Page 16 of The Wedding Deal
Chapter Six
Over the weekend, Charlotte had tried to keep up with her inbox and had gone shopping for beachwear and a wedding-appropriate dress, because everything in her wardrobe was out of style or no longer fit or both.
When Lance had pulled up to her house in a silver Jaguar earlier this morning, she’d had a beat of panic where she asked herself what the hell she was doing. But she kept going back to that moment when he’d told her she’d been underutilized.
Over the years she’d often felt unappreciated, and for him to recognize there was more to her… Well, maybe it was a line and she was a sucker, but she was choosing optimism.
As they maneuvered out of the heart of the city, Lance still talking away on his earpiece, she had her second moment of doubting she should’ve come.
“Let me know what you find out,” Lance said, and then he tapped his ear, disconnecting the call. He swerved around a car, and Charlotte braced a hand on the dash.
“Listen up, Edward Cullen. I’m sure you think highly of your reflexes, but I’d like my skin and bones to stay where they are, so if you’re gonna keep taking calls and speeding, I’m gonna have to insist on driving.”
“What did you call me?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know who Edward Cullen is.”
“Does he play football? For which team?”
She burst out laughing. “Technically he plays baseball. In thunderstorms.”
Lance glanced across the car at her. “You lost me.”
“Never mind your lacking pop culture references—we have enough to work on right now, so those will have to wait. Basically, I’m offering to drive so you can take all your important calls without wrecking.”
“Pfft.As if I’d wreck.”
“I’ll take ‘famous last words people say before they wreck’ for one hundred dollars, Alex.”
“You say such weird things.”
“Thank you,” she said. “What it boils down to is that people think they’re really great at multitasking, but they’re really just half-assing everything.”
“Half-assing? Let me get this straight, I can’t tell my employees their heads are shoved up their asses or call what they’ve done to the organization a shit show, but you can tell me I’m half-assing stuff? Do I get to make a complaint to you about you now?”
“I’m not swearingat you, especially not in a derogatory way that’d violate section two of the handbook. Swearing is permissible when there’s not a better word to describe a situation.”
“I think you just know how to twist the rules so they don’t apply to you.”
She gave him an innocent smile and shrugged. “You have to know the rules to break them. And speeding applies to everyone, as I’m sure a cop will tell you if he pulls you over.”
Lance eased off the accelerator. “There. Better?”
“Yes.”
His phone rang, and she picked it up and read him the name on the screen, not to be intrusive but to be helpful with the not-wrecking thing.
“I’ll call him back when we’re in the air so I don’t have to endure any more of your cryptic responses and lectures.”
“I appreciate that.” She really was trying not to be a backseat driver—or side seat driver, as it were, especially since he’d slowed down as requested—but wasn’t he going to get over? She pushed her foot down on the nonexistent brake pedal on her side of the car and sat forward, unable to help herself. “You’re going to miss the exit.”
“I’m not.”
“Okay, but you just did.” She flopped back in her seat. This was why she should’ve driven—why she liked control. Guys always thought they knew the way, too stubborn to listen. Sure, she occasionally got disorientated enough to not remember which way was east or west, but at least she didn’t miss giant exit signs with airplanes on them.
“Relax,” Lance said, passing a car on the right when the left side was blocked by other cars, another show of thinking the rules of the road didn’t apply to him. “We’re going to the local airstrip, not the airport. I assumed you knew we’d be taking the company jet.”
“For a private trip?” She bit her thumbnail. “That’s way too fancy for me. I can just take a regular old airplane.”
