Pressing send, I transferred the last of the money out of my bank account. Payday always meant money in and money straight back out again: rent, bills, sending money back home. By the end, I barely had enough for the tube after work. I had only moved out two months before and already I was longing to be back home.

"Any reason why you have six IT-requests from Callum Moore?"

"Very funny, Ollie," I scoffed. "You can cut the shit now."

Ollie had taken great delight in teasing me all morning after the events of the day before were relayed to him. He thought his reenactment of the giving of flowers, props involved, was the pinnacle of comedy and had winded himself by laughing. I was just pleased he had decided to act out that scene and not the desktop fondling one. Shudders ran down my spine at the thought.

"I'm not joking, Millie."

I entertained his claim with a cautionary glance over my shoulder to my PC monitor. I'd muted it earlier that morning, so I hadn't heard the request pings but, sure as day, there sat six IT requests. Moving myself back to my desk, I clicked on them and stared until the pixels went fuzzy. Blinking slowly, my stomach dropped. Had he remembered? What on earth did he want so urgently?

Expanding the subject lines, I was met with a list of demands.

Ticket number: 454567

Requester: Callum Moore

Subject: "Come to my office now."

Ticket number: 454568

Requester: Callum Moore

Subject: "How many requests do I need to send before you actually do your job?"

Ticket number: 454569

Requester: Callum Moore

Subject: "Do I need to come down there and remind you of what you're paid to do?"

Tensing my jaw, I scoffed at the screen and pushed away from the desk. He was so rude. Ollie was still reading the remaining requests, but I knew that they would only anger me further. Sending six IT requests within minutes of each other was ridiculously impatient. Did he think he was the King of England or something, trying to demand my attention like that?

"I swear he thinks the world revolves around him," I huffed, kicking off my slippers and slipping my real shoes on.

Jabbing my finger into the elevator call button, I paced back and forth in front of the doors. If he wanted my attention that badly, he'd get my damn attention. How dare he imply it was my job to drop whatever I was doing to respond to his beck and call? Nowhere in my job description did it say that I'd be harassed through IT requests by the CEO. I may have been a wage slave, but I wasn't his wage slave. Well, I suppose I was in a way but that still didn't make it alright.

"Try not to lose your job."

Ollie's words intercepted my angry pacing, stopping me in my tracks. He was right. If I went up there, guns blazing, then I would end up getting myself into trouble and I would only regret it later when I was packing up my slippers after being fired. After all, I needed the money. My anger fizzled away. My mum needed the money. Cursing under my breath, I stepped into the elevator. My temper: defeated.

I fixed myself with a hard look in the mirrored wall. My hair fell into my face as I stared, hanging in waves to my waist. Twirling the ends in my fingers, I focused on calming myself down. It was a given that he would piss me off again when I got up there, but at the very least I needed to try and prepare for it.

"Keep your rage internal, Millie," I told off my own reflection, pointing a finger at myself.

The lift doors opened up to his glass office and, thankfully, it was free of half-naked women that time. Mentally, I was not up to a round two. My sanity depended on all clothing being present. At the sight of me, Mr. Moore shot up from his desk and strode to the glass door to hold it open for me like an eager puppy. I paused in front of it, giving him a stern look.

Did he have nothing better to do than to sit and wait for me?

"What time do you call this?" he scolded me, making me grit my teeth.

"Two thirty-five PM. Do you need the seconds too, or will that do?"

The words came out strained and rather snappier than I had initially intended.

"I submitted my first request at two o'clock," he tutted. "That is a poor response time."

"What's the IT issue?" I cut to the chase, giving him a pointed look.

Callum Moore, being the man he was, chose to ignore my question. Go figure.

"As the CEO, I think it's my duty to ensure that all areas of the company are running effectively and efficiently. Consider this to be your official performance review," Callum waffled on. "I'll log your response time as thirty-five minutes. Let's work on that going forward."

"You called me up here to time me?" Annoyance laced my tone, despite my best attempts to remain levelheaded.

Everything about him just irritated me to no end. He seemed to be even more insufferable than I had remembered. I could recall him being rather entitled, but he had since taken it to the next level. The man was disrespectful and arrogant to his core; it rubbed me the wrong way.

"Not initially but you took too long," Callum said. "Go look at my chair."

He held the door open wider and I stepped through, rolling my eyes once my back was turned to him and scowling. To humour him, I took an exaggerated look at his chair and didn't see anything wrong. To be sure, I spun it around and it moved freely. I presented this finding with a flourish.

"Mr. Moore, have you confused IT with maintenance? Your desk chair is of no concern to me. It also seems to be working just fine, so what's the problem?"

I was losing all ability to internalise my annoyance with each passing moment in the presence of Callum Moore.

"It's your turn to clean up after yourself." Callum held out a roll of tape. "Your hairs are all over my chair from when you sat in it yesterday."

Taking a second look at his chair, I could see a few stray brown hairs but not enough to warrant any kind of concern. He took my hand, placing the tape in it and closing my fingers around it. The sensation of his large, warm hands on mine sent a jolt through my system but I was too irritated to pay any attention to it.

What my eyes did gravitate towards, however, was the empty space where his wedding band would be going sometime soon. It seemed almost naked, as if there should already be something there. A glaring reminder that he was not available and should not be acting that way with another woman.

"You must be joking," I muttered, staring at the tape in disbelief.

"I never jest about cleanliness." Callum was enjoying this too much. "I first noticed it yesterday on your own chair; it's absolutely covered in long, brown hairs. Honestly, you must shed like a dog. Aren't you a new hire? How is there that much build-up already?"

"I have a lot of hair," I mumbled, fiddling with the tape.

A slight embarrassment in the form of a blush dusted my cheeks as I fought to find the end of the tape to clean up the stray hairs. It was true, I shed hair everywhere I went, but it seemed rather rude to pull me up on it. It was his version of revenge, I suppose.

Using the sticky side of the tape, I bent down and began to dab at the chair. Could he not afford a lint roller? Callum rested against the glass of the window, as he had done yesterday, and watched me with a silly smirk on his face. I felt like wiping that look off his face but focused on my task to get it over and done with. The sound of the tape peeling off the leather fabric repeatedly made me want to throw up.

"You seem very familiar, are you sure we haven't met before?"

"Yeah, yesterday."

"Very funny," Callum scoffed. "Seriously... Have I seen you at La Fête or something?"

It was my turn to scoff. La Fête was the club near Soho that the paparazzi queued outside of, hoping to get a snap of who was leaving with who. The entrance fee alone was a day's wage, and their most expensive bottle would be more than my rent. Even if I had the money, I wouldn't be seen dead at one of those poncey, rich boy clubs.

"It's not my idea of fun."

I glanced up at Callum and he tilted his head, amused by my answer. He towered above, looking down at me with a curious expression painted across his face. Even from here, I could smell his undoubtedly expensive cologne on him. It had a cedar base note and filled my nose with the woody aroma. His voice dropped an octave deeper as he spoke.

"Then what is your idea of fun, Millie?"

The excited, tantalising gleam that swirled through his eyes forced me to look back down at the chair in defeat. I was fighting off a blush at the suggestion that appeared to be revealing itself in what he said. He was so crude.

"Dehairing chairs is a riveting pastime, you should try it." I refused to let him get to me.

"I think I prefer watching you do it, Millie."

He was definitely flirting with me. It drove me insane that he thought it was acceptable to talk to me that way when he was a taken man. He'd always been the same way.

"I don't remember telling you my name."

"I'm the CEO, Millie. I make an effort to know these things."

Each time his lips moved with the sound of my name it further clouded my brain. For a person who couldn't remember who I was, he certainly liked to pretend he knew everything about me. It made me curious to see if he'd managed to pinpoint where my oh-so-familiar face came from.

"Is that right? Well, what else do you know about me?" I played his game.

He narrowed his eyes at me, his expression playful. I was confident that he had no recollection.

"You're diverging from the question, Millie." His voice grew husky again. "What's your idea of fun?"

"This is starting to feel like an HR complaint, Mr. Moore."

"You're the one who brought up fun." That gleam was still in his eye.

I sighed, balling up the used tape and chucking it into the waste bin. Turning to face Callum, I looked him up and down. He towered over me at six foot something and always looked simultaneously like he had rolled out of bed in what he was wearing and that he had been dressed by an expensive stylist. He was disgustingly attractive.

"Cat got your tongue?" he asked, a tone of amusement behind his words.

The suggestion would have made me huff and puff if it weren't for the way his eyes drank me in. It was a brief expression, before he composed himself, but it was hard to miss the way his eyes darkened and his jaw flexed, swallowing harshly. Any quip or response left my head, and I was speechless, thinking about what that look meant. Frustrated with myself and with him, I stepped away from his desk and headed for the elevator. Standing there with my mouth moving like a goldfish was just embarrassing and he was only annoying me now.

"I'll take that a yes, then."

I could practically hear the smugness dripping from his tone.