Page 9 of Murder or Margaritas

“Marry me, Tina,” I begged. “I’ll make you a good husband, I swear.”

She smirked as she looked over at Mr. Crawford. “Sorry, but I don’t have anything for you.” She lifted the cup holder. “These are for the team.”

“No need to apologize, Mrs. Shepard,” he replied graciously. “I’ve had plenty already this morning.”

The liquid cocaine burnt my tongue as Tina went about her business, but I didn’t care. Knowing that I was going to be stuck in this room with Bryant all day had me needing the caffeine more than I needed working tastebuds.

“Ms. Novak-”

“I’m fine, Mr. Crawford,” I told him, waving away his concern. “I promise. This isn’t the first time that I’ve gone to work on little or no sleep.”

“That doesn’t make me feel better,” he replied sincerely, and I eyed him, reminding my lady bits that he was still a client and still way out of our league.

“I’m a professional, Mr. Crawford,” I assured him. “I’ve got this.”

He stared at me for a few seconds before finally conceding. “Fine, Ms. Novak. However, I’ll leave it alone on one condition.”

I closed my eyes as I took another hit of my coffee. “What’s that?”

“That you call me Rush, instead of Mr. Crawford,” he said, making my eyes snap open.

“Uh…”

Not giving me a chance to answer, the man threw me a wink before walking out of the room.

Chapter 6

Rush~

Ikept reminding myself that this shit was none of my business. Lots of people had shitty bosses, right? Hell, if you asked ninety percent of the people that worked for me, they’d tell you thatIwas a shitty boss. I demanded a lot from my employees, and though I paid them damn well, some people didn’t care about the money. Especially, those that had young families.

However, it was obvious to anyone with a pair of working eyes that Bryant Stanton was a bully. Now, while I couldn’t say if he was qualified to do his job or not, it was clear that he liked to throw his weight around, and I didn’t know if he did that with his whole team or if he just treated Landry like that.

After I’d left the conference room this morning, I had ignored Bryant’s attempts to speak with me, not wanting to hear his bullshit. Yeah, I liked sports just as much as the next guy, but to put your work off on a subordinate for a game had been a shitty thing to do. So, I’d gotten a hold of Preston and had directed him to make all future appointments with Bryant Stanton for the late afternoons or early evenings. Was it petty and vindictive? Yes, it was. Did I give a fuck? No.

On a roll, I had also made it clear that Davis Courtney was to stay away from all members of the auditing team. Not only had I not appreciated how he had flirted with Landry, but it was a conflict of interest for him to become chummy with any member of Jacobi Auditing. Davis Courtney’s lack of business leadership was the whole reason why we were purchasing Grandland hotels, so it was none of his business what the auditing team was doing.

Luckily, Preston had agreed, making things easier on me. While I had no problem being an asshole when the occasion called for it, I was still very aware that I was doing this as a favor to my brother, so I didn’t want to make this a contentious business deal if I didn’t have to.

At any rate, after a long ass fucking day of putting out fires and endless business meetings, I found myself back at the main offices of Grandland Hotels, hoping to see Landry Novak again. Yeah, it was super inappropriate, and I was super overstepping, but I couldn’t get the damn woman out of my head. My entire day had been filled to the rim with the shit that it took to run an empire this big, but I had still managed to make time to think of the woman, and that had never happened to me before. Women had never been a distraction in my life before, and I found the feeling rather…interesting.

Nevertheless, I wasn’t a complete idiot. So, in order for this not to look as personal as it was, I had stopped by the other two conference rooms first, asked how everyone was doing, and even asked a few questions pertaining to the audit. I had also made sure to ask if anyone needed anything, and when everyone had assured me that they were doing just fine, I’d made my way to find Landry.

As soon as I noticed that she was alone in the conference room, I fired off a text to Preston.

Me:Call Stanton and keep him busy for me

Preston:Is everything ok?

Me:Yeah, I just don’t like the fucker

Preston:Do you like anyone?

Me:Just keep him on the damn phone, Pres

Preston:LOL…yeah, no problem

Slipping my phone back in my pocket, I was about to knock on the door frame when I heard Landry talking to herself, but then quickly realized that she was on the phone.

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