Judy Hubbard - Our First Embrace

“Don’t sweat it.” Monique winked and added, “If she gives you any trouble, she’ll answer to me, and I outrank her.”

Nicole smiled at Monique’s threat and glanced at Crystal again, who treated her to another hateful stare before focusing her eyes on her tablet.

So much for not having any enemies in the office. Nicole silently sighed.

Within ten minutes, the room was full. After everyone was settled in with coffee, juice and pastries, Alexander began the meeting.

“You all know Victor.” Alex pointed to his brother, who was sitting to his right. “For some reason, he insists on loitering around the office today.”

Victor smiled. “You know you miss me when I’m not here.”

“Yeah, right.” Alexander chuckled. “Why are you here today anyway?”

“Three reasons.” Victor stood. “First, I had to fix your computer for you after you mistreated her,” he reminded his brother with a wink, which caused chuckles from around the room. “Second, I’m doing an upgrade on everyone’s computer.” He laughed at the groans and surveyed the twenty people in the room. “Hey, do you guys want to be state of the art or what? I promise the downtime won’t be long.”

“Promises, promises,” Monique drawled, drawing Victor’s interest.

“I always keep my promises,” Victor softly responded.

“Hmph!” Monique didn’t sound convinced.

“And three?” Alexander queried, interrupting their banter.

“I don’t have anything better to do.” Victor sighed and resumed his seat amid laughter.

“That’s my brother, folks.” Alexander shook his head in mock disgust.

“You know you love me,” Victor taunted.

“Be quiet,” Alex admonished and chuckled when Victor made a zipping motion across his lips. “All right, down to business. As you all know, we have a new associate designer, Nicole Carter, who comes to us all the way from New York—albeit a little late.”

Nicole’s smile faded slightly as he added the latter, and she bit her lower lip to hold in the angry retort that was trying desperately to escape from her mouth. She purposefully brightened her smile in response to the various welcomes from her coworkers before resuming eye contact with Alexander.

“I know you’ll all make her feel welcome. She’ll be working on the Bettina line, and I’m counting on those of you who are also assigned there to quickly get her up to speed.”

“She’ll be there in no time, boss,” Monique chimed in, and Nicole shot her a grateful smile.

“With your help, I’m sure she will.” Alexander nodded with a slight smile. “We have our early-spring fashion show at the end of April, so I’m expecting a hundred and ten percent from everyone.” Nicole bristled again when his eyes rested on her. “We’ll probably be going to a six-day workweek in a week or so.”

Victor glanced at Nicole and mouthed, “Don’t mind him.”

Nicole sighed visibly and Victor chuckled.

* * *

Alex caught Nicole and Victor’s subtle exchange, and his eyes narrowed on his brother’s seemingly innocent face just in time to see him wink at Nicole, who, much to his annoyance, returned his gesture. Why the friendly interaction between the two irritated him to no end he was loath to examine.

“Do you mind?” Alex frowned at his brother. “I’m trying to run a meeting here.”

“Be my guest, bro.” Victor leaned back in his seat, crossed his arms and waited for Alex to continue.

“Thank you,” Alex sarcastically said. “If you’d all turn your attention to your tablets and pull up the memo I sent this morning, I’d like to start with that.”

As Alex presided over the meeting, he found it next to impossible to keep his eyes from straying toward Nicole more often than not, which annoyed him to no end. She sat there with a frown on her beautiful face, unless she was smiling at Monique—or Victor, which peeved him. He knew she was shooting daggers at him because of his earlier reference to her delayed start with the company, and although he shouldn’t care, he did.

Alex glanced away from his presentation to answer a question, and his eyes automatically stopped to stare at Nicole—even though she wasn’t the one asking the question. She held his gaze for a second before tilting her head in Monique’s direction, who was whispering something in her ear that made her smile. She was gorgeous when she smiled.

Oh, hell!

Somehow he concentrated on answering the question at hand, but he was acutely aware of his newest employee—he noticed everything she did, when she smiled, said something to Monique, crossed her legs, sighed. With her mere presence, she was disrupting his neatly ordered world, and he didn’t like it!

Thankfully, the rest of the meeting was spent discussing designs, fabrics and the order for the upcoming fashion show. The hour breezed by.

“Good work, everyone. That’ll be all.” Alexander adjourned the meeting, and the room quickly emptied. “Nicole, could you stay behind please?”

She glanced at Monique, who patted her reassuringly on the back as she resumed her seat, crossed her legs and folded her hands in her lap. Victor gave her an encouraging thumbs-up sign, to which she smiled. Both she and Alex waited until the room was empty before speaking.

“Did Monique show you the Bettina line info?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have any questions?”

“Not presently.” She kept her responses brief and crisp.

He frowned. “Is anything wrong?”

“No, nothing.” She shrugged and pursed her lips, but the words continued to flow. “I so enjoy being embarrassed in front of my new colleagues.” His lips thinned at her flippant tone.

“I didn’t mean to embarrass you.”

“Didn’t you?”

“No, I was simply stating the facts,” he coolly replied. “If your skin is this thin, you’re never going to make it around here.”

She stiffened her back at his rebuke. “My skin is plenty thick enough, Mr. James.”

“We’ll see,” he darkly promised.

“Yes, you will.” She uncrossed her legs. “Is there anything else?”

He stared at her long and hard, and she didn’t flinch or look away. “No, that’s all for now.”

She stood and left without another word. Alone, he smiled slightly. She was a spitfire. He’d soon see what she was made of, and he had a feeling he would enjoy doing it.

* * *

The days flew by, and before Nicole knew it, the week was half-over. On Wednesday evening, she absently returned numerous goodbyes from her coworkers, including Monique, and continued happily working. She barely registered that bright sunlight had given way to pale moonlight. When she glanced at the clock, it was after 8:30 p.m.

She studied her sketch and smiled. Picking up her charcoal pencil, she continued working on the lines of the skirt she was sketching. Just a few more minutes, and she would call it a day.

“It’s way past quitting time.” Nicole jumped, then glanced up when Alexander’s voice disturbed the comforting silence.

“Mr. James.” She placed a hand against her thudding heart. “You scared the life out of me.”

“Sorry.” He pulled up a tall stool and sat beside her.

“I thought everyone had gone home.” She was acutely aware of his closeness.

“Everyone has, except us.” He glanced at her sketch, picked it up and then replaced it on the easel. His face was unreadable.

“What do you think of it?” She asked simply to have something to say.

“It’s adequate.” He half smiled at her apparent displeasure with his blasé description.

“Adequate?” She glanced at the drawing she had spent the entire day revising, intent that it would be perfect before she showed it to him. “What’s wrong with it?”