Do Me Right (De Toi à Moi #1)

Twenty

I stared at the bracelet locked around my wrist. The diamonds sparkled in the light, almost blinding me. I’d felt super uncomfortable when I walked to work this morning. This damn bracelet alone was worth over twenty thousand dollars and I had it on full display to everyone passing me by. It felt heavy on my arm and out of place, despite the fact that I really did love it. And the only reason I’d worn it to work was because I knew that was what Ryder was expecting.

As if on cue, he walked out of his office and dropped a stack of papers and binders on my desk. I could just pull back my hands on time so they didn’t land on them. “Can you sort through these contracts and file them in the right binder? Make sure they’re sorted by date as well.” Sighing, I stared at the tower of paperwork. There were probably at least three hundred contracts in there. “When you’re done, you’re free to go.” He smiled, leaning back against my desk.

I stared at him. “Mr. Jackson, it’s only one thirty,” I leaned back in my chair, chewing on my pen while I frowned. This definitely wasn’t gonna take an entire afternoon. Sure, the pile was huge, but I was pretty quick when it came to filing things.

“I know,” he replied, grinning at me. “But I’m planning to leave early myself. We need to be at the launch party at seven. I’m picking you up at six.”

“It’s an hour driving?” I asked, still frowning. When I’d looked it up, I thought it was only twenty minutes.

“Yes, Miss Ryan. Unfortunately some of the streets around the venue are broken up so we will need to take quite a detour.” I nodded. That was a plausible explanation. “And just for future reference, when we are required to attend an event, we are allowed to leave earlier. And you haven’t even heard the best part yet.” He smirked, leaning in closer as if he was about to tell me a secret. “You’ll get paid to go.”

My eyes widened. “What?” I asked. He was gonna pay me to go with him? “You’re paying me to attend the party with you?” I repeated incredulously. “What, am I an escort now?”

“No Miss Ryan.” He looked at me funnily, as if he didn’t understand why it bothered me so much. “The company will pay you. You will be compensated as if working overtime. This rule applies to everyone, not just you. And it won’t be me personally paying you,” he explained calmly. Oh well, I supposed that made sense. “And you really need to stop worrying about money.”

“I’m not worried about money,” I said, “I just want you to understand where I’m coming from.”

“And you need to understand where I’m coming from as well,” he pointed out.

I threw my hands up in frustration. Were we really gonna have this conversation at work? I was not in the mood for that. “I do understand, but you don’t seem to be doing an effort to understand my point of view!”

“I don’t wanna fight about this with you again,” he grumbled, standing up straight again.

“Then why did you bring it up?” I cried out.

“We’re done here. Get back to work.” He started towards his office.

“You’re such a child sometimes,” I called back at him, turning my chair around so I was looking at him. He stopped walking, turning around on his heels. His eyebrows were raised in question as he stared back at me. “When you don’t get your way you just mope around all day until people start feeling bad for you so they give you what you want.”

“It’s working though, isn’t it?” A cocky smirked spread across his face.

“You’re a grown fucking man, Ryder!”