Trust in Advertising (66 page)

“You know, when you’re not being a complete jerk, you’re a decent guy.”

Tony snorted and started to walk away. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Girl Wonder. Try to not mess up my boards before tomorrow. They cost more than you earn in a month to produce.”

“Bye, Tony.”

Seconds later, Vincent walked past her, glancing back at Tony and stopping long enough to look at the boards. He laughed out loud when he saw the changes, 398

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mumbling something like “Maybe he isn’t a total douche after all” before he went into his office and put his stuff down.

Usually the sight of Tony enraged Vincent, but this time he seemed amused.

When the last of her papers printed out, Lexi walked into Vincent’s office without even knocking on his door; they had work to do.

She found him sitting at his desk, the jacket of his suit draped over the back of his chair and his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He was on the phone, but waved her in with a flick of his wrist and a smile. She came in, closed the door, and took her usual spot on the couch.

“Okay, that sounds good. Yeah, I’ll call them back tomorrow. Sure. Hold my calls for the rest of the day, please. Leigh, hang on.” He nodded at Lexi. “Do you want me to have Leigh hold your calls too?”

There was a long pause during which Lexi’s brows furrowed together in confusion. Vincent watched her expectantly and waited for her answer.

“You’re talking to me?”

“Is there anyone else in the room?”

“Um, sure hold my calls.” Lexi looked around the office trying to make sure she was in the correct building and not trapped in some bizzarro alternate universe of her life. Everything looked the same, but nobody was acting the same.

First a polite Tony and now a considerate Vincent? What is the world coming to?

“Hold Lexi’s too. Thank you.” He placed the receiver back into the cradle and jotted a few notes down, then leaned back in his chair. “Are you ready to start?”

“Sure.”

Vincent heard the hesitation in her voice and mistook it for something else.

He stood up and came over to sit on the couch beside her. “You don’t sound too sure. Maybe we should talk.”

“No. No talking.” Lexi shook her head emphatically. “What we need to do is set some ground rules.” She shifted her body away from him. “This is about work, not us. No talk about you and me or what happened, only Marradesi. Got it?”

“No talk about me being a complete idiot. Agreed. Anything else?”

Lexi watched the way he turned his body to face her and snaked his arm around the back of his couch. She thought she might have felt his fingertips graze the ends of her hair, but she couldn’t be sure because she refused to look.

Instead, she stupidly met his eye, hoping to scare him away, but instead finding herself wanting to crawl into his traitorous lap. She wasn’t prepared to deal with those feelings right now. She needed to focus on the job.

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“Yeah, one more thing.” Lexi pointed her finger at Vincent’s face. “You, work over there.” She gestured toward his desk. “This,” she gestured her hands around the couch and table, “is a Vincent-free zone.”

He immediately tensed and sat back as if her words stung, but he didn’t argue. He apologized, and returned to his seat at his desk.

“Stop that,” Lexi snapped as she sorted the pile of papers in front of her, making a stack for herself and a stack for Vincent.

Vincent peeked over the top of his computer. “Stop what?”

“Being so damned agreeable. It’s freaking me out. Just be your normal …”

she struggled to find the right word.

“Dickheaded?” Vincent offered, trying not to smile.

“Yes … dickheaded works. Be your normal dickheaded self, please.” She grabbed her flash drive and tossed it at him.

“Fine.” Vincent caught the tiny projectile and folded his hands in front of him. “Give the Marradesi presentation.”

“What?” Lexi stood up and began pacing back and forth across the office floor while Vincent sat back in his chair, grinning like a fool. He even went so far as to prop his feet up on the desk, thoroughly enjoying himself.

“You heard me, give the presentation as I would. I want to watch it, dissect it and see if there’s anything we should change.” He took a sip of his coffee.

“Don’t look at me like that. You know it as well as I do. You wrote half of the points yourself. And Elizabeth said she wanted you giving part of it, so let’s see what part you’re good at.”

“Dickhead.” Lexi ran her fingers through her long hair, shaking out the tangles and gathering the courage to present this monster to the master of presentations.

“That’s Mr. Dickhead to you,” Vincent quipped.

“No, it’s not. Never has been, never will be. Let’s get this done.”

She stood in front of Vincent and retold every bullet point, every angle and opinion printed on the notes in front of him. Never once did she have to refer to the papers for information. She spoke from memory and from her heart. She even added a few things that popped into her head while she was talking, and Vincent made note of them. She transitioned from corporate history to current market trends and called attention to the pertinent details in the print ad.

She held her back straight, her posture confident, only giving away her nervousness by occasionally twirling a piece of hair around her finger. Vincent 400

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seemed mesmerized throughout her speech, and Lexi could feel his gaze on her lips as she spoke. At one point she stopped presenting to discuss a certain point with him, wanting to understand why he had included it. After talking about it for a few moments, she had a better grasp on his thinking, and jumped back into the presentation. When she finished, Vincent was speechless.

“Vincent?” Lexi asked, watching and waiting for some sort of reaction. Her stomach knotted, assuming he was just trying to figure out how to break it to her gently so she didn’t fall apart. “Okay, just tell me what I did wrong on my parts so I can work on it before tomorrow. If I can’t, then we can tell Elizabeth it didn’t work out. I’ll pretend to get sick or something, maybe laryngitis.”

Vincent stood up and came around the front of the desk to where she was standing. Sitting on the edge, he tried to look like a hardass, but then the corner of his mouth twitched.

“You were superb.”

Lexi’s eyes rolled, her hands planting on her hips. “Just give it to me straight.

Don’t blow smoke up my ass. The truth, Vincent.”

He folded his arms across his chest and paused. “The truth is you were fantastic. You twirled your hair when you were nervous, and you turned your back too much when you referred to the ads, so work on that. You also added things that weren’t in the bullets, but they’re included now because they were spot on. I couldn’t take my eyes off you when you were up there. You were charming and engaging, and I think you’ll have not only Paolo, but also Dante eating out of your hand. You were that good.”

Lexi didn’t even try to hide her shock. Her mouth gaped as his words ran in a continuous loop in her head. She had impressed him, Vincent Drake, the most captivating man in any board room, to the point that he felt comfortable standing beside her during one of the biggest pitches of his professional career.

He was saying something. She could see his lips moving, but Lexi couldn’t tell for the life of her what he said because millions of thoughts rushed around in her head at the speed of light. When his lips stopped moving, Lexi tried to speak.

“S-say that again? I’m hallucinating, or maybe this is an alternate dimension.

I feel like I stepped into the Twilight Zone in this building today.”

The tiny spark of excitement began to grow as Lexi considered what a huge opportunity it would be to have her name linked with this account if their presentation was accepted. But then she remembered what Elizabeth said earlier 401

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at breakfast about what a huge account this was for Hunter. Lexi couldn’t risk her inexperience jeopardizing everything.

“Perfect. I’m so proud of you, and I meant every word I said. I think you’ll be wonderful.” He reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers sweeping over her cheek and lingering down the side of her neck.

Before she could stop herself, Lexi nuzzled the side of her face against his hand and allowed her body to lean against his. When she felt his arm wrap around her waist, she jumped, realizing the emotional turmoil she was causing herself as alarms started going off inside her head. She wasn’t anywhere near ready to do this with him. It would be too easy to say the hell with it and fall into his waiting arms, as she had dreamed of so many nights alone in her room, but her wounds were still too raw. Every moment she spent around him helped heal the ache a little, but she didn’t know if her heart could stand the unknown with him anymore.

“I can’t do this with you, Vincent.” Lexi stepped back, putting some distance between them.

“We belong together.” There was no doubt, no question in his voice, as he said the words, only utter certainty.

“We’re attracted to each other, but a future is another thing all together.

A future requires faith and trust, two things that I’m afraid you’ve shattered.”

He winced at her harsh words, even though her tone was kind as she said them.

“I know you’re trying. I can see the effort you’re making. I’m just not sure if it should be this much work. Maybe we just aren’t meant to be long term.”

“But Lexi—” She held up her hand and stopped him.

“I can’t go there with you now. It took every ounce of my courage to walk into that restaurant and face you this morning, but I did it. The only reason I’ve made it through these last few hours, locked in this office with you, is because we’ve kept it all business, but talking about the future and my feelings, I can’t do that. I know my limits.” She grabbed his hand and held it over here heart so he could feel the wild thrashing in her chest and the sweat on her palms. “I can’t do this right now. If I try, I’ll end up in tears, and I am done crying over you. Done.”

Lexi turned on her heel, letting Vincent’s hand slide from her chest and slam lifelessly into the side of his leg as he watched her gather her things. “I’m not running away from you. Please know that. I’m just putting myself first for a change, and I hope you can respect my choices. Good luck with the presentation 402

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tomorrow, I know you’ll do a fantastic job. I’ll call Elizabeth and explain that I need a few days off. I need to clear my head and get away from here.” She looked over her shoulder, needing to see him one more time so she could take every detail of his face with her wherever she ended up. “We’ll talk when I get back. I promise.”

Lexi sat at her kitchen table, a bowl of Captain Crunch with extra milk in front of her as she started to unroll the Friday issue of the San Francisco Chronicle. She began scanning the headlines and stopped mid-crunch when she saw another picture of Vincent on the front page. All of the outside scrutiny on Lexi played a big part in her needing to take a few days off to get her head screwed on straight before she made any decisions about Vincent. She wanted to let the drama blow over so she could think and breathe again.

Despite Elizabeth’s reassurances, she stil worried about the Marradesis’ reaction to this whole situation. Their public image meant everything to them, and they were very careful about business entanglements. If Lexi showed up, giving part of the presentation to such a high profile client with as little experiences as she had in the industry, it might look even worse for Hunter. For all of these reasons, Lexi had become more confident in her decision to bow out of the presentation.

She would stay at home and wish Vincent well. He didn’t need her help.

But seeing his face on the front page made her heart skip a beat. Quickly, she rolled the paper back up and tossed it into the trash, not wanting to read another slanderous thing about Hunter or Vincent Drake.

She was just fishing the last piece of cereal out of her bowl when Hope came barreling through the door. “Good morning, Hope. Come on in, make yourself at home.”

Her friend stared at her in her flannel pajama bottoms and cami with her hair piled up on her head and asked, “What are you doing? You have a presentation in two hours and you’re gorging yourself on sugared breakfast cereals?”

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day,” Lexi mocked as she stood up and tipped her empty bowl in Hope’s direction. “Besides, I’m not going to the presentation. I told Vincent yesterday he could handle it without me.”

“You did what?” Hope was flabbergasted. “You went to work every day this week because of how important this client was, how important it was for you 403

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professionally to be a part of this campaign, and now you’re just stepping aside after all of the work you put in?”

“Pretty much.” Lexi set her empty bowl in the sink and hopped up on her kitchen counter, her legs swinging beneath her.

“Interesting,” Hope said a she leaned against the counter beside Lexi. “I never figured you for a quitter.”