Page 71 of The Bet
Chapter 21
She surprised him.
It had been easier than he had assumed, setting up work for Izzy.
Everything was done online. He’d sent her a contract which she’d signed and emailed it right back. Later, he’d sent her instructions of how to handle his documents, and she had completed the work in half the time his previous VA had.
And two weeks later, she was still surprising him. He hadn’t seen her in that time, but constant contact via email and text meant that he didn’t feel as if he hadn’t seen her at all.
Luke had told him to woo her another way and it was exactly what he was doing, even if she didn’t know she was being wooed.
Besides, he had no complaints. She was quick to pick up on things, quick to turn the work around, and she hadn’t so far, made any mistakes. But there was also a slight problem: her attention to detail sometimes drove him to the edge of a cliff.
Apart from that, taking her on had been one of the best moves he’d made. She had cleared a lot of the backlog left behind by the VA who had deserted him.
“Which spreadsheets?” he asked, alarming his car as he walked towards the building that housed The Oasis.
“The ones you emailed me,” Izzy replied. “I can’t open them, can you resend them?”
No, he couldn’t resend them. “I’m out, meeting a friend for a drink. It will have to wait.”
“If you’re okay with not getting the work back by tomorrow. I have a test I have to cram for—”
“It can wait.”
“If you saved your spreadsheets in the old format, we wouldn’t have this problem,” she continued.
Wait. He stopped outside the entrance. “Are you blaming me for something that’syourproblem?”
“It’s not my fault I don’t have a Mac,” she replied. “I’m a Windows girl, and yes, I know my version of Excel is old, but I get by just fine with it.”
“But it’s not my fault that I don’t have Windows. I’m a Mac guy. And, why don’tyouhave the latest version of Excel?” he demanded.
“Because I don’t need it for my college work.”
“Can’t you ever own up to when it’s your fault?” If she would say the words, say sorry, it would be easier to swallow. Him using a Macbook and her using a PC was causing a slight problem.
Slight.
He always forgot to export the files so that she could read them and work in them. It was causing a problem he hadn’t seen coming. Now he was not only paying for work he could have some of his other assistants do for him, but this particular assistant seemed to be causing more problems than not. He was tempted to buy her a Mac just to shut her up.
“Don’t worry about it for now,” he told her, getting jittery because he wanted to go to the bar, and sit and admire gorgeous women even if he couldn’t take one of them home with him tonight.
Izzy distracted him again. “If you could export them before you send them to me.Please.”
“I’ll try to remember.”
“But you wanted this back by tomorrow. You said it was urgent.”
Had he? He couldn’t remember half the dates he’d given her. Usually, he just reeled a date off the top of his head.
“I was hoping to get your work out of the way before I started my revision. I have to cram for a test in a few days’ time.”
He let out a loud sigh. “Forget the work I sent you, Laronde, and just concentrate on your test.”
It came out harsher than he’d intended, but his attention was now fixed on two women who walked past him. When they entered the building, he stared through the glass windows, trying to see if they were going to take the elevator up to The Oasis or down to The Vault.
But he couldn’t hit on them. This fucking bet. The pent-up frustration inside him made him feel like a bottle of fizz—he felt as if he’d explode given enough release.
