Dust of Snow

Dust of Snow

by

Indra Vaughn

Published by Indra Ink at Smashwords

www.indravaughn.com

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or
are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is
entirely coincidental.

Dust of Snow

Copyright 2014 by Indra Vaughn

Cover Design Copyright 2014 by G.D. Leigh

www.blackjazzpress.com

Editing by Keira Andrews

www.keiraandrews.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be
reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any
information storage and retrieval system without the written
permission of the Author, except where permitted by law. To request
permission and all other inquiries, contact Indra Vaughn
[email protected]

United States of America First Edition

December 2014

ISBN: 9781626227293

Acknowledgements

This one is entirely for Olivia Mandell. Without you
this book would still be gathering dust (and not the snowy kind) at
the bottom of my proverbial drawer. Thank you for gently reminding
me this story existed and all it needed was a little TLC and a lot
of whipping into shape. Another great big thank you to Keira
Andrews who did a great deal of the whipping, as well as a stellar
job wrangling my comma splices. 

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree
Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.

—Dust of Snow, by Robert Frost

ONE

THE FIRST HEAVY snowstorm of the year couldn’t have
chosen a worse night to put a stopper on the world and keep it from
turning.

Already late for work after a night of barely
sleeping, I couldn’t find the right cuff links—or rather, I
couldn’t find a matching set. Even after a longer shower than I
normally permitted, my toes still tingled painfully, while my nose
was as cold as a seal’s in the arctic.

Thanking my lucky stars I’d finally bitten
the bullet and traded the Focus for a four by four GMC, I slipped
and slid my way to the office in Troy, hoping Carl would be held up
a little too. Not that my boss was an ogre, but the annual
corporate meeting loomed close, higher-ups breathed down our necks
like goal-oriented dragons, and stress levels had recently risen
beyond what my acid-prone stomach could digest.

The thirty-minute drive took forty-five, and
while the parking lot was emptier than usual, Carl’s Audi stood out
like a black pockmark on white marble skin.

“Fuck.” I straightened my tie while I tried
to button up my peacoat and drag the laptop case off the backseat
all in one go. “Fucking fuck.” I sidestepped most of the snow
mounds, pressed my butt to the keycard entrance post and hoped it
would read the card through my wallet. When the warmth of the
building enveloped me, I huffed a sigh of relief. I said a quick
hello to Ms. Andrews, our receptionist, waved at the Boon brothers
in their R&D office, and almost bumped into the new IT guy
whose name I kept forgetting.

“Morning,” the new sales manager called from
his office like he did every day.

“Morning, Mr. Montgomery,” I mumbled as I
sped past.

Our branch consisted of the ground floor of a
two-story building we shared with another company. It was one of
those modern, metal-and-glass constructions that had started to pop
up everywhere during the late nineties. The communal hallway split
our workplace from the cafeteria and kitchens, and the actual work
floor was a huge graveyard of neatly lined cubicles surrounded by
larger offices.

My workspace sat close to Carl’s office, at
the very end of the cubicles, separated by a large partition from
everyone else. It was a little isolated, although I could see
almost everything if I stood and peered over the low walls. But my
space was bigger than anyone else’s, and to be honest, I liked the
privacy.

I dumped my things at my desk, tugged one
last time on my shirtsleeves, and aimed for Carl’s office.

I stopped.

I turned around.

A large cup of coffee steamed gently beside
my computer screen,
Greg
scribbled unevenly on the ribbed
protector sleeve. I lifted it to my face and inhaled the
mind-melting scent of chai tea mixed with espresso and milk like I
could absorb it through osmosis. A
double
dirty chai, oh
my…

“When you’re done making sweet love to your
mocha, in my office, Monsieur Peck.”

I startled and nearly dropped the precious
coffee. Carl disappeared through the door behind me, and I quickly
grabbed my tablet, clutched the cup to my chest, and followed him
inside. I took my usual seat at the visitor’s side of the gleaming
oak desk as he began to fire tasks at me. Carl had a very
comfortable couch in his roomy office, but if I sat down on that,
chances were I’d nod off. I peered at my boss where he stood by the
large windows, which cast half his face in shadow.

Carl Bourdon was a handsome man in that
francophone way of his. He had a very prominent bone structure—high
cheekbones, a straight nose, and angular chin—almost black hair
that was always neatly combed back and held in place with gel, and
vibrant, pale-brown eyes. But what I found the most attractive
about him was that lush mouth, his top lip a little fuller than the
bottom, and I was pretty sure I spent far too much time staring at
it. I guessed he’d only become more gorgeous when he hit his
sixties—ten, fifteen years from now.

Headquarters in Paris had sent him over five
years ago to whip our North America branch into shape, and by God
into shape we’d been whipped. Within two weeks the branch manager
and his golf-cheating ways had been booted out, along with both
secretaries he’d been fooling around with behind his pregnant
wife’s back.

I started with the company fresh out of
college, and I’d been in charge of licensing and some other boring
admin jobs. But Carl had taken one look at my annual review and
promptly promoted me to personal assistant. The day I’d sat in this
very chair, red-faced and stumbling over my words as I told him
that might not be a good idea, was one I tried not to remember very
often. As embarrassing moments in my history tended to do, it
blindsided me sometimes, like today.

Five years ago, Carl had stopped what he was
doing, lifted one eyebrow as he turned his disconcerting attention
on me, and asked, “Why not?”

“Because, um, the thing is, Mr. Bourdon—”

“My PA may call me Carl, since over here you
all butcher the name
Charles
so.”

“Right. Um, Mr… Carl. The thing is—” I had
gulped and pushed on, the words coming out in a rush. “I’m gay, and
everybody here knows it. So they might come to the wrong conclusion
if you just give me this job without doing the appropriate
interviews.”

Carl had folded his long, neatly manicured
hands in front of him and dipped his head.
This is it
, I’d
thought.
Back to crunching numbers
.

“Gregory. May I call you Gregory?” With those
rolling Rs he could call me whatever he liked, so I nodded.
“Gregory, even if I did swing your way, and you are very… what is
the word… striking?”

I didn’t think that was the word he’d been
looking for, but I didn’t correct him.

“I don’t fraternize with my employees,
although I don’t discourage it amongst the rest of you. After all,
a steamy office romance is good for morale now and again. But as a
boss it would be abuse of my position.” He’d held my gaze with his
tawny eyes and I’d done my best not to think of a position or two
I’d like to be abused in—not that someone as hot as Carl would go
for
me
. “If anyone grieves you about my decision, come to
me. I chose you for this job because you are talented and wasted in
a task a monkey can perform.”

And that, as they say, had been that.

I quickly ticked off the things I’d already
done as Carl shrugged out of his suit jacket, rolled up his
sleeves, and gave me my daily orders. Oh boy, it was going to be
one of
those
days.

“And then,” he said, finally sitting, “double
check with the Marriott they have all the conference rooms booked.
Amal Vijay and his wife had their baby, so organize a bouquet of
flowers for them. Move my one o’clock to tomorrow. I’m having lunch
with the vice president and will probably run late. Did you
organize my flight to France for Christmas?”

“I did,” I said, making a note to reserve his
rental car for while he was there. “I’ll forward the tickets two
days before the flight as usual.”

“Excellent.” Carl hadn’t lost much of his
accent over the years, and he still said certain words as if he
were speaking French.
Excell-on
. I loved it. “If Marc from
the London office calls, I need you to put him through straight
away. Oh, and while you call the hotel, make sure they have vegan
options available.”

“I will.” I shuddered when I remembered the
last time the company vice president had come to a conference all
the way from France and was brought face to face with the American
love for all things red meat and slathered in cheese. “Is that
everything?” I began to rise.

“No.”

I sat again. Carl eyed me, his fine chin
resting on his entwined fingers. He reminded me of a cat
out-waiting the mouse. “Is something the matter?” I asked
uneasily.

“Your cuff links don’t match.”

“I…” Glancing down at my wrists I reddened.
When Carl started working here, I was only twenty-three years old,
and the air of sophistication he carried around with him had blown
my mind. After all this time, I’d nearly forgotten I’d started
wearing cuff links because of him. “I had a bit of a late night,
and then the snow this morning… It made for a rough start.” I
straightened the gray one and then the black one without meeting
his eyes.

“Oh?” Carl brightened and smiled slowly.
“Late night? Did you have a date?”

You can take the man out of France…

“No,” I admitted. “Nothing like that.” Just
the usual stress-induced reflux keeping me awake.

“Then who is the coffee from?”

I blinked. The rush to keep up with Carl’s
requests had pushed the mysterious arrival of my favorite coffee
from my mind. “I don’t know, actually. Maybe it was Patricia. She
sometimes drops off a cup on her way to her desk.”

Only ever office coffee though, not something
she’d have to pay for. I didn’t hold that against her at all; she
was a perfectly nice girl and had seemed happy to take over my job
from her previous front desk duties. She said she preferred numbers
to phone calls.

Carl eyed me with interest. “Perhaps,” he
said. “Now off you go. I don’t pay you the big bucks to sit around
drinking coffee.”

“You don’t pay me big bucks at all,” I
countered. It was a joke and Carl knew it. He’d been a serious
hard-ass when he’d first arrived here, but he took care of the
people he knew he could trust. My yearly Christmas bonus proved
it.

The morning flew past at alarming speed, and
I ended up in the cafeteria eating a fairly tasteless Caesar salad
wrap with still more than half of my workload on my mind. The
cafeteria wasn’t very big. It had ten round tables, a coffee bar,
and a daily refilled vending machine with salads and sandwiches.
Patricia sat at my table but said nothing as I jabbed my tablet
when it didn’t bring up the rental car company website fast
enough.

A few minutes later, Amal Vijay and Mr.
Montgomery joined us, along with two other guys I didn’t know by
name. Co-op students, no doubt. They talked animatedly about some
hockey game I had zero interest in. I rarely had anything to add to
lunchtime discussions. Then I remembered Amal’s newly minted father
status.