Black Light: Charmed (Black Light Series Book 15), page 15
“Executive assistants,” Aubrey whispered back. “You want to see Laura, she’s in the center on that wall. That’s Mr. Chisholm’s office. Well… it looks like she had to step away, but just grab a seat, and I’m sure she’ll be back soon.”
“Thank you so much for your help!” Cassandra said, smiling at the woman. “You’re really sweet.”
“Seriously? You are too! It’s hard to get a smile out of people up here sometimes,” she whispered, laughing a little as she made a face that said ‘yikes’ pretty well. “I hope you have a great day!”
“You too!” Cassandra waved as Aubrey headed back down the hall, and then she walked as quietly as she could over to the desk the woman had pointed out. The soft ring of the phone was constant, but the little headset was on the desk beside it.
Pulling out her phone, she sent off a quick text to Logan: I’m here! Waiting outside your office… I think. ;p
It was probably some corporate faux pas to snoop around the woman’s desk, but she was curious about this side of Logan’s life. Leaning over the large counter bordering the L-shaped desk, she peeked around. The woman had a few photos on display, one of her, her husband, her son, and a tiny dog. Another of her and her son in front of a creek, and another of her and her husband with their faces close together, smiling broadly. Those were the only personal items besides a pack of gum. Everything else looked too important to mess with. Stacks of papers, post-it notes, and of course, her computer.
Cassandra was about to sit down when she heard Logan’s voice through the door. It was muffled, but it definitely sounded like he was yelling. Glancing around at the few other executive assistant desks, she couldn’t tell if anyone was watching her, but it wasn’t like she shouldn’t be there. Logan had invited her, put her name on the security list, and they were already over half an hour late. Feeling a little braver, she moved close to the large double doors and leaned in.
“How are we supposed to keep these clients if people don’t do their fucking job?” Logan was definitely shouting, and she could hear the rage in his voice even though the thick wood. “I want the entire team in a meeting this afternoon. Every fucking one of them.”
Something was not going well today.
The door clicked in front of her and Cassandra jumped back, but Logan’s next shouted words came through the crack in the door crystal clear. “Didn’t I ask you to keep me in the loop on this?”
“Yes, Mr. Chisholm,” a quiet, feminine voice replied, and Cassandra could tell the girl was scared. There was a slight tremor to the way she’d said Logan’s last name.
“Then do your fucking job!” Logan roared, and Cassandra felt a rush of heat flood her face as she pushed the door open, careful not to hit the woman just on the other side of it as she stepped into his office. It was massive. Close to the size of her entire apartment. And Logan was standing in front of a huge desk, red-faced, and frozen still.
“Hey, Logan,” she said, keeping her voice pointedly chipper while he just stared at her for a moment, mouth slightly open.
“Cassandra. Right, we’re going to lunch. Laura, I want this—”
“Oh, no,” Cassandra raised her hand, interrupting him as she laughed a little, but there wasn’t much humor in it. “We aren’t going anywhere until you apologize to this woman.” Turning toward her, she recognized her from the photos. A sweet looking brunette wearing a black skirt with a green blouse. “Laura, right?”
“Yes?” Laura said, clearly confused and still very nervous after Logan yelled at her like a Grade-A asshole.
“Lovely to meet you, Laura. I saw your pictures — you have a beautiful family.” Flashing her a smile, she turned toward Logan and crossed her arms. “I’m waiting.”
“You want me to apologize?” he repeated, and she was sure he was about to argue with her when she dropped the smile, and he stopped short. “It’s been a bad day, okay? I’m just frustrated with some people here who aren’t doing their job.”
“And does that give you the right to speak to Laura that way?” she asked, glancing over at the wide-eyed woman once more.
“Cassandra…” Logan sighed. “Let’s have this conversation over lunch.”
“No.”
“What?” he snapped, and she saw the dom in him wanting to respond, but she didn’t give a shit about their dynamic at the moment.
“Either you apologize to Laura for how you just spoke to her, or you can have lunch by yourself.” Cassandra waited for a beat, but when he didn’t show any sign of speaking, she continued, feeling the heat rushing up her chest. “You’re better than this, Logan. You can be a gentleman and an asshole as much as you want, but you don’t get to claim the gentleman card if you treat people like this who literally come to work every day to try and make your life easier.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, jaw clenched tight, and she gestured over to Laura with a flick of her wrist.
“Oh no, don’t apologize to me. You need to apologize to her.”
Logan met her gaze for a long moment, his blue eyes blazing, but then it finally simmered. He worked his jaw for a moment, taking a deep breath, and then he finally turned toward Laura. “I’m sorry, Laura. Cassandra is right, I shouldn’t have taken my frustration out on you. I would appreciate if you could gather the idiots who did piss me off for a meeting this afternoon.”
“Thank you, Mr. Chisholm,” she replied quietly, taking a step closer to the open door. “I’ll be sure everyone is in attendance. Will you be back by three o’clock?”
“Yes, that will work. Thank you.” Logan sounded more civil, but she could tell by the edge in his tone that she’d be in for it at lunch.
Worth it.
As Laura moved to pass her, she leaned back and gave the woman a warm smile. “I promise, he’s really not as much of an asshole as he pretends to be. If he ever talks to you like that again, just call me.”
Laura’s eyes were wide, but Cassandra saw the edge of her mouth lift as she fought a smile.
“I’ll call you later and make sure you have my number.”
“Cassandra!” Logan snapped, but she just rolled her eyes.
“For now, I’ll do you a favor and drag him out to lunch.” She grinned, and Laura hid her smile as she turned to leave the office, closing the door behind her. Turning, she faced the wrath of Logan still smiling. “Is this where you tell me I’m in trouble for expecting you to treat other people with a base level of human decency?”
“I—” Growling, Logan walked around his desk, ripping open the door on a large cabinet to pull out his suit jacket. “I cannot believe you—”
Watching him fume, struggling to come up with a reasonable response, made her walk over to him, sliding her arms around his waist as he shoved his arms into the jacket. “So… it’s been a bad day?”
“You have no fucking idea.”
“I think I have some idea based on the performance you just put on.” Smiling, she leaned forward to press a kiss to his cheek. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not really.”
“Want a distraction?” she offered, and he seemed to lose some of the tension in his back, eyes narrowing on her.
“Like what?” Logan hadn’t put his arms around her yet, but he also hadn’t tried to pull away from her, and she counted that as a victory.
“There’s a pretty cool spot maybe fifteen minutes from here that does all-day karaoke, and decent food, and I’m pretty sure that absolutely no one can feel angry after listening to day-drunk people butcher the billboard top 40.”
“That sounds terrible.”
“Exactly!” Cassandra said, grinning wide before she smacked his ass through his slacks, dancing back from him as an entirely different blaze caught behind his eyes.
“You’re asking for it, Cassandra.”
“Asking for what?” she teased, pulling her bottom lip between her teeth before she broke into another grin.
“Mmhmm,” he hummed, tilting his chin toward the door. “I’ve had my car waiting for us, and the company driver is very discreet.”
She felt a rush of tingles run over her skin, remembering just how many welts he’d put on her ass the night before last at Black Light. A few small bruises lingered on her backside, and just thinking of his hands on her made her grin.
“You won’t be smiling in a few minutes,” he threatened, and she laughed.
“Promises, promises, Logan.” With her retreating backward to the door, he stalked her, attention completely focused exactly where she wanted it. On her. Not his job, whatever shit was happening, or the people he was mad at.
She may not be able to fix whatever was happening here, but she could improve his day a little, and hopefully make everyone else’s day a little better in the process.
“Say it,” Logan growled, bringing his palm down over her ass again with a dull pop.
“No, sir.” She smiled against the leather seat, still surprised that he’d actually dragged her over his lap in the back of the luxury car. The windows were tinted extremely dark, but the driver was nowhere near far enough away to miss what was happening in the backseat.
“Dammit, Cassandra.” Suddenly, he reached under her, popping the button on her jeans, and he grabbed the waistband in both hands, getting it halfway down her ass in the first yank.
“LOGAN!” she shouted, but she dissolved into laughs as he tugged the jeans to just below her ass. All she could picture was the very stoic driver getting an eyeful of her ass in the rearview mirror, but the man didn’t seem fazed at all. Of course, her laughter was cut short by the first skin-to-skin swat of his hand, the sting lighting up her skin in a blaze.
“Say it, Cassandra,” he demanded, swatting her again, hard enough to leave the outline of his hand as he adjusted her across his thighs.
“I will absolutely not apologize for making you treat people humanely. We can spend your entire lunch driving around in circles giving Jeeves a show if that’s what your plan is.”
Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!
Logan rained down spanks, hard, and the burn built until she couldn’t bite back the whine as she squirmed on his lap, but there was no way in hell she was apologizing for defending Laura. If anything, she wanted to clarify if he usually treated her like that, and then demand he give the poor girl a raise. Hazard pay for dealing with his bad attitude.
CRACK!
She yelped, and he paused the onslaught, breathing harder. With a grunt, he tried to pull her jeans back into place, but he gave up and nudged her hip. “God dammit… sit up.”
“Giving up already?” she teased, but the look on his face as she sat up wiped the smile off her face.
“No, but I’m not going to punish you when I’m angry.” Logan blew out a breath slowly, drawing it back in even slower. “Look, it’s just…”
Leaning back on the seat, Cassandra pulled her underwear and jeans back into position, buttoning them before she sat down in L.A.’s slow-moving traffic. She waited for Logan to continue, but when he didn’t, she reached over to grab his hand. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he muttered, looking out the window.
“Clearly it matters a lot. You wouldn’t be this upset if it was nothing.” She tugged at his hand, trying to get him to look at her. “Come on, talk to me.”
“Things just aren’t going well at work, and…” He sighed again. “I really don’t want to talk about it. I’d much rather be distracted from it. Didn’t you say that’s what this lunch place would do for me?”
“If this won’t work, the only thing that would is a trip to the club, and they’re unfortunately not open for lunch.” Cassandra laughed a little at her joke, but it faded quickly when Logan just stared out the window again.
She wanted to be able to help him, but she didn’t even know the right questions to ask. Mostly because he’d given her absolutely nothing to go on. But pushing him for more information was only going to make him sulk longer, so she abandoned that tactic and dug in her purse for her phone.
“Hey, so… you remember when you said you wanted to catch an episode of the soap opera my next door neighbors are always involved in?”
Logan actually glanced at her, and she grinned as she unlocked her phone to find the video.
“Well, they had a crazy one last night, and Abelita and I had to record it. Wanna listen?” Cassandra scooted closer on the seat, leaning against his shoulder as she held up the phone, tilting it back and forth as she teased him with the offer.
“Okay, fine. Let’s hear it.”
Five minutes into the insanity of the couple shouting at each other, talking about someone’s cousin who was pregnant again, she felt Logan chuckle, his ribs bouncing lightly where she leaned against him. It wasn’t much, and he was still broadcasting his stress on all frequencies, but at least it was something.
Whatever it was, it would pass. Eventually everything did.
The universe was giving him a hard time at work right now, but things would change. Ups and downs were just a part of life, and even if Logan didn’t believe that… she could believe it enough for the both of them.
And, no matter what, they were guaranteed to hear a terrible version of Katy Perry’s ‘Firework’ over the next hour, and there was nothing better than that for distracting someone from the rough parts of life.
Chapter 17
Logan
He was a failure.
That was really the only conclusion to draw from the catastrophe of the past few weeks. If he was a stronger leader, if he was better at his job, then none of these mistakes would have been made.
Mistakes that were adding up fast.
As he sat at his desk, staring out the office windows at the L.A. skyline, the only voice he could hear in his head was his father’s. Calling him a disappointment, an embarrassment to the family name… a failure.
Whitney Asset Management had survived the devastating stock market crash in 2008 under his father’s hand, and while times had been hard, he’d led the company and emerged out the other side with a brand that the wealthy on the West Coast sought out even more than before.
His grandfather had built the beginnings of the company in the years following World War II, starting with nothing to end up as a successful businessman launching Whitney Asset Management in California before many of the East Coast finance names had even given the area a second glance.
His father may have been an absolute bastard… but at least he’d been successful.
Just like his grandfather.
And then there was him, Logan Chisholm, the downfall of the family legacy.
Lifting the bourbon from the windowsill, he poured another glass over the remnants of the ice and took a drink. It burned down his throat, sweet and smooth, until it joined the rest of the bottle in his stomach.
The last time he’d felt like this had been Yale. When alcohol had eventually stopped being enough and he’d tried every drug he could find, trying to find the one that would make him feel better. It wasn’t until someone gave him a baggy of pills his senior year that he’d finally felt a surreal bliss that felt like the answer… until he’d found out what it was.
Vicodin.
He’d tossed himself in rehab over winter break, spent weeks detoxing on everything, and he’d sworn he would never get that low again. He wouldn’t go out like his mom had.
But, how did he fill the hours when he was stressed or angry or over-tired? Drinking.
Just like his father.
He was twice-cursed. Damned to follow in their footsteps no matter how much he wanted to be different… and he did. More than anything he wanted to be someone new, someone better. He wanted to feel better.
He wanted to stop hating his life.
Staring at the warm gold of the liquid in the light of the setting sun, he had the sudden urge to throw it out. Pour it on the floor and go home.
“To Cassandra,” he mumbled to himself, spinning around in the chair to set down the glass and grab his phone from the desk. Clumsily, he texted her, fixing each typo as he made it until he finally had something simple and light, free of all the bullshit: Want to hang out tonight?
That was good.
Much better than ‘I think I’m having a mental breakdown, will you come keep me company?’ or ‘I need to see you, please come over.’ Desperation wasn’t sexy. None of his bullshit was sexy, and the last thing he needed to do was scare her off.
Ding.
Cassandra had texted him back, and he swiped back to it as quickly as he could, but his stomach dropped. I have my dinner tonight with the Elite Brand Management Group! I might be able to sneak away for lunch later this week?
Sighing, he picked up the glass of bourbon and took another swig. Of course Cassandra was busy. He’d even known about the dinner… he’d just forgotten. Everything was going wrong, and it made it hard to think straight.
Ding.
Another text. Shit, I have meetings with the agency until Friday. But we’ll get to see each other for our Nutcracker date Friday night! Vanessa is excited we’re going to be there, and I’ll make sure I send some fun pictures until then.
Peach emoji. Tongue sticking out emoji. Kiss emoji.
Logan tossed the phone back onto the desk, turning back to the skyline outlined in burnt orange as the winter sun dipped toward the horizon. It was chillier tonight, and the cheesy Christmas lights across town were starting to come on, turning the landscape below him into myriad colors. Everyone was excited for Christmas. All his employees were making plans, taking time off, and he felt like the captain of the Titanic. Doomed to go down with the ship while everyone climbed aboard the lifeboats to escape.
Cassandra deserved a lifeboat. She deserved someone better.
Someone that wasn’t a failure driving his life, and his family’s company, into an iceberg.
Thunking the glass back on his desk, he sneered as the bourbon sloshed out of the glass, dripping onto his desk as he snagged his phone to text her back. I hope you have a great night. See you Friday.
