Defending My Mobster (BWWM Romance) (30 page)

An iron fist clutched my gut in a fistful of nerves, and I breathed deeply, trying to ease out some of the tension. Frank & Seder, the company that hired me, was situated in a large squat block of a building, made up of grey concrete slabs. It was rare for them to hire an American, but rumor had it they were looking to expand into the US and needed American people in their HR department to ramp up their staffing abroad. I was to work in South Africa for the next few years, learning their business, then head back home to head up their staffing there. The lobby had white marble tiles and cherry-wood paneled walls, and a secretary manned a desk at the far end. She was an African sister with an elaborate hairdo, and I felt at ease. There was something so sweet about her face.

“Alyssa Taylor for Mr. Parker,” I said to her.

“Take the elevator up to the fifth floor and the office will be to your right.” She spoke with an accent different than the accents I’ve heard already, and she was snappy. Not sweet, after all.

I stepped into the elevator and pressed number five. The elevator took off with a rumble and shook its way upward. I swallowed, trying to lubricate my dry throat.

The elevator pinged and the doors opened at floor three. A man stepped into the elevator. He was blonde with green eyes. He slouched a bit, but he had a strong, muscular build. I could see it through his light blue collared shirt. We were absolute opposites. I’d heard about the racism in South Africa back in the day, and I wondered how he would react to me.

He smiled at me. Unexpected. His eyes were a brilliant green, shining out of a friendly face. He looked tired and worn out, even though it was only Monday morning. He clutched a file under his arm.

I lifted my hand to my hair and fingered the individual braids. Smoothed invisible creases out of my pencil skirt. Tugged at the hem of my blouse.

The doors opened on floor five and I stepped out, leaving the man behind. I fought the urge to look back at him.

I found the office on my right, and knocked on the door.

“Ah, Miss Taylor?” Mr. Parker asked, and I nodded. “Come in, come in! Please, take a seat.”

Mr. Parker was a broad man with a shirt that stretched around the vastness of his body and hair that only covered the sides and back of his head. He sat behind his desk and groped my personnel file with fat fingers.

“How are you finding Johannesburg?” he asked. “Must be quite a change from the States.”

“Oh it’s very different, yeah. But I think I’m finding my way alright.”

I was acutely aware of the differences in our accents. He spoke English like he wasn’t comfortable with it, and he shaped his words in a way I had to concentrate to understand.

“Where are you staying?”

“In a hotel in Illovo, Sandton. It’s not too far from here.”

“Good, that’s good to know. If you need anything, you be sure to ask, alright?”

I nodded. We sorted out paperwork, discussed times and schedules. Then he got up and took me across the floor to a group of cubicles placed around a copy machine and a water cooler.

“Sarah,” he called into the first cubicle, and a middle-aged woman stepped out. She had graying hair cut into a straight bob, and red lips that matched her black-and-red power-dressing suit.

“This is Alyssa. She’s joined us from America, she’s the new HR Specialist. You’ll show her around?”

Sarah nodded with a smile that didn’t look like a smile at all. She looked me up and down, and I could feel her eyes resting on the different parts of my body, judging me. She looked at me like I was something that had blown in on a stiff breeze.

“If you get stuck, you ask Sarah and she’ll help you out,” Parker said. I nodded but I had a feeling that wasn’t going to happen. Sarah looked like she thought I was beneath her pay grade. Parker led me around the cubicle to the other side and pointed out an empty one.

“This will be your desk. Feel free to make yourself at home. Don’t hesitate to ask the people around you for help, we’re a big family here. And if you need something from me, I’ll be happy to help. Contact my secretary for an appointment.”

He nodded like he was confirming his own advice, and left me standing alone in the empty cubicle. Four blank walls and a characterless desk with a computer on it. This was where I was going to spend every day for the next two years, at least.

As soon as Parker left, another woman popped her head over the partition to my left. She had wild red curly hair with blue eyes piercing me from a constellation of freckles. I felt warmth from her right away, a strong contrast to the icy Sarah.

“Alyssa, right? You’re the new girl,” she said. “I couldn’t help but overhear. This floor’s so dull it’s always a bit of excitement when someone new arrives.” She walked around the partition. She wore long flowing robes of various colors and prints and held out a hand with long, manicured fingers and French tips on her nails.

“I’m Carol. If you get stuck you come straight to me, you hear? We’re neighbors, after all!” She flashed me a wide, toothy smile. ”Besides,” she added in a whisper,  “Sarah is the office bitch.”

“Come on, let’s show you around. I think you’re going to love HR. We’re such a close department! And we have no secrets from each other, mind you, so if you have anything to hide we’ll have it served up on a silver platter in no time.” She cackled like she’d said something funny. She was overbearing and loud, but I was relieved about having some company.

I felt very far away from home, and alone.

Chapter 2 - Nathan

I dropped the file off at Sarah’s desk. She wasn’t in her cubicle and I was relieved. Every floor had their particular nasty, and Sarah belonged to the top five at Frank & Seder. She ruled HR with violent mood swings and a short fuse. The only reason why I knew her was because Harry, my colleague, had some sort of affair with her.

With Sarah gone I thought to drop Carol a line. I hadn’t seen my cousin for a while.

I heard her roaring laughter across the floor. Everyone knew her, even those who weren’t in HR. If Frank & Seder was a cloud, she insisted on being the silver lining. She stood at the water cooler, her hand on her hip, talking animatedly to a lady I’d encountered in the elevator earlier. I stopped a distance away and studied her.

She was had a very different style than the usual recruits around here. She stood out from the general crowd. This girl wasn’t made to fit in, but there was something about her that intrigued me. Her modern style, and caramel skin just fit her perfectly.

There was a certain calm and confidence about her.  And she was ridiculously sexy. Curves in all the right places and the clothes to show it off, although she didn’t come across like she was trying. A black pencil skirt showed off long legs. A white blouse that opened far enough to be attractive but not far enough to beg for attention. The long braids hanging down her back made her look sophisticated and elegant.

Her body something to remember – voluptuous, but thin in the middle with hips the way a woman should have and a chest that rounded her off with a compliment. She smiled at Carol with perfect lips, being polite.

She looked in my direction for a moment, and her dark eyes caught mine. There was something deep and intense about them, and they looked right through me. I turned and walked away. I had to break free from her spell if I wanted to get a move on the day at all. Besides, I didn’t want to be caught staring.

“Having a blue Monday, Nate?” Harry asked, leaning against the door post in my office.

“What do you want, Harry?” I asked. I wasn’t in the mood for company. I was sick of the daily grind. I wanted to get in, do what I had to do, and get out. If I repeated the cycle for long enough, I hoped I would eventually get to something that resembled freedom.

Of course work hadn’t always been like that for me. I used to love what I did. I had been first of my class at Cape Town University where I’d studied a degree in marketing, and I’d gotten a job with a small company called Witmark where I’d kicked off my career as a Marketing Consultant. I’d dated a beautiful girl, and made a good starting salary.

When Frank & Seder, in Johannesburg, had needed someone in marketing, Carol had put in a good word for me. She knew what our family was like, how desperately I’d needed to escape. It was thanks to her they’d offered me a salary that was more than double what I’d been making at the time, so I’d transferred to Johannesburg, leaving my family and a heartbroken girl behind. I’d worked my way up into the position of Marketing Strategist with an office of my own and a paycheck that covered a life of luxury, and then some. But somehow, over the last nine years, it had become a drag. The color had drained out of my life, and I worked in a place that was colored in various shades of grey.

“Word has it there’s a new girl on the block,” Harry said, leaning against my office door post when I got back.

“I saw her,” I said.

“I heard she was really hot. Fresh from the States.”

I shrugged. Hot? She was a wet dream. “She’s okay, I guess.” I didn’t want to sound like I cared. Harry was quick to jump to conclusions, and he was sleeping with Sarah. Whatever I said would probably make its way back to her. A classy girl like that deserved respect, not to be talked about behind her back like she was a piece of ass.

I would rather die before I let Harry in on that thought, though. He had a knack of never letting something go, and I could do without his high-school mentality.

The phone rang and I waved Harry away so I could answer.

“Moore.”

“Nate, honey, why don’t you return my calls?” It was my mother.

“Sorry, mom. I was busy.”

“You’re always busy.”

We talked a bit about work, my personal life, and I threw in arbitrary things that made it sound like I was sharing my life with her, but I wasn’t really saying anything at all.

“You’ll never guess who stopped by yesterday,” she said.

“Who?” I asked because guessing with her would just go in circles.

“Claire! She was asking after you.”

I sighed. I’d dated Claire for three years before I’d left for Johannesburg. She’d kept up a friendship with my mother, and I heard about her every now and then.

“That’s nice, mom,” I said. I didn’t really want to know.

“She looks great. She’s an interior designer now, did I tell you?”

“You did.”

“And she’s changed her hair again! When you come to visit, we have to invite her round for supper.”

I sighed audibly. “Mom, we broke up ages ago. I don’t really want to see her again.”

“I don’t see why that’s a problem. You haven’t found yourself a nice girl up there, not one that you ever settled down with. And Claire is such a sweetheart.”

The new girl flashed before me, and I closed my eyes, taking a deep breath.

“I’m not interested in dating, mom.”

“Your thirty! When are you going to settle down? At this rate I’m never going to have grandchildren.” She wailed a bit and I switched off to her.

I didn’t want anything serious. I didn’t even want anything pointless right now. I just couldn’t seem to find a girl that understood me. It just never… fit.

“I have to go, mom,” I said. “My week is packed but I’ll call you over the weekend, okay?”

“You always say that, but you never do.”

“Bye, mom,” I said and hung up. I just wasn’t in the mood.

I left my office well after six. The streets were packed with the back end of rush hour. On the pavement I spotted her. She had her arms crossed over her chest and her shoulders hunched.

I already had my car keys in my hand, and I was heading for the underground parking. I changed my mind, and walked over to her.

“Are you alright?” I asked. She offered a wilted smile.

“I was too late to catch the bus. I wanted to catch a taxi but the only one going that direction was packed.”

She really wasn’t from around here. The taxis in Johannesburg were old mini-vans that broke every road law and stuffed about three times the capacity’s amount of passengers into them. If the yellow cabs in the movies were anything to go by, this girl would have a heart attack.

“Where do you live?” I asked.

“Sandton.”

It wasn’t exactly on the way. But her dejected attitude made the decision for me.

“I’ll drive you,” I said.