Page 3 of Love, Academically
“Yes, of course, DeVon. I’ll follow up with you all by email after I’ve talked to Rhys. Is that okay?”
That’s what Lila liked, nods and smiles and happy outcomes all round.
Ada turned to her as the students headed to the door, a mischievous grin crossing her face.
“You know when someone holds eye contact with you for over three seconds it’s because they either love you or hate you?”
Lila laughed. “I think it’s certainly hate there, don’t you?”
“Maybe.” Ada shrugged. “But you never know.”
Uh, yeah you did. Especially when it was Rhys Aubrey. So what if his bum sat nice and pert in his chinos? So what if his soft accent wormed its way into your very soul? Never mind that she’d imagined that full bottom lip in between hers more than once.
Rhys Aubrey was not in love with her and he never would be.
Lila shoved a cookie into her mouth, needing both fortification and a sugar hit. She grabbed a copy of the staff handbook and thumbed through to the internal courses. Rhys could benefit from all the ‘Leadership Skills’ courses, but she highlighted a couple that he should start with.
Lila tucked the tin of cookies under her arm, because cookies made everyone happy, right? Rhys could definitely use some chocolatey goodness to perk him up. Perhaps it would make him less of a dick.
Rhys
Rhys slammed his office door behind him.
How dare Lila Cartwright insert herself into his affairs? Meeting with his students without his knowledge. Discussing him and his teaching methods. It was wholly inappropriate. That kind of behaviour would definitely not have been tolerated in his family’s business.
But this wasn’t Dallimore International, and he wasn’t a senior manager anymore.
Rhys refocused on his Word document. He’d allocated an hour before his lunch break to proofread his application to the Royal Historical Society Fellowship, again. It had taken a lot of persuading for Professor Painter to recommend him because whilst his academic contribution to Angevin history was insightful, his body of work could be larger.
He sighed in his frustration and re-read that sentence again. The five years spent trying to force himself into his father’s mould after his undergraduate degree had really put him behind, academically. He was now the wrong side of thirty, his PhD amendments still waiting to be ratified, no book in progress, and only a handful of articles and two standalone chapters. He needed a strong personal statement for the Royal Historical Society, otherwise…
Well, he wasn’t going to think about the ‘otherwise’.
It was no use, he couldn’t concentrate. The words were fizzing together on the screen. He sat back and looked at the ceiling. Damn Lila Cartwright and her smells-like-baked-goods office. Now he was hungry, and he had at least another hour before his scheduled lunch break.
“Rhys!” Lila didn’t even knock as she flounced into his officein her puffy-sleeved orange top and yellow skirt, tin under one arm, floppy tome of paper in hand.
He struggled to keep his eyebrows down.
“Miss Cartwright.”
“Rhys, please, call me Lila.” She smiled, probably hoping to make him more amenable to her. Nope.
Lila Cartwright was up to something that involved him, and he wanted to know what it was.
He tried to remember a time that she’d actually been in his office but couldn’t. Lila looked around, peering at the photograph of the Aubrey-Dallimore family propped on the top of the filing cabinet.
Rhys crossed his arms across his chest at her obvious lack of urgency. Couldn’t she see he was busy?
“Miss Cartwright, what could you possibly have to discuss with my students?”
The quicker he got his answers in, the quicker she could get out of his office and he could carry on with his day.
Lila looked at him like she’d forgotten why she was there. How she had ever gotten the job of Departmental Coordinator, he did not know. She was scatty, a bit dotty, and, yes, he would go as far as to say it, featherbrained.
“Here,” she said, flinging the wad of paper on one of his seats and wrestling the lid off the tin under her arm. “Have a cookie.” She slid the tin across his desk with a smile.
Rhys held her gaze, because what the hell? Why was she giving him a cookie?
