“It was a disaster,” he said.
“That’s too bad,” Lauren said on a little sigh. “It would be really magical.”
Not ten minutes before, he’d had a handful of snow dribbling down his back. His shirt collar was still wet. Maybe that was why he felt the back of his neck break out in goose bumps.
“Let’s stick with our experiment for now,” Dolores said. “Lauren, think of something Asa could do to help you with the bookkeeping, get an idea for that side of the business. I trust that you can manage to avoid snowball fights in such a situation?”
“I can,” Asa said, and when Lauren rolled her eyes, he gave her his most beatific smile.
“Perfect,” Dolores said. “And Daniel will be in on Monday, and we’ll find things for him to do, too. Asa, do you think it would help for him to spend some time in the Snow Globe?”
Sure. By himself.
“Maybe,” he said.
“I actually have a projected budget,” Lauren said, “that I’d love to get his input on. And that would probably help as we think about ways to improve the business, too?”
Dolores beamed at Lauren like she’d just single-handedly solved world hunger. “Wonderful idea. Set that up for Monday.”
They were finally dismissed from Dolores’ office, and Lauren booked it out of there like she was afraid Dolores would decide there was some additional punishment if she stayed one second longer. Asa caught up to her in a few long strides, following her to her office.
“So now you have a budget meeting with Daniel?” he asked. “Don’t you think that’s something I should be invited to, if it’s going to be so helpful to us as we come up with our proposals?”
“I don’t see why,” she said, tapping on her keyboard to wake up her computer. “If you have any specific questions as you start working on your presentation, let me know.”
The implication was clear. She didn’t expect him to do any work on his own. He flashed back to the comment she’d made when he tried to convince her to work together, how she’d carried the weight of enough slackers in school.
There’d been enough truth in that to sting a little. Asa had never been the most diligent student—in high school, he’d been way more interested in navigating the social side of things. He’d had his first girlfriend at thirteen, his first boyfriend at fifteen, and then there’d been the whirlwind of keeping any relationship secret from his hyper-religious parents, because the only thing worse than premarital sex was premarital queer sex.
And then he’d been on his own two weeks before graduation. He’d technically still gotten the credits to get his diploma in the mail, but he hadn’t bothered to walk. There would’ve been nobody there to support him, anyway. It had never even occurred to him to go to college. With what money? And to do what?
Lauren had gone to college. He knew that because she had her diploma framed and leaning against a wall behind her desk. It was as if she meant to hang it but never got around to it, or maybe she was embarrassed to put it out front and center. The more he got to know Lauren, the more either explanation made a certain amount of sense.
“You did start it, you know,” he said.
He expected a denial, or maybe defensiveness. What he didn’t expect was for her to put her head in her hands and let out a low, guttural growl. A sound that shot immediately to his dick.
Well, that was unexpected.
“Ugh,” she said, her fingers curling in her hair. “I do know. I am so sorry. I have no idea what came over me—”
“Hey,” he said. “It’s okay. I—”
I liked it. That was the sentence that was about to pop out of his mouth. But he couldn’t say that.
“I think that guy got my hackles up,” Lauren was saying. “Got me feeling all aggressive. The snow was there, and I was frustrated, and . . . I took it out on you. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah,” Asa said. He didn’t know why that explanation disappointed him a little bit, but it did. “That makes sense. I shouldn’t have put you in that position.”
She frowned. “I know to you I must seem really . . .” She blew her bangs out of her eyes, looking up like she was searching for the right word. “Timid. But I promise you, I can handle myself.”
Weird, but timid wasn’t a word Asa would’ve used to describe Lauren. Careful, maybe, or reserved. She was deliberate, and thoughtful. He had no doubt she’d been thinking her way through the confrontation with that guy, considering what would allow her to stay professional and courteous but also get out of the situation. She struck him as someone very concerned with doing the right thing, but definitely not timid.