A Fare To Remember_ Just Whistle_Driven - Vicki Lewis Thompson [16]
ZACH LOOKED AT HER AS IF she’d murdered a close relative. “Are you crazy? I’ve put eight years into that job.”
“You’ve tolerated Drake Medford for eight years?” If so, her estimation of him would take a serious nosedive.
“Well, no. He came on board last fall. The office was underperforming and he was sent in to straighten things out.”
She frowned. “By humiliating people like Ed?”
“Look, I may not like what’s happening with Ed, but Medford’s done what he was sent to do. Everyone’s working harder and making more, the ones who’ve stayed, anyway. All except for Ed, who’s close to retirement.”
“And is everyone happy? Except for Ed, of course, and you.”
“I’m happy!” He flung out both arms. “I’m ecstatic! I’m making more money!”
“Are you happy? At dinner when I asked about your job you made a face.”
His gaze was wary. “I don’t know that I made a face, exactly.”
“You most certainly did. Like this.” She pulled her mouth down at the corners and scrunched up her eyes.
“That didn’t have to be about my job. Maybe I bit into something I didn’t like right at the moment you asked.”
“It was about your job.”
“Okay, so maybe it was about the job. Nobody’s career is fun and games all the time. I can see now I wasn’t working up to capacity. I’ll bet that’s what Adrienne meant when she—” He stopped, coughed and looked away. “Are we going to Times Square or what?”
Although Hannah wanted to finish the discussion, especially now that a woman’s name had been thrown into it, she could tell that Zach’s heels were dug in on this issue. She shouldn’t have come right out and told him to quit his job. That wasn’t her place. But he kissed like an angel, and a man who kissed like that didn’t belong in an office with the devil himself.
She’d suspected the boss was bad news when Zach had told her about him during dinner. But now that she’d met the guy she knew for sure, and not just because he’d interrupted what had been the primo kissing experience of her life. Drake Medford was completely unacquainted with the concept of human kindness. He would kill himself laughing if he knew about her tuna project.
“Let’s go to Times Square,” she said.
“Good.” Zach sounded immensely relieved. He still made no move to take her hand.
She thought he might have, especially after that kiss, except that his boss had come along and messed up the mood. Hannah thought Medford took pleasure in messing up other people’s moods. He could have walked on by and left them to their kissing, but that wasn’t in his nature.
No, she really didn’t like the man. Neither did Zach, but he wasn’t going to admit it. “Would you do me one little favor?” she asked.
“Sure, as long as it doesn’t involve courting economic disaster.”
“It doesn’t.” She must have really scared him, suggesting that he leave his job. Maybe because she had no financial stability at the moment, she’d forgotten that most people liked to know where their next paycheck was coming from.
“Then ask away,” he said.
“When you’re in the office tomorrow, I’d rather you didn’t mention the thing about me giving away tuna.”
He glanced at her. “What makes you think I’d do that?”
“Oh, you know.”
“No, I don’t.” His voice had gone quiet. “Explain it to me.”
“Water cooler stuff. Medford makes some reference to catching us kissing, and you tell the very entertaining story about me giving away tuna to a guy who’s going to use the can for a hockey puck. I can understand how—”
“You think I’d make fun of what you’re doing to get a laugh from the people I work with?”
Whoops. “Obviously not,” she said quickly. “Sorry to imply that you might.”
“Apology accepted.”
She snuck a peek at his firm profile. She’d insulted him, no doubt about that. But she’d found out some valuable info in the process. The deeper she probed into Zach Evans, the more she liked what she found. It wasn’t realistic to think that the first eligible man she met in the city would become someone very special, but she couldn’t throw off the premonition that Zach was special.
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, Zach posed Hannah smack-dab in the middle of