Page 5 of His Obsession

“You have five minutes to get in here. This is an important meeting. Mr. Randall and Mr. Jackson are coming into the office.”

I popped my head up from behind my desk like a gopher. “Um, wait… what? I thought this was a regular meeting? I never had an email from Mr. Randall. Are you sure?” I panicked. I went from never meeting the man to now meeting him and his business partner. That was too much to put on a girl at one time.

“Yes, I’m positive. Now stop hiding behind your desk, and let’s go,” he grumbled.

Oh shit, this was no good. My hands began to sweat, and my heart leaped. I didn’t even know what my role would be in this situation. Should I get Mr. Randall coffee? Did he evenlikecoffee? I snatched the rest of the papers from the floor and smoothed out my black dress slacks.

Slapping the papers back onto my desk, I rushed to the cappuccino machine and made myself a potent brew. I took a sip of the fiery liquid and burned my taste buds to ashes. Cursing under my breath, I fanned my mouth, trying to ease the burn. I set my cup down to go get an ice cube when the elevator dinged.

Shit.

Three men strode out, stopping to talk to the guard by the metal detectors. My eyes locked on them, and I could swear I had seen two of them before. The first man wearing a ruby-red hoodie with the words “Sniff Networks, Not Drugs,” written on the front in bold letters, was Jake Murray, Becca’s brother. I’d seen him several times. He used to come in and check on her, bringing sweets. The other two men were in coal-black suits. One with a black shirt and tie, the other with a white shirt and black tie.

“Liz!” Mr. Donovan yelled at me again. I jerked from my trance and peeled my eyes away to Mr. Donovan. “I’m sorry. I’m coming, I just burned my tongue.”

I glanced back at the men in the front and locked eyes with the man in white. My stomach gave way to butterflies, and my burning tongue became an afterthought. Where had I seen him before? He broke eye contact and returned to the conversation with the guard. This was not a splendid example of how smooth my job was.

I grabbed my laptop and a chilled water bottle and put the evil cup of brew in the trash where it belonged.

The conference room was empty. I took my seat and prepared my laptop for notes. I opened the bottle and took a slow sip, letting the cool liquid coat my tongue and soothe the burning. Usually, the first sip of coffee is borderline orgasmic, but that was damn near hell. I closed my eyes, enjoying the feeling when someone cleared their throat.

“Are we interrupting something?” A deep voice asked.

I gulped my water before opening my eyes to see the man with the white shirt staring at me. Jesus, Lord in heaven, please don’t let it be him. Bright red slapped my cheeks as I dropped my eyes from his face to see the tattoo of a black smoking skull covering the back of his hand.Oh shit.

Memories of that one stupid night flipped through my head as I remembered that tattoo. I had been so plastered; I had a hangover for two days and vowed to never drink again. I didn’t stick to it.

Please don’t remember me.

“Nope.” I croaked out before taking another small sip of water. Walking in to save the day, Jake sat down next to me, giving me a wink.

“Hey, Liz.” He gave me a cheesy grin while eying the man in the white dress shirt.

“Hi, Jake, nice hoodie.”

He always dressed in comfortable geek attire and had an endless supply of shirts and jackets with technical jargon. I didn’t understand half of it, even if he tried to explain.

“Thanks, I’ll explain it to you after the meeting,” he promised.

“Oh, God. No. If it’s anything like your explanation of Python, my brain will explode,” I teased. I couldn’t sit and listen to the computer talk. He came in one time and tried to explain why Linux was better than Windows and why Python was superior to Perl. I stopped listening after the first three minutes.

Mr. Donovan walked in with the man with the black dress shirt and introduced me.

“Ms. Keel, meet Mr. Randall.”

The man in the black shirt walked forward, and I stood and shook his hand. He was tall and maybe in his late thirties. He had a dagger tattoo on his thumb and, peeking under his jacket, it appeared he had more. I’d never seen so many businessmen with visible tattoos before. Jake just had ‘10101’ tattooed across his knuckles. I guess it was some binary computer thing.

“It’s nice to finally meet you in person,” I said while he continued to squeeze my hand.

“Tonk, you are going to break her hand,” Jake said.

Mr. Randall dropped my hand, and I gave it a good flex. He was strong, had silver streaks through his hair, and it looked good on him. Like he styled it to be that color.

“Sorry about that. It’s nice to meet you in person, Ms. Keel.” His voice was deep and smooth like I remembered.

I looked at the man in the white shirt and held out my hand. “I’m Elizabeth Keel, and you must be Mr. Jackson?” I deduced.

“You’d be correct,” he said, shaking my hand.