And froze.
The man in question sat in the leather chair that for thirty-five years （longer than he’d been alive, I figured） Tabitha Margraves had inhabited. The desk, once cluttered with porcelain knickknacks and pictures of her dog, was clean and tidy, everything stacked in its proper place. The desk reflected the man behind it almost perfectly: too polished, in a crisp white button-down shirt that strained at his broad shoulders, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows to reveal rather intimidatingly sexy forearms. His black hair was swept back out of his long face and somehow accentuated his equally long nose, black square glasses perched on it, and there were very faint freckles speckled across his face: one by his right nostril, two on his cheek, one just above his thick right eyebrow. A constellation of them. For a second, I wanted to take a Sharpie and connect them to see what myth they held. The next second, I quickly came to the realization that—
Oh.
He was hot. And I’d seen him before. At publishing functions with Rose or my ex-boyfriend. I couldn’t place the name, but I’d definitely run into him more than once. I held my breath, wondering if he recognized me—did he?
For a second, I thought so, because his eyes widened—just a fraction, just enough for me to suspect he knew something—before it vanished.
He cleared his throat.
“You must be Ann Nichols’s assistant,” he greeted without missing a beat. He stood and came around the desk to offer his hand. He was . . . enormous. So tall I felt like I’d suddenly been transported into a retelling of “Jack and the Beanstalk” where he was a very hunky beanstalk that I really, really wanted to climb—
No. No, Florence. Bad girl, I scolded myself. You do not want to climb him like a tree, because he’s your new editor and therefore very, incredibly, stupendously unclimbable.
“Florence Day,” I said as I accepted his hand. His almost completely enveloped mine in a strong handshake.
“Benji Andor, but you can call me Ben,” he introduced.
“Florence,” I repeated, shocked that I could mutter anything above a squeak.
The edges of his mouth quirked up. “So you said.”
I quickly pulled my hand away, mortified. “Oh god. Right—sorry.” I sat down a little too hard in the uncomfortable IKEA chair, cactus planted firmly on my knees. My cheeks were on fire, and if I could feel them, I knew that he could see I was blushing.
He sat down again and adjusted a pen on his desk. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Sorry for the wait, the subways were hell this morning. Erin keeps telling me not to take the B train and yet I am a fool who does every single time.”
“Or a masochist,” I added before I could stop myself.
He barked a laugh. “Maybe both.”
I bit the inside of my cheek to hide a smile. He had a great laugh—the kind that was deep and throaty, like a rumble.
Oh no, this was not going as planned at all.
He liked me, and he wasn’t going to like me in about five minutes. I didn’t even like myself for what I was here to do—why did I think a cactus as a gift would make this easier?
He scooted his chair in and straightened a pen to be horizontal with his keyboard. Everything was neat like that in this office, and I got the very distinct feeling that he was the kind of person who, if he found a book misplaced at a bookstore, would return it to the shelf where it belonged.
Everything had its place.
He was a bullet journal guy, and I was a sticky note kind of girl.
That might’ve been a good thing, actually. He seemed very no-nonsense, and no-nonsense people were rarely romantic, and so I wouldn’t get a pitying look when I, eventually, tell him that I no longer believed in romance novels and he would nod solemnly, knowing exactly what I meant. And I would rather have that than Tabitha Margraves looking at me with those sad, dark eyes and asking, “Why don’t you believe in love anymore, Florence?”