a list on the clipboard he carried, “umm...you are cleared
for entry. Come this way.”

‘Cleared for entry' to her own office?
Ooookaaaaay.

What the hell was going on?

Before she had a chance to ask those
questions, she rounded the corner of the building where Red Hot was
located and saw at least a half dozen uniformed officers and four
detectives in plain clothes in the suite next door to the Red Hot
agency.

They were all gathered in the offices of
Thrive Therapy. Hmmm...Raiza knew that several therapists who each
had their own specialty shared that office suite. She knew them all
in passing, enough to smile good morning, but not more than
that.

She tried to step around Officer NO INFO so
she could get into Red Hot and find out what was happening, but the
officer held out his arm to block her path just as two paramedics
passed in front of them, pushing a stretcher that held a zipped up
body bag.

OK, Raiza thought uneasily, that’s not
something you see every day. A very unsettled feeling welled inside
of her, like a storm brewing in her psyche. Not good. This was not
order and it was not structure, in fact, it was the opposite of
both of those things. Therefore, she felt her sanity threatened
just the tiniest bit.

Raiza did
not
like being around dead
bodies, no siree, not at all, not one little bit. Didn’t like it at
all. Probably stuff left over from her childhood, she knew - she
had been the one who had discovered her grandma’s body after
Grandma Ida had died in her sleep. Raiza shuddered. She remembered
how cold the old woman's skin had felt when Raiza had tried to
shake her awake. She could still feel the clammy, freezing skin
under her fingertips when she recalled that fateful morning.

She shook her head to try and clear all
reminders of that day. Yeah. It wasn’t working.

Raiza needed to get into her office, sit at
her desk - see her things all in order, everything in their place.
She needed to re-center herself among order and structure. She
needed to boot up George, to hear the soft swishing sound of him
coming to life. She needed to feel the keys under her fingers as
she worked.

She closed her eyes, the need to be in her
soothing and predictable environment consuming her and making her
heart beat faster, until she felt the officer release his arm back
down to his side, effectively freeing her. As soon as he did, she
started putting one foot in front of the other as quickly as she
could. She heard him saying something as she walked away, but
didn’t wait to find out what it was. If he needed to talk to her
badly enough, he could damn well follow her.

She entered the lobby of Red Hot and felt as
though she had tunnel vision. She could see people in her
peripheral vision, but did not stop until she made it to the safety
of her office. Shutting the door behind her, she leaned against it
and tried to calm her racing heart.

“Good morning sunshine. You OK?”

She jumped at the sound of a man’s deep
voice. Turning, she saw Mateo sitting at the once unoccupied desk
in her office. Now, it certainly looked occupied. Very occupied.
His laptop was sitting to the right on the desk and next to it sat
a coffee cup and a bottle of water - neither of which had coasters
underneath them, she noted with mounting irritation. Not only that,
but there were several stacks of papers strewn about on the desk,
and none of them were contained in folders or wire baskets! Dammit,
none of them were even in symmetrical PILES for God's sake.

What are we, animals? She thought to herself
incredulously.

“What are you doing in here?” She asked
curtly as she made her way past him and stood behind her desk. She
felt the tight knot inside her belly loosen just a little. Looking
down at her pristine workspace did make her feel a little better.
Everything was just as she had left it the night before. In perfect
order. Just as things should be.

She sat down in her ergonomically designed
desk chair and placed her hands on the flat, empty surface of her
desk. This was her happy place, her safe place. She wasn’t going to
let some unwanted visitor take anything away from that.

She turned to look at him, waiting for an
answer. He had invaded her personal space, her sanctum, and now he
had some explaining to do. But, rather than turning toward her and
illustrating the proper contrite manner, he simply sat with his
back to her and continued typing away on his computer, not a care
in the world. Ignoring her. He could be SO frustrating.

“Mateo,” she said, carefully modulating her
voice so that it sounded friendlier...sort of, “What are you doing
in here?”

Still no answer. Damn him, she knew what he
was waiting for. She just didn’t want to play his little games. Not
today. Not after what she had just seen. But she knew for a fact
that if she wanted information, she had to play.

Rolling her eyes and trying desperately to
suppress a loud sigh, she put a smile (sure it was fake but, oh
well) on her face and into her voice and said, “Good Morning,
Mateo. You startled me. What, may I ask, are you doing here?”

He turned and she saw a satisfied smile
forming across his handsome, chiseled face. “Well, since you asked
so nicely - I’ve been assigned to be your office mate. Because of
all of the recent personnel changes that have been going on, with
Dominic and Cristal bringing on more people, space is at a premium.
So we have to double up.”

Cristal Hart was Raiza's best friend and
mentor, and now boss, as well. She and Dominic Charles had recently
become equal partners in the firm of Red Hot Private
Investigations. They each owned 40% and Red, who had started the
agency, retained 20%. Raiza knew that things would probably be
shaken up a bit when Dominic and Cristal took over, but she hadn’t
been prepared for the possibility of having to share her office
with someone. Even someone as sexy as Mateo. Hell,
especially
someone as sexy as Mateo.

She needed to talk to Cristal and get this
resolved, asap.

--- ~ ---

Mateo knew that technically he should have
waited until after the Monday morning meeting, where Dominic and
Cristal were going to announce all of the new changes, to move into
Raiza’s office. But he thought that she might take it better if she
didn't hear the news in front of ten sets of prying eyes. He knew
Raiza. She would need time to process it.

She stood and crossed the small room, quickly
heading towards the door.

“Where are you going?” he asked with a smile
in his voice.

“To talk to Cristal,” she replied shortly,
anger as evident in her voice as it had already been in her body
language.

“She's the one who signed off on the move,”
Mateo said lightly, “If that influences your decision about whether
to go and talk to her. I mean, maybe you're just going to thank her
for giving you such a fine-ass office mate. I know that's what I
would have done if I had walked in this morning and seen all of
this,” Mateo gestured at his face and body, “sitting up in my
office.”

This piece of information got Raiza to stop
in her tracks. When he was done talking, she pivoted on her heel
and crossed her arms as she turned her head and met his eyes, just
in time to see him give her a huge wink. He was slammed with the
same overwhelming feeling he always experienced when her large
golden brown eyes looked into his. Desire.

“She did?” Raiza asked suspiciously.

It was asked more as a challenge than a
question, and was probably meant to be rhetorical, but he decided
to confirm it anyway.

He nodded, “She sure did.”

“What happened to your office?”

“Well, since I shared a space with Dominic,
and he is now an owner, the general consensus was that he should
have his own office.”

“Cristal shares an office,” she snapped
back.

“Not anymore. She moved into Red’s old
office.”

Raiza stood still, seeming to be assessing
the ramifications of the information he had just shared with her.
He waited, letting her work it out in her own time.

“Why didn’t one of the guys in my department
move in?” she asked suspiciously.

He lifted one eyebrow, barking out a short
laugh. “They're terrified of you. From what I hear, Jerry
practically peed himself at the mere mention of it.”

She tilted her head and placed her hands on
her hips. Damn those hips, he had wet dreams about those hips.
“They are
not
scared of me!”

“They are,” he stated simply.

“They respect me and like me. I’m always
fair,” she seemed a little hurt at the implication that her team
was afraid of her. He hadn’t expected that.

“As a supervisor, yes. Absolutely! As an
office mate? Come on. Do I really need to remind you of poor Kim?
That girl barely lasted a month.”

Her sexy, full lips turned up slightly at the
corners and he could tell that although the thought of someone who
worked for her actually being afraid of her had genuinely bothered
her, the thought of someone being scared to share an office with
her amused her.

“She lasted two months and six days, for the
record. And she was a basket case. Her leaving had nothing to do
with sharing an office with me.”

“Really?” he questioned lightly as she moved
back behind her desk, apparently giving up the notion to go
confront Cristal about his presence in her sanctuary.

“Really,” she confirmed as she sat at her
desk and turned on her computer. What was her computer's name
again? Greg or Gopher...something with a G.

“So what about Ken, Samuel, Trent,
Laura…”

She lifted her hand in dismissal, “They all
had issues, none of which had anything to do with me.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” he said, “but that
doesn’t change the fact that people aren’t lining up to volunteer
for the risk.”

She leveled him with a stare that was equal
parts question and challenge, “You’re here. So...what? Did you draw
the short stick or lose a bet?”

“No, I volunteered,” he heard his voice get a
little gravely as he said it. That always happened when he got
turned on, he couldn’t control it. Most of the time it worked for
him. Most of the time women ate it up. He didn’t think this was one
of those times.

Her eyes widened, and she finally looked
intrigued. “OK, I’ll bite,” she said warily, “Why?”

He leaned forward in his chair and rested his
elbows on his knees. He raked his hands through his hair. He
shouldn’t say what he wanted to say, even though it was the truth.
He needed to keep things professional, especially now that they
were going to be working in such close proximity.

Screw it. He wasn’t big on doing what he
should
do. Fortune favors the bold.

He stood and crossed to her desk, setting his
hands down he leaned forward. She looked up at him, surprised, as
he began to speak from that vantage point.

“Sharing an office with you,” he began, his
voice more ragged than ever, “Seeing you all day every day...in my
book, that’s not losing a bet. That’s winning the lottery.”

Her breath hitched and she licked her
lips.

“Meeting time!” Cristal announced as she
flung open the door.

Raiza quickly stood, her sudden motion
knocking the tape dispenser off of her desk. Mateo reached out and
caught it before it crashed to the floor. After replacing it on the
desktop, he noticed that Raiza moved it about an 1/8 of an inch to
the left and straightened it.

He shook his head. OK, so maybe all the
office gossip about Raiza being OCD held a little truth, Mateo
thought.

"Am I interrupting something?" Cristal
sounded more than a little amused.

“Nope,” Raiza said briskly as she grabbed her
iPad and purse and brushed past Cristal in her hurry to leave the
room.

Mateo's eyes automatically traveled to the
sway of her hips. He honestly hadn’t meant to look at her ass as
she exited, he had really tried to break himself of that habit.
But, damn...it really was one fine ass.

Cristal cleared her throat, reminding him of
her presence. He snapped his gaze up to meet hers as she asked
faux-innocently, “Enjoying the view?”

Mateo had initially looked up expecting to
see one very pissed off Cristal, but instead she just smiled and
shook her head before heading out of the office. Just as the door
was about to close, she shot one last parting remark through the
remaining crack, “I gave in to your near-constant pleas to move
into this office with my best friend, Mateo. Now, you kids better
behave in here.”

He looked around the small room and
immediately only saw it in terms of a collection of surfaces that
he wanted to “behave” with Raiza on. The desks, the walls, the
chairs, the floors...he sighed. Damn. What had he gotten himself
into?

THE CROSSROADS SERIES