The Design(63)

“Come in,” he called.

“Are you free for a few minutes?” I asked as I held onto the door, hovering between stepping into his office and staying on the other side of the door, the safe side.

He smiled up at me and dropped his drafting pencil onto his desk.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I quipped, stepping in and closing the door behind me.

“Are you hungry?” he asked, glancing at the clock on the wall next to me. “Should I order lunch?”

I shook my head. “I had a late breakfast.”

I took a seat on one of the chairs in front of his desk. A week ago, the seating arrangement would have made me nervous, like I was on the chopping block, but a lot had changed in the last seven days.

“I never asked—are you going to see Stu again?” he asked, his eyes twinkling with charm.

I scrunched my nose. “Who?”

Grayson barked out a laugh, tipping back in his desk chair.

“Are you serious?”

I cracked a small smile. “Only slightly. “

He smirked. “Do you want to come by my place after work tonight? Maybe grab some takeout?”

He was basically asking me if I wanted to see the Holy Grail. Normally, there was no way I’d turn down the offer… but I had to really focus on my competition proposal if I wanted to have something decent to turn in the following week. I’d forced myself to work on it all weekend, but I was nowhere near being done.

To delay having to turn down his offer, I stood and walked around the desk. He sat still, eyeing me with curiosity as I slid my hands down over his chest. His suit was crisp, but the fabric was thin enough for me to feel the muscles that lay hidden beneath. When his breathing picked up, I finally replied.

“I can’t. I have to get some work done.”

He craned his head back to place a kiss beneath my neck. “You mean the work that I’m paying you to do?”

I laughed.

“Mmhmm,” I murmured half-heartedly as he continued to kiss along my neck.

“That’s taken care of. You are now officially free after work. Here’s the address.” He reached forward out of my grasp to jot down his address on a small post-it note.

I took it from him, but I knew I wouldn’t be stopping by.

“Sorry, but this work is unrelated to you, so I’ll just see you tomorrow morning,” I said, walking around his desk and waving the post-it note in the air with pride.

“I'm not used to being told no, Heart,” he said as I reached the door.

I turned the handle without looking back. There’s no way I would have been able to turn him down with those stern baby blues boring into me. I reminded myself that I’d have plenty of time to spend with Grayson in between finishing up my competition submission and leaving for Paris.

There it was.

That punch to the gut that seemed to accompany my departure to Paris in the recent days. It was becoming increasingly impossible to ignore and I knew exactly where it was stemming from: the closer Grayson and I became, the more Paris seemed like a bad idea.

But I couldn’t let myself stray from the original plan. Paris was happening.

I needed it to happen.

…



True to my word, I went home after work and locked myself in my room. I spread out my favorite architecture textbooks from college, my sketchpad, my straight edge, three drafting pencils, and my computer with AutoCAD pulled up so that I could start taking my designs from paper to computer.

I’d done projects like the park proposal when I was still in college. The difference was I’d had an entire semester to work on those projects. For this, I had one week left.

I skipped dinner and tried to ignore Hannah’s incessant knocking on my bedroom door.

“What are you doing in there?” she asked.

“Nothing. I don’t feel well.”

“What do you have? A sore throat? Fever? You'd better not get me sick,” she demanded.

Aw, what a thoughtful roommate I had.

She wanted to know what I was doing in my room but it’s not like I could invite her in. I was breaking at least three company rules by submitting my own proposal behind Alan’s back, and I didn’t trust Hannah as far as I could throw her. So, I feigned sickness and waited until I saw her shadow move from beneath the door before I continued working.





Chapter Twenty-Two





Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday—uhh, Cara— Colleen—Cameron...”

To their credit, my coworkers did their best to add my name at the end of the song. I’d only worked with them a few short weeks and there were quite a few architects to keep track of at the firm. Thankfully, Peter all but yelled my name so that people would catch on.