Page 28 of Julian

“You know, you can come sit with me. Standing there make me seem scary.”

He did not move a muscle.

“Julian must have said things to you. He can be an ass sometimes. I know you know him better than I do. I don’t bite though.”

He turned and looked at me with a smile playing on his lips.

“You know, you can join me. There are enough pastries here for the both of us.”

Drummer cleared his throat, “I’m doing my job.”

“Okay. I know you’re mad about the phone. I’ll have Julian buy you a new one. Here,” I reached out my hand toward the doorway. “You can use mine for now if you’d like. I’ll tell him whatever story you want me to.”

A laugh escaped his lips.

“What?” I narrowed my eyes, as I bit into a cream filled doughnut. “You think I can’t scare you? I trained with the best of the best. I am a walking machine, a live weapon.”

He crossed his arms over his chest.

I jumped to my feet and walked over to him.

“Jab,” I told him. “Come on, throw a punch.”

“My job is to protect you,” he returned.

“I am not a broken, weak woman. I’m a fighter. Come on, throw a punch and let me show you.”

“I’m sorry ma’am, I can’t.”

I narrowed my eyes and huffed.

“You are no fun at all,” I turned to go back to my seat.

As I was just about to flop into the chair, I heard my name.

“Gia?”

I looked over my shoulder and recognized the woman I had seen at Julian’s house. She wore a navy pant suit and her dark hair sat just above her shoulders.

“I am Marissa Brighton. We met briefly, sorry I wasn’t able to introduce myself because I left in a hurry…you know, work.”

I reminded myself that my goal was to be light and cheery not snarky.

“Let me guess, you are here to see Jul?”

“Jul?”

“Sorry, I call him Jul. You know how love birds do.”

I chocked but quickly recovered.

“Love birds?”

“He’s in a meeting for a little while longer. How about I take you to lunch? We can chat and get to know each other,” she smiled brightly.

“Lunch?”

I was so confused by this entire exchange.