My heart thuds a little faster. “Is that a yes?”
He folds his arms behind his head, leans back in his chair, a smile stretching across his face. “You’re going to have to tell me your name if we’re going to work together.”
“Cassie,” I say. “So we have an agreement?” I walk around to where he sits and offer him my hand. He shakes it, his palm cool against my warm one.
“Tomorrow morning. Nine,” he says. “You’ll work in here.”
“With you?”
“Is that a problem?”
“No,” I say, surveying the office. It’s not small, but there’s one desk, one chair, and boxes of files that will have to go somewhere. Not to mention the mountains of receipts and other papers ready to avalanche across the desk. “It just could get cramped with both of us.”
Ryder turns toward me in his seat, his head level with my waist, right where his hands grasped me only moments before. “Lucky for you,” he says, “I know how to move well in tight spaces.” He looks up at me, the line of his jaw strong and straight, brushing the hem of my skirt as he fingers the beveled edge of the desk, and though from somewhere I can hear the dull whirr of the air conditioner, I make a mental note for tomorrow: this office can get hot.
CASSIE
CH. 6
“That’s your real name?”
“Real as it gets,” he says. “Cash Ryan Gardner.”
“With a name like that maybe you should be the accountant,” I say.
“No way,” he says. “I don’t want to count the money. I want to have enough money to pay someone else to count it.”
“Good plan.” I save the balance sheet file on the laptop as Cash hands me a beer. It’s the end of my first week as the new bookkeeper for Altitude. At twenty bucks an hour, I’ve only got, like, three more months to go. If I don’t count the interest.
At least the drinks are free.
Cash the bartender is also one of the partners with Ryder in Altitude. He’s what in the nightlife business I guess is called “front of house”—good-looking, smooth-talking, the kind of person who can get customers to buy just one more drink, stay for just one more song. Great for a night out, difficult when you’re trying to get work done.
Still, the last couple days, I’ve found myself gravitating to doing work out in the main area instead of the office, sitting at the end of the bar, even if there are customers, even if Cash and Ryder are out here.
Maybe especially when Ryder is out here.
He and Jackson, another partner in Altitude, are holed up at an empty table in a front corner. Jackson’s an architect and he’s drawn up plans for a new place they all want to open together again—Ryder, Cash, and Jackson, and the fourth Altitude partner, Parker, who’s moving back from New York soon, I’m told. Bending over the table, Ryder and Jackson study the blueprints they’ve spread out very seriously, their backs to me. More significantly, their butts.
I once read that having a great ass is a genetic trait. If that’s true, Ryder Cole won the DNA lottery.
“You hungry?” Cash says, jarring me out of admiration of Ryder’s backside.
“Not really.”
“You sure? Because you’re staring over there like you need a little something in your mouth.”
I roll my eyes. “You are such a troglodyte.”
“Hey, now.” He holds up his hands in surrender. “I don’t know that word, but if it means anything like the look you’re giving them,” he says, “I’m into it.”
“You’re into it alone, then. It means caveman.”
Carrying the rolled up plan under his arm, Jackson approaches. Ryder hangs back near the door, the phone to his ear. Cash pours Jackson a whiskey as he takes a seat, around the corner of the bar from me. “Thanks, man,” Jackson says. “Probably want to get one ready for Ryde, too. I think a girl just bailed on a shift tonight.”
“Who?” Cash says.
“I don’t know,” Jackson says, sipping his drink. “Staff is Ryder’s department. I’m just the architect.” He looks at me, takes in the laptop and the piles of papers surrounding it. “Do you work for us, or are you doing homework at a bar?”
“She’s the new Brightfield,” Cash says. “After he got carted off.”
“I’m sorry, was he talking to you?” I say to Cash as I go to shake Jackson’s hand. “Cassie. Nice to meet you.”
“You, too,” Jackson says, grinning at me, then looking at Cash. “Anyone who talks to Cash that way is welcome here.”
“Thanks, bro,” Cash says as takes Jackson’s drink and downs what’s left of the whiskey.
Jackson shakes his head. “Now you’re just going to have to pour me another one.”