Page 5 of Love Notes & Lifelines
Thank you for your interest. Elijah is…helpful, isn’t he? Please take your time filling out this questionnaire. It is intensive and thorough, so I encourage you to be thoughtful in your answers. Once it’s complete, I’ll be in touch to let you know if you’re a good fit for the SDH.
Sincerely,
Lottie
The attachment she included is seventy-two pages of questions. I gulp. Well, it’s not like I had anything else to do tonight.
For now, I push everything to the back of my mind—it’s something I’ve become a pro at, especially when it comes to Mr. Sexybeck—and hurry to fill his chocolate drawer before he returns with his coffee and an attitude the size of Texas.
CHAPTER TWO
BECK
“All I’m saying isI hate people doing things for me. I’m perfectly capable and?—”
“She’s a helper, Beck. It’s her love language. Get over yourself. What you witnessed last week—her helping all those people inyour company—that’s who Stella is.”
Horror must show on my face because Elijah picks up a notepad and hits me in the chest with it.
“Love language, you asshole, not that she’s in love. It’s how she measures her value. Being needed by people gives her purpose.”
“Right.” I scoff. He’s been listening to self-help books again. Feeling my body tense, I cross my arms over my chest, hoping it hides the way my hands shake. “And I suppose you’ll tell me everyone has a love language?”
He nods with a smug expression that tilts his nose to the sky and makes me want to throw a pie in his face. “We do.”
Taking two steps, I prop one hip against Stella’s desk and stare at him, but I’m distracted by the sweetness of her scent again—apples. One goddamn kiss a year ago and she’s imprinted herself on my mind. It’s fucking stupid. Can I ban apples fromthe office? HR banned peanut butter when someone from the third floor had an allergy. Are apple allergies a thing?
I peek under my arm at her desk and then behind me, but I can’t find the source of the scent. “What’s mine then?” I ask, surreptitiously scanning her space. Everything is so…tidy.
He reclines in his chair with his hands clasped behind his head. A vision of him falling over makes me ridiculously happy.
“You don’t know your own love language because you don’t allow anyone close enough to show you what you need or allow yourself to learn how other people’s love languages affect their daily lives.”
He leans forward and clasps his hands on his desk. “Hell, I love you like a brother, and have for over twenty years, but you hide that part of yourself away, even from me. If I had to guess, and based on your pre-Sailport Bay exile, I’d say you have two love languages—touch, which is a fairly common one, and acts of service.”
“You’re out of your mind.”
“Am I?”
“Yes. I don’t go around touching people to see if my love button is broken.”
He shakes his head. “Last week when we went to lunch and our server was berated for nearly ten minutes, what did you do?”
How am I supposed to remember some random server?
When I don’t answer, he does it for me. “You stood between her and the jackass, then took the coffee from her hand and held her arm until she stopped shaking.”
“For fuck’s sake, Elijah. Are you telling me I’m in love with a server from a restaurant I can’t even remember?”
“No, I’m saying you show your love and compassion with touch and protection. That’s your love language because you do it without realizing it, just like Stella making herself invaluable to everyone around her is an unconscious act.”
The phone rings just as Caleb’s door opens and Stella exits his office. Elijah answers the phone and Stella does an incredible job ignoring me as I openly stare at her. There’s something about this woman that makes me want to know her—really know her—and I’m struggling to even process that.
Elijah’s face contorts, and he holds the phone out to me. “It’s about Cally.”
I stand, with my hands in the air, and walk toward my office.
“I don’t care how many times she calls, Elijah. She pulled her money out of this company without so much as a phone call and nearly bankrupted me, then she chose enemy sides. As far as I’m concerned, I no longer have a family.”
