Hiring Miss Linton

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

"15 hours?"

"Yes." Mr Ambrose replied to his secretary's question, while typing in his laptop. "This is the fastest flight we could get from London to Manila. Then another hour, from Manila to Palawan."

"Then what am I supposed to do?" Lily sunk into her chair and looking out of the window. "Get bored out of my mind?"

"You can arrange my schedule for next week." Mr Ambrose made a move to give his laptop to her when she motioned him to stop.

"I'm going to sleep."

"Ms Linton." Mr Ambrose almost sighed. "If you don't do this now, it will be deducted from your wages."

"Okay, okay." Lily muttered as she reached for the laptop. "Ugh, bloody workaholic."

"Respect, Ms Linton."

"What?" she said through gritted teeth. "You're going to deduct that from my wages too?"

Wordlessly, Lily started typing and sorting through her boss' schedule while Mr Ambrose turned to Karim. The bodyguard noticed this and lowered his voice.

"Sahib." He started. "That manager of the resort. He has been paid by Lord Dalgliesh."

A muscle in Mr Ambrose's jaw twitched. "I knew it. That man would never back down."

Karim's expression hardened. "My sentiments exactly, Sahib."

The bodyguard glances at the brunette beside his boss and decided whether it would be wise to point something out to him - again.

"What is it, Karim?" Mr Ambrose inquired after noticing Karim glance at Lily, rather warily.

"Don't you think, Dalgliesh paid her too?"

Ice-cold silence settled between the two men.

It had been a question Karim had been asking Mr Ambrose ever since Lily started working for him as his private secretary. Though she seemed harmless to him, the fact that she sought a job in Dalgliesh's company was enough to make him suspicious.

"No."

It's the same response Mr Ambrose gives whenever the topic was brought up.

Sure, he was suspicious and kept an eye on his newly hired secretary for the first month she had been working for him but...

But...

That was the problem.

Karim sighed. Was his Sahib getting swayed by the femininity of their companion?

He glanced at the Ifrit who was now halfway through finishing her task.

At least she's doing good.

If that Ifrit does anything to his boss, there would be hell to pay.

With that notion in mind, Karim leaned back on his chair, still alert, and just made sure nothing was off about the passengers around them.

Lily closed Mr Ambrose's laptop as she finished the task given to her. Smiling to herself, she whips out a phone to send a message to James. But just before she could do so, Mr Ambrose speaks.

"You're not allowed to do that here on the plane."

"What?"

"Weren't you listening to the flight attendant's instructions earlier?"

Lily's ears turned pink due to guilt. "No."

"I figured." Mr Ambrose said. "You are not keen on listening after all."

Lily opened her mouth to throw insults at him. "You are a bloody son of a bachelor!"

"And you are a disrespectful female." He retorted. "Do you want to be dismissed from your job?"

Now that hit a nerve.

Reluctantly, Lily sunk back into her seat but not without glaring daggers at her employer.

As she looked out of the window, she thought of her best friend, James.

They had met each other during 1st grade. Lily, for some reason, vividly remembers how that day went and it took a lot of her willpower not to burst into a fit of laughter.

She had been coloring something back then, when this mahogany-haired boy suddenly showed up, startling her. Her young self immediately grabbed a pair of scissors that were conveniently beside her and pointed it at the boy.

"Woah!" James had said, putting up his hands to surrender. "I didn't mean to startle you. Sorry."

Lily hadn't accepted his apology and grabbed his hair. "Are you so sure you didn't mean it?"

Now, now. She was a friendly girl back then. In fact, so friendly that she made her classmates cry when she volunteers to design their lunch boxes with some stickers - stickers of Shrek which, for some reason, irked the other children.

"You don't have to be this mean." James pleaded as the girl had raised her scissors and aimed it for his hair. "I just wanted to make friends."

Lily loosened her grip, but never let go. "Making friends by creeping behind their backs and startling them?"

"I guess..."

Let's just say that after Lily had cut the few long strands of hair, which resembled a rat's tail, at the back of James' neck, they went through guidance counseling together for a week.

Why was James included if Lily was the only one who assaulted him?

Well, that morning, before he met Lily in the afternoon, he had startled a classmate who had a heart disease. Poor thing went into a shock and was brought to the nearest hospital. Luckily, she didn't die.

Lily smiled wistfully. Oh how she missed those days with James. It was actually a wonder how the two of them became the best of friends since then.

After yawning, her eyes started to get droopy. All the bickering with her boss and nostalgic memories must have drained her brain. Darkness and peace started to envelope her as soon as she closed her eyes.

His previous bickering with his secretary had Mr Ambrose thinking.

Why can't he just dismiss her if she annoyed him so much?

And as much as he kept telling her that he would deduct her wages, be it because of her tardiness or impoliteness, he never did.

Before he could dive deeper into his irrelevant thoughts, he felt something touch his shoulder.

He looked to his side and found his private secretary's head leaning on it.

Should I push her away?

Mr Ambrose's thoughts on pushing her away dissolved when she snuggled closer.

Deciding that there was no actual harm in letting Lily do this, he let her be and proceeded eating the food given by the airline.

It was free after all.