Page 45 of The Cinderella Secret
“You hope,” she said with a saucy little toss of her head, and suddenly he grinned. Her cuteness knew no bounds.
“I do, actually. See you tomorrow, Ella,” he said, returning to the elevator before this moment got completely out of hand.
“Good night, Aiden,” she said as the elevator doors closed. He looked up just as they did, she was watching him with a thoughtful expression. He realized it was the first time she’d ever used his first name.
17
Aiden – The Man With No Fear
Aiden went back upstairs and grabbed two drinks. Then he went over to the Deveraux table and set the second drink down in front of Jackson.
“Thanks for making me come tonight,” he said. “It definitely beats my other plan.”
“You mean, staying home and freaking out that you haven’t studied enough?”
“Who told?” demanded Aiden, only half-joking. Aside from the bodyguard Jackson had shadowing him since the thing with the Zhao watchdog, he was also fairly certain that Jackson was bribing one of his neighbors to keep tabs on him.
“Pretty sure that’s mostly what you’ve been doing for the last month,” said Jackson. Aiden tried to decide if there was a hidden meaning inmostly. “Where are you with the case anyway?”
Aiden grunted. “The Zhao implied that the loss of the HR records was deliberate. Seems unlikely. DevEntier lost other items as well. But whatever. Then they produced some evidence that showed that not only was Bo working on multiple projects—not that I know where they managed to find a crap load of internal DevEntier documents—but that he was getting money withdrawn from his paycheck for a 401k. Which wouldn’t happen with a contract employee. So now there’s a subpoena out for the bank records during that time and we’re going over to witness them being collected tomorrow morning at the bank.”
“If they show that he was an employee, does that mean we lose?” asked Jackson frowning.
“Not even close,” said Aiden. “Even if, and I say if, he was employee, he still died before the stock went public. I don’t think the promise of stock options to employees extends to an employee’s heirs. Ella will, of course, disagree. But we can argue about that next.”
Jackson grinned. “Not that you’re enjoying arguing with the very pretty Miss Zhao or anything.”
“I’m not actually,” said Aiden. “She is too smart to argue with.”
Jackson shook his head. “Sometimes I cannot believe I’m involved in this mess.”
“Neither can I,” said Aiden. “It’s not like Dominique or I actually even own any shares in the damn company. I’m only involved because you idiots put me in charge.”
“I know,” said Jackson, “it’s great.”
Aiden glared at him and Jackson grinned.
“Hey,” said Dominique, walking up with Evan. It was still weird to see them getting along. Dominique rarely talked about her relationship with Evan, even with Aiden. He knew she still felt uncertain about their cousin, but he hoped she didn’t feel like they were glossing over Evan’s past behavior. On the other hand, what were they supposed to do? Talk about it at every family dinner? “So, what are we talking about?” she asked, giving Aiden a little head tilt that meant that his expression was worrying her. He straightened his face into a smile.
“How happy we are that Jackson came to live with us,” Aiden said.
“That’s true,” agreed Dominique, nodding, then sitting down next to Aiden and stealing his drink. He tried to steal it back, but she insisted on drinking half of it first.
“Yes, but why are we talking about it?” asked Evan, watching their tug-of-war with a bemused expression. “I’m fairly sure that talking about feelings isn’t allowed for Deveraux.”
“Really? Because this evening you told me you felt strongly that my suit was tooon trend,”said Jackson.
“My therapist says it’s good to express my emotions,” said Evan, and Aiden couldn’t help but laugh, which earned him a skeptical look from Jackson. But the fact that Evan could even joke about having a therapist was a massive step forward.
“I’m not sure those are the emotions she was referring to,” said Dominique.
“He can’t help it,” protested Aiden. “Evan has always had deep-seated feelings about our sartorial statements.”
“It’s a suit,” said Jackson. “I’m not making a sartorial statement. I’m wearing a suit. It’s a nice suit. I like my suit.”
“You look very nice,” reassured Dominique.
“I look likeReservoir Dogs,” muttered Jackson. “It’s cool.”
