Page 6 of Open for Negotiation
- Scarlett Hale
My hand flexes on the mouse as I read her email over and over again. Jackson has continued talking but his voice has drifted off from my conscience and is barely a whisper to me. Like I’m underwater and he’s trying to talk to me from the surface.
She’s quitting?
Over my dead body.
I’m running over the myriad of ways to stop her when a paper ball hits me directly in the face.
“Um, hello? Are you just going to completely ignore my question?” Jackson says, pulling me back to the here and now. He’s looking at me like I’ve grown two heads.
“What? What question?” I clear my throat but look back to my screen instead of at him. I pull up the office IM system to see if she’s still at her desk. She is.
“What’s going on with you? You were all in, fully focused sixty seconds ago, and now you’re one hundred miles away. You all good?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m okay. Just… wait right here for a minute.”
I’m out of my chair, sending it hurling backward to the wall with a thud, and out the door before he even has a chance to question me. I’m a man on a mission as I make a beeline down the hall and toward the open cubicle area where I know the girl who is driving me nuts is sitting.
I see her stand when I round the corner, the cubicle walls being just short enough for me to see her eyes. I can tell the moment she sees me coming toward her. Those gorgeous eyes go wide, but another set impedes my view immediately.
“Oh! I’m glad I caught you.” Helen, my finance manager, says as she literally steps into my path. “We are looking at…” Her voice carries on, but I don’t really hear her. I’m too busy looking over her shoulder, trying to get a view of the now missing Scarlett.
I see a flash of hair and a swirl of her white dress disappear around the corner. She’s going for the stairs.
“Helen—” I cut her off. “Can we finish this this afternoon? I just need to handle something quickly before I forget.”
“Oh, of course. I’ll send you an email. Sorry to keep you. Go, go.”
I push around her, being much ruder than I’d ever be in any other circumstance, but I have to go. I have to get to her right now. This can’t wait.
I push past Helen and slam through the heavy, metal door that leads into the stairwell. The concrete floor and brick walls create an intense echo as her heels click under her footfalls.
“Scarlett,” I say, acutely aware that I need to keep my voice down because anyone could hear us in here. “Wait.” She doesn’t. She keeps going. So I go faster. Taking the stairs so quickly that I’m stunned I don’t misstep and fall forward.
I manage to catch up to her, only a few steps behind her when we reach the bottom. I reach out and press my hand flat onto the exit door, closing it just as she begins to open it.
“Christ, just talk to me for a second. Don’t run from me.”
Our height difference is evident like this with her back to my front. Even in high heels, the top of her head only comes chest level with me. She’s petite and curvy. My favorite.
“Max… please,” she whispers.
“Please what? I just want to talk to you, Scarlett. You can’t drop a bomb like that and expect me to not want to discuss it.”
Her hand is still outstretched, resting on the door handle.
Where we are in the building, anyone could come through the door at any moment, but at this hour, midmorning, pre-lunch… it’s not likely.
“Someone could see us. You shouldn’t have come after me.”
I look around and underneath the stairs is a small, dark alcove—completely hidden from prying eyes.
“Come here.” I offer her my hand. “Please give me five minutes with you to talk this out.”
She doesn’t move at first and for a fleeting moment, I think she’s going to go. I feel that she is going to tell me to fuck off and to mail her last check next week.
But she doesn’t.
