Page 27 of Cakewalk
I nodded, and her sympathetic expression was almost touching. I hadn’t been afforded much sympathy since the charges. “So we can’t tell anyone I’m innocent. But at least, maybe, they’ll appreciate that I did my time.”
“Maybe,” Jade said, but she didn’t sound too convinced that would be the case. “All right, if we’re going to make this work, I need you to do a few things for me.”
Or to you?I silently mused. Instead, I nodded, waiting.
“First. Get the rental company to switch out the BMW for something simple, like a Honda. Flashy’s not good when you’re trying to win people over, at least not around here.”
“Noted.”
“And you should show up at the town hall meetings regularly. Show that you’re involved and care about your place in this town. The meetings are every month, and most of the local business owners go, including my sister. You can address their concerns in person, where they’ll have a harder time dismissing you.”
“Of course.”
“Finally,” Jade concluded, “you’re going to be the best, most well-behaved boss there ever was, so I can report back to my sister and anyone else who wants to know what a great and principled guy you really are.”
“Sure.” If only she knew about all the fantasies I had about her in just the last few minutes.
“No, Griffin. I don’t think you’re picking up what I’m putting down.”
“What?” I asked innocently, wondering if she could read my mind.
“We can’t fool around. I’m a terrible liar, especially when Courtney puts the pressure on me. She’s going to ask, going to interrogate me, and I want to be able to say without so much as a blush that you’ve been entirely reformed since your time in prison, and wouldn’t do anything in the slightest that she’d find objectionable.”
“I think she’d find our first date very objectionable.”
“That was just some fun between two adults who were entirely willing and on equal footing. Now that I’m working for you, we can’t quite make that same argument. And anyway.” Jade cleared her throat. “That never happened.”
It was going to be very difficult to pretend like I hadn’t touched her in the most intimate ways, like I hadn’t been inside her. But at least I learned some discipline during my five years inside.
It’d be enough.
Wouldn’t it?
“If that’s what you want,” I said.
She rubbed her temples. “Okay, I’m going to go grab us breakfast and coffee. We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us.”
“We do?”
“Yeah. That mission statement, for one. It’s fine, but it could address certain concerns a bit more clearly. And there are some other things, but just… Let me grab something to eat first. I assume you like my sister’s cupcakes, because who doesn’t? So, how do you like your coffee with them?”
“Black.”
Jade stood, grabbed her purse and keys, then paused. “Did I thank you yet?”
“For what?”
“The job. What else?”
“The nice date, maybe?”
She playfully side-swiped me with her hips as she headed out, saying before she closed the door, “That didn’t happen, Griffin.”
Chapter 10
Jade
It wasa relief to be out of that trailer—and not because I wanted to get away from Griffin. From the first moment I stepped out of the car and saw him at the trailer door, I wanted to rip my clothes off and beg him to take me like he did that night.
