Chapter Three - Can't Count

Caroline

"He did what?" Rebekah gasped.

I looked down at my hands in slight mortification. I haven't felt this weak in a long time.

Nick Sinclair had made me feel so powerless when he'd effortlessly made me agree to work for him—by blackmailing me.

He was a fiend straight from hell.

"I'm going to teach that manwhore some manners." Rebekah was suddenly rolling her sleeves up and reaching for her phone, which was lying on the nightstand.

I quickly took the phone out of her reach.

"What are you doing, Rebekah?"

"What do you think?" she snapped. "He can't just manipulate people like that. Okay! His own employees, fine! But my friend? NO!"

I sighed.

"And what was my dimwit for a brother doing there?" She gritted her teeth.

"Mr. Andrews tried his best, Rebekah. In fact, if Nick Sinclair had called the cops, I'd be the one in trouble. Maybe that's why he didn't say much."

She frowned.

"That jerk! I've always hated Nick's guts," she snapped, but when she tried to snatch her phone I hid it behind me.

"Give me my phone, Caroline."

"No, you don't understand, Reb. If you call him and he gets mad, he'll somehow find a way to take it out on me. I'll be his secretary until Penny recovers and I don't wanna find out what a person like him can do."

She was silent for a few moments and then she let out a frustrated groan.

"Fine! But if he does anything again, you tell me, okay? Not stupid Blake, not your aunt in a town far, far away..."

I let out a chuckle at that.

"I'm serious, Care." She tried to keep a straight face but a smile formed on her lips.

"What's your beef with Sinclair anyway?" I asked.

Her eyes literally rolled to the back of her head at that. "Let's just say that he is a cocky bastard who thinks he can have every fucking woman in this world."

I blinked at her.

"Which is why I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for you." She burst out laughing.

I swear she acts bipolar sometimes.

I narrowed my eyes for a moment. "You are joking, aren't you?"

"Nope." She jumped back on her bed and pulled the covers on top of her.

"You start tomorrow, right?" she asked.

I had been preventing myself from thinking about it. How bad can it be?

I nodded.

"Well! Good luck, Caroline," she sang and closed her eyes with a chuckle.

I let out a cry and went to bed. I had high marks in my courses so far so I was going to skip a few classes this upcoming week to learn things at Sinclair Enterprises.

It's gonna be alright, Caroline.

I'd been through worse. How big of a deal could a billionaire playboy be?

*****

I looked at my reflection in the mirror as the elevator took me up to the devil's den.

I was wearing a white blouse and a black pencil skirt. It was a borrowed outfit from Rebekah.

I should probably start working longer shifts at the coffee shop, so I can buy a few business outfits. I could wear casuals at Mr. Andrews' office, but I didn't want to give my new boss a chance to throw tantrums.

As I nervously walked down the corridor towards his office, my palms became sweaty.

Well no shit.

The last thing I wanted was someone shaking my hand during the summer.

Fist bumps should be considered professional.

Taking in a deep breath, I lifted my hand and knocked on the door, but there was no response.

"Ms. Stewart?"

I turned around to the voice and found the guy from yesterday. Trent.

He was a fairly tall guy with a nerdy vibe owing to his huge black-rimmed glasses. His hair was a nice shade of platinum, going well with his olive complexion.

"Mr. Sinclair will be here in a few minutes. You're asked to wait in his office. He will talk to you and after that, I'm supposed to show you around."

I nodded. "Okay."

"And—" he started, but then scratched the back of his neck awkwardly, "—I'm sorry about yesterday."

"Oh, that's okay." I gave him a little smile. "You did what you were supposed to do."

His lips pulled up into a smile. "So no grudges?"

At this, I let out a chuckle. "For making me sit in a very comfortable waiting room? No, I think I'm good."

He laughed but it was cut short when someone cleared their throat.

We turned our heads to the side and found Mr. Sinclair standing a few feet away from us, a frown sitting on his lips. He seemed to be in a shitty mood.

Oh God! Someone just had to piss him off on my very first day!

A little help, my lucky stars?

"Mr. Sinclair," Trent said.

"I told you to make her wait in my office," his gaze snapped to mine, causing me to gulp, "not stand here and chat with her."

"Uh, yes, Sir." Trent was nervously glancing at him.

And I wondered if Mr. Sinclair treated all his employees like that. Blake Andrews was so much better.

"Ms. Stewart, I'll join you in my office," he said.

Without thinking twice, I nodded and went inside his office, closing the door behind me.

He is one scary guy.

Letting out a breath, I settled on one of the chairs in front of his desk and looked down at my hands. A smile formed on my lips as I admired the ring on my right index finger.

My mom had given it to me when I had turned sixteen.

I removed it and slipped it back on. It was an old habit of mine to play with the ring whenever I was nervous or wanted to take my mind off something.

I took it off again and gasped when the ring suddenly slipped out of my hands. Before I could bend to retrieve it, it rolled under the desk.

"Ugh," I groaned, crouching down and trying to grab it. But the space between the floor and desk was very narrow on this side.

Looking at the door nervously, I quickly made my way to the other side of the desk and bent down.

There was enough space between the side drawers for me to crawl under the desk and get my ring.

I stretched my hand in the dark corner and probed the floor. No luck.

Stretching my hand further, it finally came in contact with the ring but an unusual sound made my eyes grow wide.

Cloth ripping.

My hand immediately went to my right shoulder and I gasped.

The blouse was already a size too small and stretching my arm had torn the cloth.

Oh God! Oh God! Oh God!

I immediately got up from the floor and turned around to run towards the door but screamed when I bumped into someone, lost my balance and fell, but a pair of arms caught me.

It took me a few moments to catch my breath.

I inhaled the person's scent. It was a mixture of fresh cologne and coffee.

I slowly opened my eyes to find an intense pair of blue eyes locked with mine.

His lips were pressed into a thin line and for a moment, I couldn't take my eyes away. I finally blinked and looked back up into his eyes, which to my surprise were trailing all over my face before stopping at my lips.

My lips parted and his gaze lifted to my eyes once more.

His arms were strong enough to hold me in place and I could feel his rock hard chest against my palms.

Man! Just how much does he work out?

I cleared my throat and pulled myself away from him, taking a few steps back to create some distance between us.

"I-I'm sorry, Mr. Sinclair."

His face held a slight frown. "Are you alright?"

I nodded.

"What were you doing?" he asked in confusion.

"This," I held the ring up in front of his face and he gave it a weird look. "My ring slipped under your desk and I was just getting it back."

He scrutinized the shiny little thing.

"Must be a really special ring."

"Yeah, it is." I slipped it back on my finger.

A frown formed on his lips as he walked behind his desk and sat in the chair.

I shifted in my position to face him squarely, so he wouldn't see the torn material at the back of my blouse.

All I had to do was get to the bathroom and come up with a solution to fix the shirt. And if my brain didn't work, I would call Rebekah.

"So I'm supposed to go to Trent, right?" I asked while taking a step towards the door.

"No." His eyes narrowed for a moment. "Why would you?"

"Uh—he said he was supposed to show me around."

"No, Ms. Stewart," he said. "Trent is a little busy at the moment. So..." He directed his gaze to the chairs across his desk, motioning for me to sit down.

Letting out a breath, I seated myself in one of the chairs and faced him.

He went back to typing on his laptop and I thought he would say something after finishing some work, but half an hour passed and I was just sitting in the same spot, doing nothing.

I cleared my throat to get his attention but he just kept looking at the screen.

Was he doing that intentionally?

"Mr. Sinclair?" I finally spoke.

He looked up from his laptop. "Yes, Ms. Stewart?"

"Is there something I can do for you?" I asked.

"Not at the moment." And with that, he went back to typing again.

Another fifteen minutes passed.

"Mr. Sinclair?" I called again.

He let out a breath. "Yes?"

"Is there something I can do for you?"

"No—"

"I can fetch your coffee? Or send e-mails? Or go out to get someone in case you don't feel like using the phone?"

"Not really."

I frowned. "Is there anything I can do for you?"

He thought for a moment. "Yes."

My eyes lit up. "What?"

"Sit quietly."

My jaw dropped. Did he really say that? That was so mean.

"Well, I'm not skipping my classes to sit here and do nothing." I crossed my arms over my chest.

I regretted my words when his callous look fell on me, which was soon replaced by a look of amusement. But it was gone as soon as it came.

"Blake said you were a very docile person. Seems to me he was wrong."

"He also said stuff about you. Guess he was wrong," I said, knowing well that Blake had never said a word about him before. I didn't even know his name until I met him in his office.

I seemed to have caught his attention.

"What kind of stuff?" He placed his elbows on the desk and leaned forward, suddenly showing interest in a futile conversation.

"You know," I shrugged. "Good stuff. Stuff that I really wish was true."

There was a glint of amusement in his eyes once more and a slight smirk forming on his lips.

"Careful what you wish for, Ms. Stewart. I'm nothing like Blake."

What could he mean by that?

"Clearly you're not. Because, you see, I was actually learning something at his company."

He pressed his lips into a thin line, then took in a deep breath like he was stopping himself from lashing out at me.

I'm one step away from being fired on my very first day. That should be put on record.

Then, he got up from his spot and I held my breath as he rounded his desk to walk in my direction.

He finally stopped when he was standing a few inches away. I found myself involuntarily getting up in fright and facing him.

"Turn around."

My eyes grew wide. "What?"

"Turn around, go to that cabinet and get all the files from the first shelf." He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against his desk.

I turned around in confusion to find a sleek white cabinet in the corner. Walking over to it, I collected all the files from the first shelf and walked back to him.

There were five files, each containing a large bundle of papers.

He picked up a few papers from his desk and placed them on top of the bundle in my hands.

"These papers have all the corrections. Go to my secretary's desk, which will be your desk for the next few weeks. It's right next to my office. Look for these files' original versions on her computer and make these corrections. Print out five copies of each and arrange them in order like these files. Am I clear?"

I was too dumbfounded to nod.

"Am I clear, Ms. Stewart?" he asked, this time in a more authoritative tone.

I nodded and without wasting another second, I started walking towards the door while carefully balancing the files in my arms.

"Caroline."

My feet stopped moving when his deep voice sent my name reverberating all around the room.

"Yes?" I turned around and gasped when the files bumped into his chest. I didn't even realize he had walked up to me.

He grabbed the files from my hands before I could drop them and placed them on a nearby cabinet.

Then he took his blazer off and held it out for me.

I stared at him in confusion.

"Take it, unless you want everyone to notice your wardrobe glitch."

My eyes grew wide as I remembered that my blouse was ripped. How could I forget that?

My cheeks heated up in embarrassment as I took his blazer and slipped into it, inhaling his intoxicated scent.

"Thank you," I muttered.

He picked the files up and handed them back to me, frowning in the process while looking down at his hands.

"What the hell is that?"

I noticed the dampness near the area where I was holding the bundle from.

Oh my God!

That's my sweat.

I opened my mouth to say something but shut it again, having no idea how to confess something so gross. No wonder I didn't have a lot of friends in high school.

"Mr. Sinclair." There was a knock on the door.

"Uh, I'll go." Without waiting for his response, I was out the door and facing Trent.

Nice save!

Giving him a smile, I quickly ran over to the desk on the right and sighed in relief.

I should consider wearing gloves all the time. People might think I have powers like Elsa.

Either way, ice queen trumps sweat queen.

Shaking my head, I started looking for the files on Penny's computer. She was a very organized person. I could tell by the way every file was named properly. It didn't take me more than five minutes to find all the files.

I started working and it was finally 7 p.m. when I was done with all the five files and was ready to leave.

I walked up to Mr. Sinclair's office but found out through Trent that he had already left.

So I put the files on his table and left. After about an hour-long bus ride, I was finally entering my dorm.

Rebekah was using her phone and she looked up at me—looked at the blazer I was wearing, more like, and a smirk formed on her lips.

"Ooh, saucy."

"About that." I took the blazer off and turned my back to her. "I owe you a shirt."

"What happened?" she asked in confusion.

"Long story." I buried my face in my pillow in exhaustion. "And I have to get this blazer laundered."

"Whose blazer is that?"

I lifted my face up.

Recognition flashed across her face and her jaw dropped open.

"Nick Sinclair?" she gasped.

I nodded and buried my face back in the pillow.

"Care, I have to ask you now. How was your day?"

"Worst day ever," I mumbled into the pillow, counting the number of times I had embarrassed myself in front of him.

Can't count.

"Maybe we can talk over a few drinks," Rebekah suggested.

I lifted my face up once more. That didn't sound very bad.

"Only a few," I stated.

She gave me a little salute. "Aye, aye, captain."

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