Page 40 of All the Drama from New York
If anyone had told him that he would become so invested in a planning app that he’d eventually lose all sense of time, Ryan would have laughed at them. But this was no laughing matter. He’d been working for Camille for four days, and each day he’d left her design studio a bit later than the previous day.
It was Wednesday. Tonight she’d gone to a private dinner with one of her American cousins, leaving Ryan alone with a delivery of delicious chicken satay. He hadn’t checked the time until almost twenty minutes ago—then in a panic he’d bolted out the door. Those two large helpings of dinner had slowed him down.
On the subway platform, Ryan pulled out his cell, and tapped the Uber app. “Double fuck.” A ride home at this hour was going to cost him over eighty bucks. All that money he’d saved fromgetting free food at work would be gone in getting back to East Orange.
A nearby security guard waved at him, and Ryan waved back.
Yeah, buddy I hear you, no more trains, time to get out of the station.
It would be another four hours before he could get a train home. He’d arrive back at the apartment just in time to shower, change, and head back into the city to start work all over again.
Making his way up to street level at West 33rdStreet he pondered his next move. A super cheap rat infested hotel room.No thanks.A yellow cab.Just as expensive as an Uber.All of them were options which would cost him money he couldn’t afford to spend. The money from his severance pay had covered this month’s rent and some cash he owed his folks. But he was down to his last thirty dollars.
I just need to get through to next week, then I will get paid.
There was only one place he could go at this hour. Back to the design studio. If he had to go and wait somewhere, at least it was comfortable and safe. Hanging around the streets of New York City in the middle of the night was never a good idea.
If he slipped quietly back into the office, he could try and grab some sleep on that fancy green sofa thing which Camille had sitting in the corner.
Back at West 28thStreet, Ryan tapped his keycard on the front entrance scanner and made his way up to the sixth floor. He turned the light on in the kitchen, then closed the door behind him.
After pressing some paper towels into service as a makeshift face washer, he rummaged around in the middle drawer of the kitchen bench and retrieved the small travel toothpaste and brush set he’d spied there earlier in the week. Tomorrow he would replace what he had taken.
Following a quick wash, he left the light on in the kitchen, then closed the door behind him as he stepped back out into the main studio. If he woke during the night and needed to go find the bathroom, at least he could see where he was going, and not fall over any of the fabric boxes from Milan which were scattered all over the place. He was sure Camille had some sort of a system about her materials, but Ryan was yet to figure it out.
He dropped onto the sofa-couch-whatever you call it thing.I should ask Camille what it’s called.He couldn’t keep referring to it as a couch come sofa thing. It probably had some fancy French name, that he would never be able to pronounce.
Tomorrow afternoon, he’d set his phone alarm to make sure he left the office in plenty of time to be able to catch an earlier train. He’d just have to hope Camille was in an understanding mood when she arrived in the morning and found her employee already at work. In yesterday’s clothes.
Bending, he unlaced his boots and tucked them under the sofa. Ryan glanced at his socks and had a moment of doubt. Should he take them off, or leave them on? Bare feet got cold.
Yeah, better leave them on.
He lay down, wrapping his arms around the decorative cushion which sat at one end of the sofa thing. Like the sofa it too was green velvet. Soft against his skin. A long day, two large servings of satay, and the surprisingly comfortable bed soon had Ryan’s eyes fluttering closed.
She was sorely tempted to tap him on the shoulder and ask why he was asleep on the chaise longue, but a slumbering Ryan was such an endearing thing. And she didn’t want to disturb him. The clock on the wall, the one which had both the times for New York and Paris on it, showed the local time as being 2.17am.
She wasn’t sure why her new PA was still here, but at least he had the good sense to be getting some rest. After the dinner with Bryce and Vivian during which they had discussed and solved most of the world’s problems, Camille’s brain was now refusing to switch off.
She’d come up to the studio to collect a sketch book only to discover Ryan resting on the chaise doing his best impression of a male Sleeping Beauty. His hands were crossed over his chest and the cushion was hugged tightly to him.
He looks so damn cute.
It was hard enough working with this man while resisting her growing attraction to him. But finding Ryan asleep in her design studio in the middle of the night was the sort of temptation that bordered on unfair.
When he woke in the morning, she’d ask why he’d been sleeping in the studio. Camille headed back downstairs. If there was one thing she did have, it was plenty of warm blankets. In winter she liked to keep the heating low and parade around in a woolen wrap. Even Bryce, who had lived in various European countries had said his cousin’s behavior was a little strange.
When she returned to the studio a few minutes later, Ryan had rolled over onto his side, and was now facing the wall. Camille gently draped a cashmere wool blanket over him, carefully tucking it under his sock clad feet. By some miracle she managed to slip a memory foam pillow under his head without disturbing him.
What I would give to curl up under that blanket with him.
But Ryan had every right to sleep undisturbed. Camille tiptoed back downstairs to her apartment. As she closed the door behind her, she whispered into the dark, “Sleep well, Ryan.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Ryan was warm and snuggly under the blanket. He rolled over and pulled it up around his ears. He was still in a state of sleep, but his brain managed to register the fact that he was under a blanket. And the firm cushion which he’d clung to earlier in the night had given way to a soft as a cloud pillow.
He cracked open an eyelid and checked the time on his watch.
