Page 15 of The Marriage Bid
With his eyes never leaving me, Tyler snapped his fingers, and the assistant rushed over to him. The young man handed Tyler the tablet, and Tyler read through it. I waited in silence as he went through what I assumed were the changes I suggested to Sebastian. If he had come here so confidently, why hadn’t he read the briefs before?
“Yeah, we’re not making any of these changes.” He handed the tablet to his assistant and shoved his hands back into his pockets. His casual stance slowly pissing me off. “Too expensive.”
Exasperated, I raised my hands in surrender. “You haven’t even read through the reasoning.”
“I did. Don’t think it’s reasonable.”
“You did not—” I took a deep breath. Any wrong word and it was over for us. “You know what? Can you at least let me walk you through what we discussed before throwing away my suggestions?”
Tyler shook his head. “Fine. But I got better things to do. You were only brought in to complement our vision, not change it.”
“That’s what I am doing.”
Tyler did not look convinced. I marched over to him, specifically to the corner windows he had been gazing out from. “We can’t put the kitchenette here. We should move it at least three feet to allow space for a breakfast table. By the window. Sebastian was going to sign off on it.”
“But he hasn’t, has he?” Tyler said.
Of course, he was going to be difficult.
“You can’t just come into my projects and make whatever changes you want. I don’t know who you worked with before, but that’s not how we operate at H&H.”
I gritted my teeth. God. He was determined to be a prick. “Like I said before, Sebastian was about to sign off on this. Heapprovedof the idea.”
“Hmm…” Tyler sounded unconvinced.
I gripped the phone in my hand so tightly it might have broken if it weren’t made of sturdier material. Tyler surveyed the area where the kitchenette was supposed to go. He knew I was right, but he didn’t want to admit it for some stupid reason.
He gave his assistant the tablet and whispered something to him. The assistant shuffled out of the room. I was left alone with Tyler. Somehow, the other man’s presence felt like a shield, and now that he was gone, I was exposed.
“So?” I couldn’t remove the plea in my voice. “What do you think?”
Tyler said nothing. He shrugged and marched out of the bare penthouse suite. The move was so sudden I had little time to collect my bag and scurry after him. I only caught up with the asshole in the elevator as he tried and failed to get the doors closed. I entered and pressed the correct button.
The door rattled to a close. The elevator was functioning but still in barebones shape. I hated elevators in general, but I hated this one more. The plywood scuffed with boot marks and the dangling work light on top of the smell of dust and construction debris gave the elevator the feel of a serial killer’s workroom.
Tyler fumbled with the buttons looking for the floor number. “It’s the down arrow. The buttons are switched.”
He frowned, looking at the buttons. “And how do you get this thing started…”
I pressed the giant red button and then the floor we were visiting next. The elevator groaned. Jerked down, moved half a floor, and stopped. “Fuck. It does this sometimes. The foreman said he would look into it.” I pressed the red button three times like he had told me to, and the elevator began climbing up again.
“He should get that fixed,” Tyler said.
“You tell him,” I crossed my arms. “He’s your man.”
Tyler looked like he was about to come back with a retort, but we reached our floor and the elevator jerked us to the side as it came to a stop. I wasn’t holding on to the rail, like I usually do, and stumbled into Tyler’s massive chest. My head hit his rock-hard body, my lips colliding with his blue tie. I breathed in vetiver and fougère. My hands held onto his jacket lapels as I felt enormous arms envelop me. Without meaning to, thoughts of the last time I was this close to him flooded into my mind. How his firm hands had gripped my waist. Gripped my tits as… I cleared my head and pushed myself away from his embrace. Tyler held my arms as he steadied me. The door rattled open, and I rushed out, my skin burning. I did not want him to see the blush on my cheeks, but the low chuckle I heard behind me said that was unnecessary.
“You don’t have to fling yourself into my arms. Whatever lust-driven desire I had for you ended that night.”
If my face could have gotten any redder, it would have. “It’s not my fault your elevator is faulty, Tyler.”
He snorted and strolled around the suite waiting for me. I took a deep breath. He wanted to irritate me so that I would give up this contract. Well, it wasn’t happening. “For this space, I thought—Sebastian, and I thought—it would be better if we placed a half partition in the middle of this living room.” I went to the wall where I had drawn a marker. “Somewhere around here. It’s too large. Surely you can see that.”
“But it would also partition the light coming through those two.” He gestured to the two windows that spanned the entire space.
“Would that be so bad? One side has a window large enough to let in enough sun.”
“But your partition would shade people on one side depending on the time of day.”
