Trouble

4. Audrey-1

Four

Audrey

I’d forgotten all about my lunch encounter with the redheaded guy by the time four o’clock rolled around. I was neck-deep in reports and business calls, and so when my private line rang, I assumed it was just another client remembering that oops, they needed me to finish a report today, or their entire damn company would go up in smoke.

“Caslik Consulting, Audrey Waits speaking,” I said as I picked up, without taking my focus off the Excel sheet I’d spent the past thirty minutes plowing through.

“Audrey. It’s Liam. Liam Steel.”

I frowned, trying to allocate the name, but with no luck. “What can I do for you, Mr. Steel?”

A small chuckle. “It’s past four—you asked me to call you.”

I did? Internally cussing, I grabbed for my diary and desperately flicked through the crammed pages, but no appointments were noted in for past four. s**t! The damn thing was my lifeline, but I’d obviously completely spaced on noting down this guy’s call.

“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Steel, but could you just remind me which report this is concerning?” I asked, doing my best to keep my tone as calm and don’t-you-worry-your-company-is-in-excellent-hands as I could while I frantically rummaged around my desk for any hint of which company he might be working for.

“Well, Miss Waits,” he drawled, and I got the distinct impression he was both aware of and enjoying my squirming, “it was about the very important meeting we set up earlier today. You wouldn’t have forgotten about it, would you now?”

“No, of course not, I’m just pulling your file up now, Mr. Steel,” I lied, sending my co-worker Eileen a desperate look as she stared at me with an amused grin from her desk next to me, being not the least bit helpful.

“I’m glad to hear it, Miss Waits,” my nightmare client said, and I frowned at the way he intoned my surname. Hadn’t he called me Audrey when I picked up? “When can I expect to pick up the package, then?”

Package? I stared in bewilderment at Eileen, who still didn’t offer me so much as the shakiest lifeline.

“Package, Mr. Steel?”

“The beer, love.” He sounded like he was smiling widely now, his timbre changing from stern business to something much warmer that made me blink in confusion. “It’s Liam, from the park this morning. You gave me your card at lunch.”

“The… beer? Oh! The beer!” I mentally facepalmed when my brain finally connected the dots. “Of course, I’m so sorry! I didn’t catch your name before.”

“That’s quite all right,” he said, and this time I was certain there was a laugh in his voice. “But what do you say, Miss Waits? Are you still up for it?”

“Yes, let me just check my schedule…” I flipped back to the right page in my diary. “I should be done about six. Is that all right?”

“That’s fine. Meet you at the pub?”

“Yes, I’ll meet you there.”

“That’s a date, then. Bye for now, love.”

“Bye, Liam,” I said, hanging up the phone.

It was only when I saw Eileen’s teasing smirk that I realized my lips were quirked up in an involuntary smile. There was something about that cheerful voice that made it impossible not to smile—as if he was overflowing with so much zest for life, it was impossible not to be infected.

“Audrey Waits… was that… a date I heard you arrange just now? And on company time, no less!”

I quickly pulled my mouth into a straight line and tried to ignore the faint blush on my cheeks. “No, of course not.”

“Really, though? Are you sure about that? Because from where I was sitting—”

“It’s just one beer,” I interrupted her, shooting an annoyed glare at her across my piled-up reports. “As a thank-you. He saved me from having to limp back home with a broken shoe and be an hour late for the meeting with Perkinson this morning.”

“I’m sorry, he saved you?” Eileen lit up like a damn Christmas tree and rolled her office chair out from behind her desk in classic gossip pose. “Do tell me more.”

I rolled my eyes, but nevertheless told her the story of my disastrous morning. Only when I was done, her face was still stuck in a wide grin.

“Sounds like you gave it as quite the damsel in distress,” she mused, flicking a pen between her well-manicured fingernails.

“I did not!”

“Tell me, was he handsome, this savior of yours?”

I paused, the image of Liam’s silver eyes and fiery hair—and the way all his rows of muscle had been so clearly visible through his clothes—flickering before my mind’s eye. “That’s neither here nor there. He can’t be more than early twenties, and I’m not exactly a cougar here. Nothing’s going to happen—it’s just a thank-you beer.”

“Mmhm,” Eileen hummed. She swiveled around on her chair to rummage through her purse, but before I could get back to work, she pulled out a string of foil packs and turned back around to me with a smirk, hand outstretched.

“You should probably take these, though. You know, just in case you slip on your way to the bar and land on his d**k. It can be tricky for old maids like yourself to navigate around a hot young stud without stumbling.”

“Eileen, put those away!” I hissed, glancing out the open door of our shared office out of fear of one of our superiors seeing her lewd offering. “It’s not a date, and I’m certainly not going to need condoms! Are you crazy?”

“Just looking out for you and your cobweb-infested v****a,” she said, shaking the row of condoms at me. “Come on, Audrey. When did you even get laid last? You’ll let that young man take you home—and then you’ll ride him like a pony.”

“I most certainly will not.” I turned my attention back to my screen. “And I’m not taking those from you, either. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.”

When I walked into the same pub I’d run into Liam at earlier, it was with an obscene amount of condoms stashed away in the depths of my purse and a nagging fear that every other patron in the place had suddenly developed X-ray vision. Despite Eileen’s commentary throughout the afternoon, I wasn’t exactly a blushing virgin, but there was just something about walking into a pub to meet a guy with a purse full of condoms that made me feel like a perverted predator.

I had zero interest in the kind of things a guy like Liam had to offer, and besides—Eileen was just full of it. There was nothing s****l in an after-work beer with the guy who’d saved you from getting chewed out by your boss. It was just a friendly thank-you. The end.

My train of thought halted when I spotted Liam’s red hair up by the bar. He was lounging on a bar stool, a pint of beer next to him.

He lit up in a smile the moment our eyes met, and my breath got stuck in my chest by the sheer force of his expression. I’d never met anyone who could do that—who could light up the entire room, pushing every hint of dark thoughts aside in an easy sweep as if they never existed, just with a smile.

“Miss Waits,” he rumbled, quirking a teasing eyebrow at me when I walked up next to him.

I flushed at the reminder of my blunder earlier and gave him a stern look. “Mr. Steel. I’m glad my panic was amusing to you.”

“Oh, it was, love,” he said. “I take it you thought I was some fancy client ready to throw a tantrum?”

“Yeah,” I said with a small sigh at the reminder of my current high-maintenance client, Perkinson. “We get some pretty highly strung managers on the line. The one I was on my way to meeting this morning is one of the worst, so I really can’t thank you enough for the rescue.”

Liam glanced down at my shoes. “It’s still holding up?”

“Yeah.” I wiggled my foot for emphasis. “Which is more than can be said for my feet.”

The smile that was never far away from his handsome face returned, bathing me in its warmth. “I never understood why women put themselves through such torture.”

“After this morning, neither do I,” I grumbled, earning me a low laugh.

“We should probably find a seat then, love, so you can give your feet a break, eh?” He winked. “Listen, would you mind if we grabbed dinner before we get down to the business-end of that beer you owe me? I’m absolutely starving.”

“Oh. Yeah, sure, I guess that would be nice,” I said, checking the time on my phone. It was close to dinner time, of course, and the idea of a nice pub meal made my stomach rumble in agreement. It would be a welcome change from all my takeaway, anyway.

Liam slid off the bar stool with an easy movement that displayed perfect control of his body and held out his arm to guide me toward one of the empty tables by the window.

“So what do you do, Liam?” I asked as we sat down, grabbing the menus. “I presume something business-related, since you were in the area this morning and around lunch?”

“Nah, I live close by,” he said distractedly as he looked at first page. “You in the mood for a starter? Nachos sound good?”

“Uh, sure.” I blinked at him, taking in his casual shirt-and-jeans outfit. “The area” was mainly big corporation HQs and a few high-class pubs like the one we were at. The residential buildings I knew of lay right down by the river, and… the kind of people who lived there generally pulled home seven-figure salaries and weren’t seen without their Louis Moinet watches and Roberto Cavalli ties. What the hell did a twenty-something guy do for a living that had him shacked up with a view over the Thames?

“You in IT then?”

“Nope. I think I’ll do the ribeye for mains. Have you got something selected?”

“The soup of the day.”

“Dessert?”

“No thanks.”

He shot me a decidedly wicked smirk. “Guess we’ll just see what we’re in the mood for at the time. Stay put, I’ll order.”

I fought to control my blush as he sauntered up to the bar to put in our order. He was clearly a tease, judging by the prank he’d put me through when he called my office earlier.

And what was about not telling me what he did for a living?

Liam returned shortly after with a bottle of white wine and two glasses.

“Oh, I wasn’t going to drink,” I said when he put them down on our table and slid back into his seat.

“Oh come now, love. You weren’t going to let me drink that beer on my own, were you?” he said, easily pouring a healthy measure first in my glass and then his own.

I paused, quirking an eyebrow at him. “Are you really peer pressuring me into drinking on a work night, Mr. Steel?”

He let out that rumbly laugh of his that seemed to warm my chest in the most pleasant way, as if his amusement was as infectious as his easy smile. “Of course.”

I sighed and eyed the full wine glass in front of me. It looked more inviting than it had any right doing—I hadn’t really enjoyed a cold glass of wine in good company in way too long.

For some reason, the b****y condoms in my purse flashed in front of my mind’s eye again, and I scrunched up my nose in annoyance. Damn Eileen for putting those sorts of thoughts in my head!

I glanced from the glass to Liam, then reached out, quickly swapping our glasses before I raised his to my lips and took a sip. It tasted heavenly.

“Clever girl,” he said, raising my swapped glass to drink long and deep without breaking eye contact. Demonstrating that my safety measure wasn’t needed.

“Sorry, I—”

He waved me off with a hand. “Don’t apologize for being smart, love. A single girl has to look out for herself, I get it. In fact…” Liam reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, sealed plastic bag. He put it on the table, shoving it over to me. “Use these, if you don’t have your own. I won’t be offended.”

I stared down at the small, factory-sealed kit of CYD test-strips. Who the f**k carried a set of drinks-testers around to hand out to random women?