He heads toward his office. The door shuts with finality and I release a shaky breath. Across the hallway, Mason is staring at me with wide eyes.
What the hell do I do now?
The other shoe doesn't drop the day after. Or the day after that. St. Clair continues to send me emails with no content, only orders typed as efficiently as possible into the subject line.
Push my four o'clock meeting.
Reschedule my Denver flights.
Still, I can't believe my idiocy. To leave my resume out on my desk, amongst my other papers… I almost deserve to be fired. But still, I hope he doesn't. Not only because I need this job and the money it provides, or that being fired will make it harder to find a new one.
But because I still haven't lasted a year, as the timer on my desktop likes to remind me, and beating that shiny, ticking little thing has become a life goal. Two weeks left, and then I'll have worked a full year for Victor St. Clair. I suppose my life will feel empty afterwards, meaningless, even. What do I do when I'm not fighting a war with my boss that he doesn't even know he's in?
Victor likes to work undisturbed for a few hours every afternoon. Any meetings I can delegate, I do. Any conference calls that are not strictly speaking necessary, I decline. So I'm confused when he calls me into his office at five p. m. on Friday.
I know he's not close to slowing down. A Friday afternoon means nothing to St. Clair. I've lost count of the weekends I've spent working, helping St. Clair with projects, booking obscure plane tickets, sorting out his calendar.
I push back my chair and straighten my pencil skirt. Glance at Mason's empty desk. He's left, because Eleanor didn't require him to stay longer. She cares about employee satisfaction.
I wonder what that feels like.
Victor is sitting at his desk, back straight, eyes on his computer.
"Sir?"
"Have a seat, Myers."
Nerves dance in my stomach, but I do as he says, sitting down on the chair opposite his desk. "I'm sorry."
He looks at me from his computer. "What are you apologizing for?"
"My resume?" I ask. "You saw it? I know I shouldn't have had it in the office."
"No," he says, "you shouldn't have."
"I recognize that, and I'm sorry. Won't happen again." I'm about to start cold sweating beneath my silk blouse.
Victor raises an eyebrow. "Despite how unprofessional that might have been," he says, "I didn't call you in for that."
"Oh."
He leans back in his chair and looks at me in that full, scrutinizing way he'd done the other day. That's twice in a week. I bear the full brunt of Victor St. Clair's intensity, unsure if I'll survive a third time.
"So you want to quit," he says.
"No," I say. "I mean, I might in the future. This has been a terrific job, truly. But I think I've learned all I can in this position. So I'm thinking of finding another job, one more challenging, so I can continue to grow. But that's in the future."
"Right. Well, that's excellent."
I stare at him for a long moment, my heart pounding like I've run a marathon. His words don't make sense. "It's… excellent, sir?"
"Yes. I have a new job proposal for you."
"You do?" He has never expressed anything but disdain or a complete lack of interest in me. Had I managed to impress him? I do everything he asks of me and a lot more he doesn't.
"Yes. It's unorthodox."
"Unorthodox?"
He braces his hands on the desk. "You know that my grandfather passed a few months ago."
"Yes, I do. I helped arrange his funeral."
"Right. Well, he left a will."
"A will with certain... stipulations."
This I understand. "You want me to coordinate with the lawyers?"
The lines of his face deepen. "No. I've already tried that for the past half year. They won't budge."
"Oh. Well, I'm sorry."
His jaw works. "My grandfather's will stipulates that to gain access to my inheritance, I must be married."
"Married, sir? Is it legal to include that in a will?"
"I doubt it," Victor mutters. His hands clench tight around the edge of his desk. "But the old bastard got his lawyers to agree somehow. They filed every available loophole to make sure my inheritance is contingent on my civil status."
"Wow. I'm sorry, sir. I imagine that's difficult."
St. Clair is never going to marry. I know that from working a year with him. Hell, I'd known it after working for him a week. He dated like a tomcat. Over the past couple of months I'd set him up on dates nearly every week.
Not to mention there wasn't a woman in this world who'd tolerate the long hours he worked. The man had even spent Christmas Day in the office and forced me to answer his emails remotely.
And then there's the issue of his personality, of course.
"It's ridiculous," he says. "But as it so happens, I've decided to do it."
"To get married, sir? To whom?"
"I'm glad you asked, Miss Myers," he says. There's a hint of humor in the ice blue of his eyes. "To you."
"You want me to marry you?"
Victor meets my gaze. I've never looked at him for this long before. It's terrifying. "You want a new job."
"Not as your wife."