The Boss Project

Chapter 3-3

“Lark…” He shook his head. “Even the name pisses me off.”

“Well, go be pissed off somewhere else.”

Short Guy grumbled something I couldn’t make out and turned to leave. He wiped sweat from his ruddy face as he marched toward the door and swung it open, brushing past us as if we weren’t even here. Inside, the boss walked toward his desk. Apparently, we were invisible.

The receptionist looked at me sympathetically before knocking.

“What!”

She cracked open the door and peeked her head inside. “Your five o’clock interview is here. You told me to bring her back.”

“Great.” He frowned and shook his head. “Bring her in.”

Apparently, Kitty’s grandson didn’t inherit her kind demeanor.

The receptionist extended her hand with a hesitant smile. “Sorry,” she whispered. “But good luck.”

I took a few steps inside the palatial office. When the glass door clanked closed behind me, and the guy still hadn’t looked up or greeted me, I got the urge to turn and run back out. But while I stood debating doing exactly that, Mr. Grumpy lost his patience.

He kept his back to me as he put something on his bookshelf. “Are you going to take a seat, or do I need to get a tin can and string to interview you?”

I narrowed my eyes. What a jerk. I wasn’t sure if it was the day I’d had, or just this guy’s attitude that made me lose my cool, but suddenly I didn’t care if I got the job. Whatever happened, happened. The nice thing about the point when you stop giving a crap about whether you win or lose is that it takes all the pressure off playing the game. “Perhaps I was allowing you a minute in the hopes it would improve your mood,” I said.

The guy turned around. The first thing that caught my attention was his smirk. But when my eyes lifted to meet his, and I got my first good look at that startling green, I nearly fell over.

No.

Seriously?

Just no.

It can’t be.

Kitty’s grandson is the guy from the fitting room?

I wanted to crawl into a hole somewhere.

But while I was quietly dying of humiliation, the man who fifteen minutes ago had walked in on me sniffing my armpit was forging ahead.

Merrick held out his hand to the chair in front of his desk. “Time is money. Have a seat.”

Does he not remember me? Is that even possible?

After watching the exchange he’d just had with his employee, I didn’t think he seemed like the kind of man to not speak his mind.

Maybe he didn’t get a good look at my face… I had yanked the door shut pretty quick. And I’d been standing there in a b*a, and now I was fully clothed.

Or maybe… Could I have been wrong and he wasn’t the guy from the store? I didn’t think so. While I might be forgettable to him, this man had a face I couldn’t forget—chiseled jawline, prominent cheekbones, flawless, tanned skin, full lips, and thick, dark eyelashes that rimmed nearly translucent green eyes. Those were currently staring at me like I was the last person he wanted in his office.

He put his hands on his hips. “I don’t have all day. Let’s get this over with.”

Wow. What a peach. He sounded as excited as I felt about the prospect of working for him. Nevertheless, I’d put in quite a lot of effort to be here, so I might as well finish my shitty week with one more rejection and play along.

I walked to his desk and extended my hand. “Evie Vaughn.”

“Merrick Crawford.” We locked eyes while we shook, and I still didn’t see any sign that he recognized me, not from the fitting room or as a friend of his grandmother’s.

Whatever. Kitty got me in the door, but the rest was up to me.

My resumé sat in the center of his massive glass desk. He lifted it and leaned back into his chair.

“What’s Boxcar Realty?”

“Oh, it’s a nonprofit company I started a few years back. It’s more of a side project, but I spent a good portion of the last six months working on it full time while I was between therapist jobs. I didn’t want to leave it off and show a gap in my employment.”

“So you left your last therapist position six months ago and haven’t had outside employment since then?”

I nodded. “That’s right.”

“And Boxcar is involved in real estate of some sort?”

“It’s a rental-property company. I own a few nontraditional spaces that I rent out through Airbnb.”

Merrick’s brows pulled together. “Nontraditional?”

“It’s sort of a long story, but I inherited some property down south that’s great for hiking and escaping the city. It wasn’t developed at all, and I didn’t want to spoil the land by building homes, so I built a glamping site and two treehouses that I rent.”

“A…glamping site?”

“It’s camping, but done with a little more glamour. It means—”

Merrick interrupted. “I’ve heard the term glamping, Ms. Vaughn. I’m just struggling to figure out how it relates to being a therapist.”

Ugh. Not off to a good start. I sat up a little taller. “Well, it doesn’t directly—unless you consider that most of the people I rent to are looking for an escape from their stressful jobs. It’s sort of my passion project. All of the proceeds go to charity. After I left my last position, I took some much-needed time off to focus on growing it a bit.” I leaned forward and pointed to my resumé. “If you look at the job before that, you’ll see my experience as a therapist.”