Mitchell’s Truck
: Equipped with gun rack.
*
Food
: Going to waste. No appetite.
TRY AS I MIGHT, I could not get Canon to let me discuss anything privately with him before our orders arrived.
Mitchell opens the passenger door. “Your chariot, m’lady.”
I manage a smile. Not a good one though. “He’s a real piece of work, isn’t he?” Mitchell says and offers his hand.
“Huh?” I step toward the door. My voice sounds foreign to me. “Oh, Canon? I suppose he can seem rather terse.”
“Terse?” Mitchell laughs as I slip into my seat. “Does he have you bugged or something? I was just glad to get you an evening away from that asshole.”
He pauses for a moment then shuts my door.
What is this I’m feeling? Oh, who am I kidding? I’m jealous. That bitch. “Handle it” as he said he would or not, she got me out of the way. She set this up, and I said nothing. Now Canon thinks I may have lied to him about Mitchell being married and maybe even that I wanted to be alone with him and I really was flirting with him. I was not, and I don’t want to be alone with Mitchell, and I don’t know why I don’t want a break from Canon because he really can be an insufferable son of a bitch. I don’t want Canon to be alone with Diana because I only want him to be alone with…me…
“How long?”
“What?”
“How long have you had a thing for your boss?”
What? “That’s crazy talk.” Crazy, crazy, craziness kind of crazy. Like post anti-helmet law Gary Busey crazy.
“Crazy or not, you definitely have feelings for him.”
“Of course I have feelings for him. I feel he drips disdain and breathes arrogance and harbors standards designed specifically to ensure their failure to be met.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Don’t ‘uh-huh’ me, Mitchell.” It would not do me any good to have feelings for Canon. Sure, yes, he is proving himself to be capable of being nicer than I ever thought possible. But he wants the exact opposite of me: obedient in the day and some sort of aggressive bedroom role with which I am not accustomed, not comfortable with, at night. How crazy would I be to have feelings for someone who pushes me around during the day and then wants to be pushed around at night? Who confuses me with desire and doing up my bra?
“I won’t claim it makes sense. But you have always been a strong person. Maybe this a good fit. I’ve never seen anyone affect you like this.”
I laugh. It’s weak. “What makes you think I’m so affected?” My arms cross over my chest.
He sweeps his hand exaggeratedly over the expanse of the dashboard. “Because we’ve been sitting here in your hotel parking lot for a good ten minutes.”
What the…? I look around, bewildered. The hotel sign lights the thin layer of ice on the lot.
Cringing, I realize I hadn’t even noticed we’d left the restaurant.
I have simply got to harness this. Get a lid on it. Control.
“I’m not in love with Alaric Canon.”
“Um, Emma…I never said you were.”
7:18 p.m.
*
Sofa
: Sitting on it.
*
Lights
: Off.
*
Mitchell
: Elsewhere.
I LEFT MITCHELL IN HIS TRUCK, crossed the lobby, went to the room, dumped my food in the trash, and sat on the sofa. About twenty minutes ago.
Canon could very well be helping Ms. Fralin make her way through her wine. Then, doubtless, she will want his help making a way through her.
I’m angry. Jealous and angry.
She has out-maneuvered me. Out-plotted me. Out-planned me.
I’ve let her. Because I’m not being me. Maybe if I was, maybe I would have put her in her place, called her out on her shit, schooled her.
More than that…more than that…the idea of her…him…
The thought is painful. I try to shut it down.
But I keep coming back to the notion that I’m not certain what it is that I—me, not this little PA part I’m playing—have on the line here. A romp with my boss? A couple of encounters?
A fling? A potential fling?
No, I don’t even have that.
Ms. Baker has that. He’s willing to give her the time of day…er, night…whatever.
I’m still unnoticed.
And—I think I’ve known all along—there is the distinct probability that I will remain that way.
I have made a giant mess of this.
If I weren’t here, on this trip, in these borrowed clothes, ironing my hair, hiding my studies, holding my tongue, he would never have known that I exist.
But, for me, he definitely exists. More than ever. Intelligent and intuitive. Precise and passionate. Decisive and desirable, and I am desperate.
I have planned my way into desperation.
There are two choices here: Grab the bull by the horns and make some memories, or let it go and regret not experiencing more…whatever this is.
If this is all I get, I will take it, and treasure it, and make the most of it.
Bargaining stage.
If he comes back tonight, I will be whoever he wants me to be.
Just let him come back tonight.
God, I’m not just in the neighborhood of pathetic, I’m circling the block.
The door opens. The light spreads across the carpet, growing from sliver to spear, then snapping back to dark with a click.
“Ms. Baker?”
“Mr. Canon.” I’m slumped forward with my elbows on my knees. I don’t know if it looks quirky or clumsy.
He looks around for the first time, apparently not expecting me to be here alone. “Where is the illustrious Mr. LaCygne?” He flips on the entry light. His jacket is undone. The access card bends in his hand.
“I don’t know. Not here.”
“I gave you your leave for the evening. Why are you here?”
“Because this is where you want me to be.”
A beat. “I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
I have been sitting here too long; everything seems bogged down, with the world trudging by in slow motion. He hangs his jacket. It feels as though it takes a whole minute or more. Without a sideways glance, he’s gone into the bedroom. My train of thought has steamrolled down the mountainside as I’ve gone from nervous he would not come back to nervous he actually would, with a side track of the possibility he would come back covered in Diana residue, and then barreling into town with a load of he might very well not give a fair fig if I’m here or not, no matter who I happen to be.
This is crazy. I stand up on Jell-O legs—sitting on the sofa has taken its toll—and start toward the door.
As I wobble round the coffee table, Canon steps back into the room. Shoes and tie gone.
“Where are you going?” He stops trying to unbutton a cuff.
I look at the door and realize I have forgotten my card. “For a walk.”
“If I wanted you walking around the hotel in the dark, I wouldn’t have booked us into this single room.”
A record skips in my head. While I would love to contemplate how and why anyone dug up an LP just to scratch it inside my brain—and it better be “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” because God knows that song’s just asking for it—I am a tad busy trying to process Canon’s statement. Aren’t we in this room for productivity’s sake? The time to traverse the hotel campus between rooms and all that? He asked for that reason. Or wait…did I?
“You have given me my leave for the evening, as you say. I’m going for a walk.”
He shakes his head and sighs. “If you insist upon going for a walk, I will go with you.”
Him coming with me rather defeats the purpose of the walk.
“I’ll stay in then.”
“Because I would walk with you?”
“Because it’s cold outside,” I counter and step into the entryway with him.
“It has been cold all day.”
“I’m not dressed for it.”
“Change.”