He chuckled. “Fine. You’re safe from punishment this time. How was the visit with your sister?”
She shrugged. “Stressful as always but I do my best to make sure they get to see their mom at least once a month.”
Garrett smiled. “You’re a good sister.”
“I don’t always feel like it. She thinks I didn’t do enough to keep her out of jail. I fought pretty hard for her the first time, but…” she trailed off with a shrug.
Garrett gave a half-hearted smile. “I have a bit of experience with wayward siblings.”
She raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t know you had siblings.”
He held up a finger. “Just one. I don’t talk about him much.”
“I would love to hear about him sometime, but I won’t pry,” she said.
He wanted to go to her, hold her to his chest, but he knew he couldn’t. The warehouse floor below them was bustling with activity and he needed to remain professional around her at work.
“I want you to go home early and get some rest,” he said, changing the subject.
She shook her head. “I’m good. I’ll just take off at three like normal.”
Garrett frowned, wanting to argue, put his foot down, but he didn’t. “OK. Three is fine. For now. If you’re going to insist on working, I need you to dig through employment records for the last couple of years.” He picked up a pen and wrote something on a sticky note. “I want to identify the people fired during these time frames so we can figure out if they were the ones fired for stealing. I want to talk to as many of them as possible.”
She took it and stood. “I’ll get right on that, Mr. Oliver, Sir.”
Was she trying to bring his inner Dom out at the office?
“I haven’t dismissed you yet,” he said sternly. When she dropped back into her chair, he very nearly smirked at how quickly she reacted to his commanding tone.
He pushed back from his desk and walked to the blinds to close them. After locking the door, he turned and prowled toward the pretty girl sitting at his desk.
Her hair was down, cascading over her shoulders, so he let his hand sink into the wavy tendrils at the nape of her neck and gripped hard, pulling her head back so she was staring up at him.
She gasped as his grip tightened. “Garrett, we’re at work.”
He didn’t respond, just bent, and pressed his lips to hers.
“I missed you in my bed last night,” he said when he pulled away. “And if you’re going to be my submissive outside of the club, you might as well get used to seeing at least a little dominance from me at work.”
Her blush made him want to dominate her even more, but he knew it was unwise to take it too far. At least while there were so many other employees in the building.
“I’ll have mercy on you for now, though. You can go back to work.”
She blushed as her hair fell from his fingers. Standing, she surprised him and leaned up on her tiptoes to press a kiss to his cheek.
“Thank you, Doll,” he murmured as he watched her walk out the door. He kept his blinds closed so he wouldn’t stare at her all day. He had a lot of work to get done so he could return to his normal routine in Pennsylvania. He did his best to tamp down the voice that said maybe he wanted to work out of Colorado long term.
His train of thought irritated him. He liked Colorado for Solitaire and the cheap warehouse property, but he had no desire to live there. A woman like Isabelle wasn’t going to leave her family to come live with him in Pennsylvania either. Not that he wanted her to. He enjoyed living on his own and wasn’t ready for a family or long-term commitment.
“Sir, I have your shipping team manager here, he’s ready for your tour.” Isabelle’s voice crackled over the intercom, making him smile.
He pressed the button. “Thank you. Tell him I’ll be down in five minutes, please.”
On his way out the door, he stopped and said, “This will likely take me until midafternoon. Take your lunch break whenever you’re ready.”
He spent the rest of the morning going through the entire shipping department with the manager. He had tours set up with all four of the major departments inside the center and every team manager knew their jobs were on the line.
Back in his office that afternoon, he got on a video call with Regina to sort out his schedule. The President was adamant that they meet soon, so he was trying to make it work.
