Page 24 of Assistant to the Billionaire CEO

This man is an asshole, I reminded myself.Just a regular run-of-the-mill asshole. Act normal!

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes! Uh-huh, of course.” I nodded quickly.

His icy-blue eyes sparkled like moonlight reflected off the ocean’s surface. “You look a little flushed. Let’s go to my office over there and have a seat. I’d hate for you to faint on me.”

He led me into one of the rooms connected to the hallway. Its beautiful old wooden floor creaked as I stepped onto it.

“Excuse the floorboards.” Ace gestured to the ground. “The interior designer reclaimed the planks from theTitanicfilm set. It’s a good talking point during boring meetings, but they creak. I’ve been threatening to pull them up and redo the floor, but I haven’t gotten around to it.”

“You couldn’t do that! They’re worth a fortune.”

“And noisy,” he said matter-of-factly. He pointed at a brown leather chair on one side of the large oak desk in the center of the room. “Please, take a seat.”

Obediently, I complied, neatly tucking my beige dress beneath me.

“Here, drink this,” he said, handing me a glass of water. “I suppose I only have one question for you. Why do you want to be my assistant?”

9

ACE

Sitting down in my chair, I leaned forward, and rested my hands on my table. She was more attractive than I had anticipated. I’d half-expected an “enchanting pumpkin” to show up for the interview, but it didn’t. At least the photo on Damon’s phone had proved that she didn’t take herself too seriously. I had firm priorities for my staff. The last thing I needed was another pretty face or an apple-shiner crumbling under pressure—those were my exact thoughts as I listened to her rather boring ramble about her college achievements. I could tell she was nervous, and it was obvious that she was desperately trying to hide it, which in itself wasn’t a bad thing. Getting this job seemed to be crucial to her—but something was off. She kept staring at me like I was a ghost from her past, which made little sense. Her chest rose and fell quickly as she regurgitated a speech, highlighting her skills gained during an internship that, according to her, had proved to be more effective than your typical training. I heard everything, despite being busy trying to make my mind up about her.

“And that’s why I think I should be your assistant,” she finally concluded, slightly winded from her lengthy speech.

She would break under any pressure, I surmised. She wasn’t the right fit. What it ultimately boiled down to: she had almost no experience, even though she’d done her best to gloss over it to convince me otherwise. It was true: experience wasn’t everything, but we were in a time crunch, and I needed someone who had built a certain portfolio to remain calm in stressful situations.

She wouldn’t last.

It would be madness to hire her.

I knew that.Sheknew I knew that.

I owed Damon. He was my bro. If she weren’t his sister, I wouldn’t have asked for her résumé in the first place, much less demanded—after my HR department had dismissed her application with a depreciatory chuckle—for Glenda to call her in ASAP.

The move had caused a certain disarray, and if anything, we’d become masters of improvising. Many people were on edge. I was no exception. Until things were back to our smooth rhythm, we had to power through. Aside from renovating the building, setting up offices, hiring new staff, and taking care of day-to-day business, the merger was on top of my priority list. It was the one thing I’d been working toward over the last months, ever since Damon had brought it up. Back then, it seemed like an impulsive idea, but it turned out to be one I was growing to like more each passing day—albeit not for the obvious reasons. Sure, a fusion with Humphries Properties would mean more opportunities, more control, more power. It would turn us into the largest architecture firm in the country and relieve me from dealing with the corrupt deeds of the other major players breathing down my neck.

But that hadn’t been my only motivation. For me, it was about more than just the money.

Time. That was what I wanted. To focus on the shit that really mattered to me. Tilly. My sister—my family. She had just moved in with me, and I craved time away from the office.

Timing was essential. The sooner my team and I got this merger in the bag, the better.

In short, I couldn’t allow any more mistakes to slow us down. My new assistant needed to be on the up and up. We had four weeks. Four weeks to put together information that presented us in the best light regarding finances, history, and future.

“How do you feel about working overtime?” I decided on one last question, offering her a perfect way out. “I work late most nights and, ideally, I need an assistant that won’t mind facilitating me during them.”

“Oh,” she said, still seeming to try to catch her breath. “I don’t mind working overtime. I’m a bit of a night owl anyway.”

“You? A night owl? I remember you being an early bird.”

“Well, we haven’t seen each other in quite some time. There’s probably a lot you don’t know about me.”

“That’s true,” I conceded. “I think the last time I saw you, you had just turned eighteen.”

“Yeah, true.”

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