Page 25 of Always. Forever.

I lean over, placing my hand on the desk in front of her with my palm up, offering her to place her hand in mine. She does and squeezes before looking up with tears in her eyes.Oh shit.

I let go of her hand and walk around the desk, leaning down in front of her as a single tear runs down her face.

“Rach, shit. What’s happened?” I don’t know whether to ask, but I can’t just leave it. “Has he . . . has he hurt you? You know you can tell me,” I rush the last bit out.

She shakes her head back and forth fast. “No, no. Nothing like that.” I grab a tissue and pass it to her.

“Talk to me, babe.”

“There’s so much to talk about, Ry. I honestly don’t even know where to start.” With how upset she is, I definitely think coffee and pastries are not the correct setting.

“How about we have this catch-up and you can tell me all about it over a liquid lunch? I think that will be better, don’t you,” I say, squeezing her hand.

She laughs while dabbing under her eyes, careful not to rub the makeup off.

“I think you’re right, there. I’m sorry I just blurted it out like that, then cried on you. I just needed to get it off my chest, it’s been playing on me for months now.”

Months? Wow.I softly smile at her.

“I’m just glad you told me. You know I’m always here for you and will help you with anything.”

“I know, Rylee, and thank you.”

I walk around my desk, taking a seat, passing her back her coffee and pastries. We leave the gossip, as I don’t think Rach is really in the mood, but we talk about how work has been. She tells me about some awkward clients who were causing her a lot of hassle, as they weren’t giving her the information needed to accomplish the work—story of our lives. She asks me a few questions about things she isn’t sure on. We always have things pop up that we need to bounce off each other to make sure we are taking the right approach.

“Okay, I think that’s everything.” She starts grabbing the trash, but I tell her to leave it. She smiles at me.

“I’ll book a table for us at Chimes at say, 12:30? I’m thinking we could grab some food too?” I say as I load the website up, ready to book.

“That sounds perfect! Thanks again, Ry.” She slips out of my office door.

I hope she is okay. I can’t believe she hasn’t told me about this before. I can only imagine this goes deeper than I may think and just pray Harley doesn’t hurt her. He is known as the “office slut.” He has the appearance for it, don’t get me wrong. Swept back light-brown hair, bright-green eyes, chiseled jaw, and always looks immaculate and lives and breathes at the gym. There is one thing that makes all that come crashing down, well, for me, he knows he’s hot and that is the biggest ick. Walks around the office like girls would sell their soul for five minutes to be with him, and it kills me a little inside every time I see him acting the way he does. He knows not to be like that around me, Jace made sure of that.

When I started working here, we had been together for about a year. Jace came and picked me up from work one day and saw Harley acting the way he does, so he made it very obvious I was taken, and that would not change, by kissing the life out of me right in front of my whole office. Jace has never been a jealous person, but I think he wanted to make a point that day. Harley, who used to flirt with me before this, backed away after that and treated me as a colleague, although we are all pretty relaxed around each other and treat each other more as friends, but he never swayed from that. I know how he can be, and I can bet any amount of money he has been playing with Rach’s feelings.

I open my laptop, going through my emails. There are way too many, and I’m sure some of our clients think we work seven days a week because the amount I have from yesterday is a joke.It’s a Sunday. Give a girl a break.I never knew all those years ago when I completed my degree in accountancy that there would be so much more to uncover within the job, and believe me, there is. We get hit with new challenges all the time but it’s what makes the job interesting.

People would say accounting and interesting wouldn’t go in the same sentence, but when you have a great team, it can make work interesting and enjoyable. It can also be a very stressful role, so having a great team alongside you makes all the difference, and here at Quaylands Accountancy, we have just that.

Quaylands is a global firm and has offices all around the world, so we have to be on our game at all times. We do have goals we have to reach, which makes it that more challenging, but like I say, we work as a team to hit those goals, and we do it with flying colors each time. We deal with a lot of corporate clients, so we deal with the larger company accounts, and most of our clients are great.

I go through my emails and reply to some. I need to get my spreadsheets open and work on some final accounts for one of our biggest clients. It’s their financial year-end which always causes stress around the office. You can tell when this time of the year hits for this client as everyone is a lot more quiet and has their head down, focusing on the work. We have virtual meetings each week to go over what we’re doing and who needs help with what. We set each person on one job so we’re not crossing over on anything. It makes everything run smoothly.

A knock comes on my office door.

“Come in!”

The door opens and all I see are a huge bunch of multicolored tulips. My eyes grow big as I see the true size of them once poor Amelia, our receptionist, who is peeking over the top, walks up to my desk. I get up and walk around the front, taking them from her and placing them on my desk. Amelia flashes her beautiful big smile at me.

“These arrived via courier for you just now. They are beautiful.” She beams.

“They really are, they’re my favorites, so I can only guess who they’re from.” I smile back at her.

“I keep telling you, you need to hook me up with one of Jace’s friends, Rylee. I need this kind of treatment in my life.” She giggles as she heads toward the door.

I laugh back at her. “If he had any decent single friends, you would be the first person I would be contacting, but unfortunately, he doesn’t at the moment. They are all taken.” That’s not necessarily true, but Jace’s friends are still going through their whore stage. I don’t need to be having them break my colleague’s heart. There is James, who I did consider for a moment, but to be honest, I think Amelia can do better.

Amelia opens my door and turns around to me.

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