Because of His Fortune (For His Pleasure, Book 25) (5 page)

Grace knew she recognized her, but for a
split second, she wasn’t sure who it was and her mind was blank.

“Scott?” the woman said.

“Oh, Kennedy,” Scott cried, holding his
arms out and hugging her, gushing over her, kissing her cheek.
 
He stepped back.
 
“You look gorgeous, lady!”

Kennedy smiled, but Grace thought the
opposite was true.
 
Kennedy’s smile
and her eyes looked strained and she seemed somehow acutely tired.
 
“So good to see you, Scott.”
 
Kennedy’s eyes flicked to Grace.
 
“And you are?”

Grace stood up.
 
“Hi, Kennedy.
 
I’m Easton’s new executive assistant,
Grace.”

Kennedy’s eyes narrowed momentarily, but
then she held out her hand and Grace took it and they shook briefly.

Grace felt as though Kennedy’s hand was
cold and clammy and weak, as the woman withdrew and gave Grace a long
stare.
 
“Do I know you from
somewhere else?” she said, almost suspiciously.

“I was at your wedding,” Grace said.

Kennedy’s eyes narrowed again.
 
“I don’t recall that.”

“She’s my sister,” Scott clarified.
 
“She helped me on the day,
just—you know—being a good little sister and helping out.”

“Oh, of course.”
 
Kennedy didn’t seem to be put at ease by
this explanation.
 
“And now you work
for my husband.”

“Just recently.
 
Red Jameson hired me a few days ago.”

Kennedy nodded, one eyebrow rising as if
she was putting the puzzle pieces together and finding them lacking.
 
“It’s funny how these things work out,”
the pregnant woman said, her lip twitching a little.
 
“Small coincidences become very large in
retrospect, don’t they?”

“In the best of ways,” Scott stepped in,
grinning.
 
“Did I mention you just
get more beautiful every day?”

“Oh, you’re too kind,” Kennedy said.

At that moment, Easton’s office door
opened and he stepped out.
 
“I
thought I heard your voice,” he said, his forehead wrinkling as he took in the
scene.
 
“Just got off a conference
call, honey.
 
Have you been here
long?”

“Oh, not at all,” Kennedy told him.
 
“I was just catching up with Scott.
 
You remember Scott, of course.”

“Of course,” Easton said, more confused
now.
 
“And Scott is here…”

“He’s my brother,” Grace said, feeling
more ridiculous than ever.

“I’m her brother,” Scott added, his
cheeks bright red.

Easton nodded.
 
“Sure.
 
Well, that’s nifty.”

Kennedy stared across at her husband, her
demeanor clearly one of upset and anxiety.
 
“And then I met your new assistant, Grace.
 
She’s quite beautiful and sweet and I’m
sure, very capable.”

Easton swallowed and looked distinctly
uncomfortable.
 
“Red hired her.”

“So I’ve been told.
 
Everyone seems very anxious to mention
that point to me,” Kennedy laughed, and her laugh sent icy chills down Grace’s
spine.

Scott’s eyes got wide and his cheeks grew
even redder.
 
“Well, I should be
going,” Scott said, coughing.
 
“I
was just…you know…stopping off to say hello to my sister.”
 
He waved the paper like an ineffectual
wand, and then started off.
 
“So
great seeing you both again,” he told Easton and Kennedy on his way out.

Kennedy and Easton, meanwhile, were both
still looking at one another, and Kennedy in particular, seemed very unhappy.

Easton sighed as he turned his attention
briefly to Grace.
 
“My wife has an
appointment with her obstetrician,” he said.
 
“We’ll be out of the office for a
bit.
 
Forward any calls to
voicemail.”

“Absolutely,” Grace said.
 
She was sweating profusely, she
realized.

Kennedy was once again staring at her
intently.
 
“Nice to meet you,
Grace,” she said, and although it was friendly on the surface—Grace felt
like her eyes were stabbing knives of hatred.

“So lovely to see you,” Grace said,
nodding like a fool.
 
“So…so…lovely.
 
Well,
uh—enjoy your appointment!” she called out, and then felt even more
ridiculous, as Easton subtly shook his head, escorting Kennedy out of the
suite.

They left and Grace sat down heavily,
exhaling as if for the first time in hours.

What had happened?

She didn’t even know.
 
One moment, she’d been working on
meeting minutes—and the next, there were people poking at her, insinuating
things, making her feel absurdly guilty for no reason at all.

What had been Kennedy’s strange fixation
on her?

Grace had no idea, but Easton’s wife
seemed to instantly take a disliking to her, just as Easton had.

Grace would’ve thought that perhaps
Easton had told his wife about what she and Liam had done in his office, but
Grace seemed not to even know that she worked for him until just that moment.

What had happened with Kennedy, why did
she seem to dislike Grace so much?

Not to mention, the newspaper
article.
 
They’d somehow gotten a
photo of Liam with her in it.
 
Granted, she was hardly even visible, but she was visible enough for
Scott to notice.

That was all it had taken.

Grace got up, went to the bathroom and
splashed her face with cold water.

This world she’d been thrown into was
incredibly stressful and disorienting.
 
The rules weren’t clear—in fact, the rules seemed to change from
one moment to the next.

And why was it that everyone else seemed
to know what the rules were, while she always felt like she was blindfolded and
walking into oncoming traffic?

Grace freshened up and tried to compose
herself.
 
Then she went back to the
office, sat down at her desk, and tried her best to do some more work.
 

It was difficult enough trying to make sense
of the meeting audio with all of the unfamiliar terminology, references to
other projects, other companies and people’s names…but on top of all those
issues, Grace kept getting distracted by thoughts of Liam, Easton, Kennedy,
Scott, Anne Houston, even Exley and Vera.

Her mind was going in a million different
directions and she was losing focus.
 
Meanwhile, she’d hardly gotten half a page of meeting minutes written
down, and she wasn’t very confident that what she did have was any good.

Sitting back in her chair, she put her face
in her hands and moaned with a discouraged pain.
 

Why?
 
Why is this all happening? She wondered.

She heard the door squeaking open yet
again and pulled her hands off her face, only to find Red Jameson entering the
room, looking at her with a curious expression.

Grace couldn’t believe it.
 
In just a few hours, it felt like
everyone she’d ever known had walked through that door.
 
It was like dealing with the ghosts of
Christmas Past, Present and Future, like someone was intentionally messing with
her.

“Everything all right?” Red Jameson
asked, wearing a dark coat that extended to his knees, and a light gray suit
with a violet tie.
 
“You look upset,
Grace.”

“Oh, no,” Grace said, shaking her head
and laughing.
 
“Just having a moment
is all.”

Red nodded, his lips compressing.
 
“I know you’re close with Liam.
 
So I take it you’re aware of what’s
happening with him.”

“Yes,” she said.

Red nodded again.
 
“It must be difficult for him right
now.”

“I’m certain it is,” Grace replied.

Red seemed to pick up on her attempt to
remain professional and removed from the situation.
 
He stuffed his hands in his coat
pockets.
 
“Is Easton in?”

“No,” she said.
 
“He went with Kennedy to a doctor’s
appointment.”

Red checked his watch.
 
“When’s he due back?”

“He didn’t say.”

Red’s eyes grew a little cold.
 
“Well, what time was the appointment
for?”

She hesitated, then smiled
uncertainly.
 
“He didn’t say.
 
I’m so sorry.”

“And you have no idea when he’s coming
back.”

“No, he didn’t mention it.”

Red sighed, took out his phone and
punched some keys, then raised the phone to his ear.
 
“Hi Easton, this is Red Jameson calling
about a very urgent matter.
 
Please
return ASAP.”

Red hung up the phone and scratched his
jaw.
 
“He’s not picking up his
phone.”

Grace was feeling more and more
incompetent as her boss’s boss—the man who’d hired her—stood there
in the office and waited to be told even the most basic information about Easton’s
whereabouts from his assistant.

“Let me try him, Mr. Jameson.”
 
Grace realized that she didn’t actually
have Easton’s cell number—only his office line.
 
But then she thought perhaps he was
checking his office voicemail, so she called the number.

When Red heard the phone ringing in the
office, he got a bemused, but almost disbelieving expression on his face.
 
“Is that you calling his empty office?”
he asked.

Grace nodded.
 
“I thought I’d leave a message in case
he checks the office voicemail.”

Red chuckled.
 
“I think my message on his cell phone
already covered that base.”

She hung up, her cheeks aflame with
embarrassment.
 
“I’m sorry, Mr.
Jameson.
 
I should’ve done a better
job of asking him for his itinerary.”

“In the future, you should definitely try
to assert yourself more in that area,” Red told her.
 
“I can’t have my top man out of pocket with
no way of reaching him—ever.
 
It’s unacceptable and I expect you to have knowledge of his whereabouts
so I can access him when necessary.
 
I’ve got an emergency to do with our largest account and time is of the
essence.
 
If you’re able to reach
him or he contacts you—please tell him to be in touch with me
immediately.”

“Yes, of course,” Grace said.

Red nodded, looking around, seeming to
want to leave.
 
But then he looked
at her.
 
“How are you finding things
so far, Grace?
 
Is the position to
your liking?”

“Oh, absolutely,” she said, smiling and
nodding.
 
“It’s very exciting work,
very challenging.”

“And Easton’s been accommodating?”

She hesitated, just for a moment, but Red
seemed to notice that instantly.

“He’s been very professional.
 
A good boss, a good leader,” she intoned
seriously.

Red watched her.
 
“A good leader?
 
How lovely.”

“He’s demanding but fair,” Grace lied.

“I want you to remember that I hired you
because you’re right for this job, Grace.
 
Whether he knows it or not—Easton needs someone like you
around.
 
So please, don’t allow
him—or me, or anyone—to stop you from doing your job
effectively.
 
Easton might seem a
little scary, but his bark is much worse than his bite.”

This cheered her, so she smiled and her
smile was much more genuine now.
 
“I’ll try my best.”

“You do that,” Red told her.
 
“Here’s my card with all of my contact
info,” he said.
 
“All my numbers and
emails are on it, in case you can’t reach me one way or another.”
 
He dropped it on her desk and then left,
waving.
  

She waved back, relieved that he was
finally gone.

This had been another incredibly
stressful day, with all the unexpected visitors and the attendant drama.

She spent the rest of the day working and
checking her email and phone to see if Easton was trying to be in touch.

People were calling for him, and she just
kept putting them through to voicemail.