The Fate Date (Glengarry Curse #1)

9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Gavin

T he buzzer for the building door finally sounded—sixteen minutes late—and every tick of his watch only compounded the agitation inside him. He’d set up a power bar on the high-top dining table, the wireless printer was fully stocked, and another monitor was poised to be plugged in. His apartment was ready, but his second cup of coffee was doing little to bolster his conviction this morning.

He heard a rustling noise followed by a stressed, “Shit!” from the hallway. Gavin opened the door with his favourite glare for people who wasted his time.

“You’re late.” Normally people cowered. He preferred that to the fake excuses and feigned apologies.

Sabrina, however, beamed.

“I know, I know. But the fall leaves are bananas beautiful today.” She shoved a box into his hands.

Gavin felt as unsettled as when he’d taken a look at Sabrina’s finances the other day. He’d recognized the futility of these coaching sessions immediately. He’d almost told her that, before she welled up with tears and he’d felt strangely guilty. It wasn’t like her financial situation was his fault. Yet, despite the crushing blows he had delivered over the years in business, caring little for people’s struggles or ego—for the first time in his life, he’d hesitated. He hadn’t wanted to squash her spirit or examine the parallels between her situation and his own .

She flounced into his apartment and deposited her absurdly large “purse” on the table, crushing some of the paperwork he’d set out.

“How are you?” she asked as she removed her patchwork coat and draped it over his leather couch.

“Fine.” Gavin balanced the box at the far end of the table, away from anything else she could upend with her whirlwind, and took her coat. He didn’t trust her not to mess up his closet system.

“Nice place,” she said, practically bouncing at his heels, craning her neck to look around. He hung up her coat on the appropriate hanger. Her eyebrows were furrowed, probably searching for a decorative pillow or knick-knack, like those that cluttered her own living space. She wouldn’t find any here.

“You really have a greyscale motif going on,” she said, like it was a bad thing.

“The walls are more of a taupe.”

“Can I get the tour?” she asked.

“No.”

Her enthusiasm seemed to dim momentarily, like Tinkerbell wilting at the disbelief of her magic.

A tinge of remorse swelled inside him after his blunt response. Like the other day, her enthusiasm and openness made him feel…weird. Lighter. Happier. It was like his body craved her chaos. It was unacceptable. Especially as things could become confusing if they were to actually like each other. No, it was preferable, essential even, that they keep things professional. Hence, he defaulted to his usual apathy.

“You’re being a very unobliging host.” She crossed her arms over her chest, blocking his path back to the table. He inhaled that sweet, spiced scent of hers, like cinnamon sugar cookies. It made his mouth water.

“I don’t care.”

She pulled herself up taller. “You know, you’re not going to win your board’s approval if you can’t at least fake social niceties.” Ignoring her rebuff, he walked around the pint-size menace to the table, eager to get started. Sabrina’s exuberance redoubled behind him. “This can be a two-way coaching situation. I am the relationship coach,” she said the words with a large gesture like she was lighting her job title on a marquee.

“I don’t need a relationship coach.”

She scrambled up the chair at the high-top table. “You absolutely do.”

He let out an overly exaggerated sigh. It had no observable effect.

In fact, she continued with fervour. “Lesson one, it’s polite to ask someone how they’re doing if you haven’t seen them for a few days.”

“How are you?” he forced out through his clenched teeth.

Her hand came to rest on his bare forearm. “I’m good, thanks for asking.”

Her touch was shocking, just like last time. It was what he imagined Rogue from X-Men felt like; Sabrina’s fingers were so cold they sucked the heat from his body. He didn’t like the sensation. He issued another glare, but she didn’t seem to notice.

“Lesson one of business coaching—don’t show up late.”

He tried to pull his arm away. Instead, she reached down to grab his hand and gave it a squeeze. His hand tensed involuntarily. Why was she so touchy?

“I brought apology donuts—” She stopped mid-sentence, releasing his hand to raise an accusatory finger in his face. “By the way, don’t touch the apple pie donut. It’s my favourite and I’m not sharing.”

The abrupt change had Gavin suppressing his smile. “I thought you were supposed to teach me about being nice?”

“True, apple pie donuts excepted. If you so much as look at it, I’ll put a hex on you.”

“Oh, so threatening people is friendly behaviour? You’re a fantastic relationship coach, by the way. Exemplary role model.”

“Gavin Glengarry you have to be the most infuriating person I have ever met.” But her face was radiating joy .

“I won’t touch your donut.”

She leaned in and whispered, “Thank you.” Gavin stopped breathing. Then, like she had no idea how her proximity caused the tension to coil inside him, she chirped, “Should we get started? Wait till you see my homework.”

She pulled her Mary Poppins bag over to her, and the papers trapped underneath let out their crumpled pleas. The bag had to be half the size and weight of her.

“Take a look.” She took out her laptop and pulled up some of the crude charts she’d made about her sales records and her completed market research spreadsheet. Gavin welcomed the distraction of data. His frantic heartbeat was soothed by the organized columns. He loved seeing the numbers come together in patterns, visualizing how to make it a meaningful path forward.

“Quiz me.” Sabrina reached for the box of donuts, but started to fall out of the high-top chair. Gavin grabbed her arm to help her.

She wore a tight short-sleeve turtleneck dress that hit mid-calf and hugged her body perfectly. His grip wrapped around her forearm so easily. An odd sensation of longing hit him, to stroke her with his thumb, on the underside of her wrist…

“Thanks,” she said, unaffected.

He pulled his hand back. All this touching had to stop. She grabbed her precious apple pie donut and took a hungry bite, the filling spilling out the side of her mouth, all over her face.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, clutching the donut in one hand, the other cupped under her mouth to catch the filling dripping down her chin, shining all over her lips. “Do you have a napkin?”

Gavin hopped down quickly, taking a moment to screw his head back on straight when he was hidden from view. Where did he…keep…his napkins? He searched several drawers before taking a deep breath. Logically, napkins would be in the drawer under the tea towels and above dishrags.

What was it about this woman that affected him this way? She was flighty, naive, and irritatingly optimistic. Yet he continued to have the same visceral physical reaction to her, his mind jumping to obscene conclusions. Adjusting himself and recommitting not to fantasising licking pie filling off his colleague’s face, he came back to the table. He refused to watch as she wiped her lips clean. Instead, he found solace in the spreadsheet.

“What’s your top seller.”

“Crystals, however, they’re not the most profitable.”

“What is the most profitable?”

“The card decks.”

“Why?”

She stopped with her mouth open, poised for another bite, before replying, “Sorry?”

“Why do you think they are the most profitable?”

“Um…I don’t know. I guess…Well, with the small crystals the price point is so low we sell lots of them. They’re also discreet. There’s a lot of stigma for people who believe in or find comfort through forms of witchcraft.” She paused and sat taller in her seat. “For the cards, it’s a similar reason, I think. It’s a good entry into this sort of spirituality without going full broomstick, you know?”

Gavin smiled, picturing Sabrina poised atop a broom, with a pointed witch’s hat. A good little witch.

“There’s a guidebook inside the decks, and it’s an easy gift. Some even collect them because of the artwork. I got trapped in a huge internet hole of card deck reviewers …”

She pulled up another spreadsheet and he saw another side of Sabrina. The one with a business hat. He stayed quiet, not wanting to break her confidence as he was apt to do. She talked about revenue streams, social media content with high engagement, messaging she found effective, and websites that were “just the coolest”.

“I see what you mean now, about needing both your head and your heart engaged in the business. The bits that resonated for me incorporated both.”

“Do you have any idea how you can translate some of what you’ve learned and apply it to your own shop?”

Sabrina chewed her lip. “I’m not sure yet,” she said finally. “I have some ideas, but…” She shrugged. “I think I need some more time for all of this to marinate.”

“Reasonable,” Gavin said. “You’d put some of my employees to shame with all this.” He considered whether perhaps he’d been too quick to judge the fate of her mother’s shop. She was a quick study, and maybe scrappy enough to keep things going.

“Really?” She eyed him suspiciously. “Are you just being nice?”

“When am I nice?” he answered honestly. She chuckled. It sounded like the tinkling of wind chimes. He didn’t know why, maybe it was the cheerful spell she put him under that compelled him to elaborate, but he sensed she needed to hear it. “It’s true though. You were efficient, thorough, and assessing. It’s alright not to have all the answers yet. It wasn’t part of the assignment. But I think that’s good homework. Come up with three rough ideas of how you might change your current business model to incorporate some of the features you’ve outlined in your spreadsheet. We’ll discuss them next time we meet.”

Her smile dazzled. Her joy was deadly, and she wielded it like a weapon she didn’t know she was employing. He wasn’t used to this sort of enthusiasm for work tasks. Maybe it was because he wasn’t usually on the receiving end of one, but he liked making her smile. Liked it a little too much.

“Now it’s my turn,” she said. “Where’s your homework?”

“You’re serious about this relationship coaching thing?” Gavin asked .

“Yes. You were supposed to get birthdays, remember.”

“Uhhh, yeah, HR had some policies…”

“No problem, let’s search through your emails.”

“No offense, Sabrina, but I don’t see how that information will be helpful.” Indulging her astrological tendencies was not part of the agreement. As far as he was concerned, his coaching duties were complete for the day, ahead of schedule, even.

“Emails. Now.”

With an obvious sigh he pulled the laptop over and searched for Yves’ name —he sent out the monthly birthday messages. Sabrina recorded the dates in her cat-shaped notebook with her glittery marker. Then, on her laptop, she plugged them into a software, creating circle charts like the one in the car. She chewed on her lip while she worked, sighing and drawing symbols that he didn’t understand. Fully absorbed, the light of the screen cast shadows from her long lashes, her mouth parting and chewing on the end of her marker. Her tongue popped out to touch it.

Fuck, what was with his obsession with her mouth? He got down from the barstool and found refuge in the kitchen, away from the five-foot-nothing temptation in the other room. He flung open the fridge door, taking out the sandwiches he’d prepared, and grabbed some extra napkins too, while he was at it.

As he deposited the food on the table, Sabrina finally came out of her trance-like state to say, “OK, I’m ready.”

He looked down at her notes. “None of this will make sense to me.”

It was her turn to huff out a breath. Her irritation was a foreign language—people never sighed at him. But then again, so were her smiles.

Before he could respond, she cut in, “Could you make a spreadsheet?”

“I—yeah, I can make a spreadsheet.”

“Great. ”

Gavin got back up on his chair and she leaned closer to him to point at his screen. He swallowed, his body warming, blood rushing towards places that had no business swelling.

“Across the top columns can you put: Motivation, Security, Communication, Attraction, and Drive.” Gavin typed in the headers dutifully, struggling to avoid typos with the way his hands were sweating.

“Now, along the rows, put the names of people and we’ll go through it. It’ll be your little socializing cheat sheet.”

“I still don’t understand…”

“Let’s do an example—your friend Alfred.”

“‘Friend’ might be a bit generous.”

“Fine, your colleague Alfred,” she said testily. “For motivation, he’s a people-person, charming, perhaps gossipy and intelligent.”

“That’s pretty accurate,” Gavin conceded. A faint smile hinted at her lips before she continued, a little louder now.

“By ‘security’, I mean daily emotional and physical needs. In Alfred’s case, he needs attention and the opportunity to express himself creatively. For his ‘communication style’, he’s diplomatic and easy-going, which probably makes him very well-liked. For ‘fun’ and ‘attraction’, I would put generous, maybe materialistic, he may enjoy brand-name gifts and food. Under ‘drive’—this is for the planet Mars—this pertains to productivity and confrontation style. In this case, Alfred seems very conflict-avoidant, maybe even passive aggressive. He likes to take a collaborative approach to things. He craves peace and may resort to underhand tactics to keep it. How did I do?”

Gavin didn’t quite know what to say. He re-read the columns, feeling like he finally understood his colleague—and why all of Gavin’s training attempts had been a flop. He’d never tried to engage Alfred collaboratively, he’d withheld creative leadership opportunities—maybe that’s why neither of them had been particularly successful.

“It’s eye-opening. ”

“Here, this is your homework.” She added a sixth column, and Gavin was more irritated by its heading than the fact she was touching his computer.

“Based on the info in the spreadsheet, I want you to brainstorm two small-talk questions you could ask your colleagues—and no repetitions.”

They repeated the process for Ian and the board members who would be at the retreat. She took her astrology gibberish and translated it into his language. This was something pragmatic he could actually use—if it wasn’t based on complete nonsense. But then what did he have to lose?

The afternoon sun coming in from the window made her skin glow. It was an odd observation, that had him checking his father’s watch, shocked at the time.

Sabrina began packing her things. “That signing bonus is ours.”

The comment caught him off guard. The words felt like a tiny sliver, not devastating, but irksome. He didn’t understand why it bothered him. “Oh, right. We make a good team, don’t we?”

“Speaking of our fake relationship, I think we need some…clarifications to our agreement.”

Gavin’s eyes sharpened on her, all thoughts of her creamy skin shoved aside. He wasn’t going to budge on the signing bonus, she’d already played him on that one.

“It’s kind of awkward, but I figured we should set some boundaries.”

Gavin nodded, though he was still confused.

“Are you sure I can’t give you a lift home?” he asked. She hoisted the ergonomic atrocity she called a purse on her shoulder. It wasn’t his responsibility to provide transportation, but it wasn’t outside the realm of their agreement to help her. It was a practical gesture. Not a friendly one.

She waved him off. “No, I’m good, thanks. So, as I was saying—I’m thinking we should set some ‘touching limits’ to make sure we’re both comfortable with—”

“Sorry, what?”

“I don’t know what else to call it? I mean, we may be in a situation where we need to kiss, or hug or…I don’t know.” She came closer to where he stood and circled her hand around his bicep, where the sleeve of his t-shirt ended. Her grip sent goosebumps up his body, teasing his cock into action, not for the first time today.

“No.” He stepped back.

“Sorry?”

“No touching.”

“Don’t you think that might look a little weird? If you’re worried, I’m comfortable with, you know, an arm around the shoulder, even a kiss if we were really put on the spot. No tongue though.” She pointed her finger at him playfully.

His imagination didn’t even hesitate. He was consumed by the thought of wrapping an arm around the small of her back right here and now. If he propped her up on the bar stool, she’d be the same height. He’d spread her legs and step in between them, and let his thumb graze her cheek like he’d wanted to earlier to see how soft her skin was. He’d wrap his fingers around the nape of her neck and pull her closer for a kiss, his other hand coming to stroke her thigh under her dress. He’d finally taste those lips, sweet and tempting, searching for that hint of cinnamon from her donut. Her tongue, which had fascinated him all fucking day, would dart out hesitantly, like how it had touched the tip of her marker—

“No tongues. No touching.” He walked over to the closet to get her coat.

“But don’t you think it will be strange if—”

“No.”

She sighed as she put her arms into her coat that he held out for her. He needed her out of this apartment now.

“OK, what about nicknames? ”

“What?” he snapped, his composure slipping. Holding her jacket, being so close to her made her scent all the more powerful. He felt like he couldn’t escape it.

“You know, like ‘dear’ or ‘sweetie’, ‘babe’?” She said the words like she was testing the names out on him. He was nobody’s ‘sweetie’.

“Gavin is fine.”

She tilted her head, eyes wide with an exaggerated sigh. “Gav?”

“I’ll allow it.”

“I should call you grumpy bear,” she said under her breath, which elicited the same sort of guilt he’d felt before. Like he cared about making her happy.

“I’ll call you Tink,” he offered up. That was how he’d been thinking about her in his mind.

She gave him a weird look as she once again hoisted the leather straps of her carpet bag on her shoulder. “Tink?”

“Short for Tinkerbell,” he tried to explain.

“Oh, because I’m short?” Her eyes seem to lose a little sparkle.

“Partly, and with the hair.”

She went to leave.

“But it’s also because of your smile. You’re so full of joy. You’re like a little happiness fairy, flitting about with all your magic.”

She stopped and looked at him, a little doe-eyed. “That’s actually really nice.” Her smile broke out then, hitting him square in the chest. “I like that, no one has ever called me that before.”

“Plus, you’re too short to be a Disney Princess.”

She laughed then, and the smile he’d been fighting all day slipped out too.

“There’s the Gavin I know and despise.” She attempted a sneer but her mouth stated otherwise. That mouth .

Gavin opened the door, barely concealing his desperate need to usher her out. “I’ll pick you up after work on Tuesday and we can head over to Ian and Melanie’s together then.”

“Awesome.” She hesitated in the doorway. Was she going to hug him? She seemed to decide against it. “OK, well, bye.” She gave an awkward wave and departed.

Gavin closed the door as quickly as he could, his heart racing and his breathing ragged. What was wrong with him? Hereturned to the table where they had been working and began tidying, trying to let the soothing act calm his strange reaction to this woman. The kissing fantasies? The nickname? Even the fact that he’d spent four hours in her presence without checking the time once? He hadn’t felt this way about a woman in…well…ever. What was more distressing, his traits that usually drove people away were now proving to be oddly useful. His pragmatism gave structure to her creativity. His restraint focused her vivacity.

Almost as if they were opposite .

That was a line of thought he wouldn’t entertain.

However, maybe if he let himself enjoy the rush of attraction he felt around her, it would make their relationship more convincing? But with his complex financial situation, it had to stop there.

He turned his attention to his spreadsheet. He adjusted the formatting she’d mangled on the sixth column entitled “Small Talk” and began brainstorming his questions. This was ridiculous, totally nonsensical, but perhaps, it just might work?