A ringing bell caught my attention. A phone.
Frowning, I turned around, scanning the room before I spied a pile of luggage—Jesus, was all that ours?—with Malcolm's jacket folded neatly across it. The sound was coming from it. Already tipsy as hell I tottered across the living room and spent precious seconds hunting through Malcolm's pockets before I located his phone just as the person on the other end of the line hung up.
Damn, I thought. But then the phone lit up again almost immediately, the ringtone loud in the quiet of the penthouse. In bold letters on the screen, the name Don Cardall shone out. It meant nothing to me.
I wavered and after a few rings the call went to voicemail. I had no problem with that, as I wasn't ever a fan of people answering my own phone--safely tucked away in my purse at the base of the tower of luggage, thank god--but when the home screen popped up I saw that Malcolm had seventy-eight missed calls.
Seventy. Eight.
Holy shit, I thought. This might be kind of important.
For a second I stood in the living room, trying to decide what to do. On the one hand, I wasn't Malcolm's personal secretary or anything like that, and we'd only known each other for a few days. I should, technically, go wake him up so he could field whatever emergency had popped up back home. On the other hand, I really wanted to stay here and just fuck the next few days away. Maybe drink some good liquor, eat some good food. Bone some more. Especially on that terrace... Perhaps I should just answer and see who was calling and what sort of fire Malcolm had to put out before bothering him. He looked exhausted. I didn't really want to disturb the first good sleep I was betting he'd had since we met. I didn't think he'd slept on the plane, and since he'd been forgetting to eat I didn't exactly trust him to take care of himself in my absence. I took another gulp of wine and pondered, and then the decision was made for me when the phone lit up again. Don Cardall once more. He was very persistent. I was willing to bet he was at least half of those missed calls.
Oh, I thought, very well. I hit answer.
"Malcolm Ward's phone," I said, very cool and sophisticated. "May I ask who's calling?"
"Fuck you, this is a fucking emergency!" Don Cardall spat at the other end of the line. "Where the fuck is Mr. Ward?"
Chapter Nine
One and a half glasses of wine on a very empty stomach did not make me the most delicate of people. "He's in a sex coma," I snapped, all my good sex vibes falling away and my typical crankiness reasserting itself. "Who is this?"
"No, you tell me who the hell you are and you put Mr. Ward on the phone right goddamn now."
Damn, this dude was rude to someone he'd never met. “I'm Sadie MacElroy,” I said. Then, because I thought I could perhaps parlay it into some sort of social currency: “Mrs. Anton Waters' personal assistant."
At the other end of the line, Don was quiet for a moment, clearly reassessing the situation. Yes! I thought. Finally that stupid job came in handy for something other than boring shit like keeping food on the table and a roof over my head.
"I apologize, Miss MacElroy," Don finally said, his voice now stiff and formal, "but I am Mr. Ward's secretary. I hope you will understand that this is an emergency and put Mr. Ward on the line."
Ah. The secretary to whom Malcolm had given over the reins of the company. I could sympathize. I really could. It was always a frantic day when something big had gone down and you couldn't contact your boss. I know this because it happened frequently when Felicia and Anton decided to go on a sex retreat, although now that I came to think of it I was obviously not any better, seeing as how I had skipped work--and town--to screw some virtual stranger's brains out. And I didn't even have the excuse of being in a relationship with him.
Still. I didn't really want to wake Malcolm up. It was probably midnight in New York now. I'd been missing from my job for a whole day at this point. I probably had a million messages, too. Ugh.
I wavered for another moment, and then gave in. "All right, just a second," I said. "I'll go see if I can wake him up."
"Thank you," Don said. I hit the hold button and tottered back to the bedroom. That wine was really hitting me hard.
Malcolm lay on the bed in the same position I'd left him in. I hated to wake him up. But this was probably really important. I hoped he hadn't skipped out on some kind of life or death deal to bone me in Croatia. I mean, that's flattering and all, but I understand priorities, too. Reaching out, I put my hand on Malcolm's shoulder.
"Malcolm?" I whispered.
He slept on.
I gave him a little shake.
He continued to sleep. He was out.
"Malcolm," I said a little louder, but he might as well have been a lump of clay for all the response I got from him. I shook him harder, then moved over to my side of the bed and began to jump up and down on it. "Wake up!" I commanded him.