“Yeah. You too.”
Slow and steady, I skated off the elevator and through the courtyard. Once I found my rhythm—and balance—I was moving down Folsom Street like I was seconds away from lifting off and flying.
I was that good. Well, at least, in my head I was.
The fact that I had managed to make it five blocks without falling on my ass was a goddamn record. My determination was paying off. In no time at all, I’d be a skating pro without the awkward warm-up that included falls and crashing into unsuspecting gentlemen in the elevator.
Two blocks later, I rounded the sidewalk and saw the sign for Gus’s Community Market. I smiled and carefully navigated the cracks in the concrete.
Knowing the end was near, my gaze jumped up and zeroed in on the entrance doors, but my little bubble of happy was immediately popped. There stood Simone, outside the doors, chatting up a teenage boy wearing a “Gus’s” apron.
Oh, fuck. Abort. Abort. Abort the mission!
I tried to maneuver my skates to a stop, but instead, I just jolted myself to the right. It was a domino effect after that. My knees wobbled, my feet shot out in the opposite direction of one another, and I fell directly on my tailbone, on the concrete sidewalk.
Pain shot behind my eyes and I shouted, “Motherfucker!” loud enough for anyone within a fifty-mile radius to hear.
So much for being incognito.
“Son of a bitch.” I stared at my pathetic display and groaned.
“Need a hand, LoLo?”
Oh, God. Say it isn’t so…
I followed the masculine hand being held out toward me, up the veiny forearm, to the defined chest, until I reached a set of blue eyes I knew all too well.
Reed Motherfucking Luca.
Could this moment get any worse?
“Lola!” A poorly executed British accent called toward me. “Oh my God, are you okay?” Simone kept shouting as she walked quickly toward me. “Everyone just saw you fall. That looked so embarrassing!”
Yep. It could get worse. It could, and it did.
“We want you to start doing a weekly spotlight on the website too,” Rhonda Leech decreed as I toyed with the hem of my T-shirt, already over this meeting in every way possible. She’d called me in first thing this morning, but it’d taken me nearly the whole day to follow orders. With the way she seemed to bark all of her words like an angry dog, I was guessing she wasn’t thrilled about my pace.
“Your video was a hit for several reasons, but I’m not naïve enough to think one of them wasn’t how goddamn physically attractive you are.”
I rolled my eyes as she tossed out a hand and waved at…well, me.
“And you aren’t naïve enough either, so cut it out with the eye rolls.”
“I just had no idea you’d been pining for me, Rhonda,” I teased, and her whole face seemed to ice up.
“Can it, Luca. You’re a pain in my ass. That’s all you are.”
I figured that was true enough and kind of exciting, seeing as a little healthy confrontation was pretty much my running goal with Rhonda. It wasn’t that I wanted to be the token asshole employee, or that I wasn’t taking the job seriously. It was that the more I came to this office—and it had only been a few times so far—the more I saw how terrified Rhonda had everyone around her. She didn’t give pats on the back, she gave ass-chewings. And since no one else was eager to teach her some lessons of her own, I willingly filled the role. It was, in fact, one of my specialties.
If confrontation were a superpower, I’d have my very own cape.
“But people are loving the little dance you’ve got going with Lola Sexton, and I love what the people love. So I’ll deal with the pain by constructing a pillow made of money.”
I had to laugh at her single-minded focus. No wonder the paper kept her at the helm.
“I thought the press was supposed to be unbiased. You know, only here for the news.”
Now, she was rolling her eyes.
Still, a promise I’d made brought my attention back on task.
No more videos. I’d promised it and swore it to Lola during our very first encounter, and if I reneged, any chance of keeping her close would be lost. I was a liar, but not like this—not when it was this important, and especially not when it would completely destroy my own achievements and goals.
“Sorry, I can’t.”
Apparently, Rhonda’d still been talking—though I hadn’t heard a word—and my declaration interrupted her midsentence.
“What?” She shook her head. “You can’t what?”
“Do any more videos.”
She waved me off. “It’s all set up. You won’t have to do any of the other work. Just stop by the office, do the recording, and go on your way. Though, sorry to tell you, smoking in the building is strictly prohibited.”