Chapter Forty-One
Dylan
Since I was working from home today, I’d gotten up early to start some of my paperwork, figuring I could take Allie out to breakfast when I was done. The lack of groceries was more than a little embarrassing, but I’d never had much reason to learn to cook. I worked long hours and came home to an empty house, so cooking hadn’t been a priority. Having spent many nights with humans, I knew they considered eating out all the time a bad idea, but that was probably because they didn’t have access to diet spells or witch medicine. Witches didn’t have to worry about human problems like obesity, high blood pressure, or heart disease. Still, I needed to shop for groceries if I expected Allie to stay at my house while I was at work. Based on the comments she’d made about my lack of food, I got the impression she didn’t want to survive on takeout.
Since my first meeting of the day was a conference call with the Whitmores, a witch couple who were opening a resort on a Caribbean island hidden by magic, I’d been able to move that meeting to six and open up some extra time for Allie today. It was just after seven thirty, and I heard the shower running upstairs. Missing out on the chance to shower with Allie sucked, but business needed to come first.
“Again, I would strongly advise against hiring any humans,” I said impatiently. For some reason, the Whitmores really wanted to hire humans, probably because they could get away with paying humans less. “As I’ve already said, it would be very difficult to keep the humans from discovering that your guests are not human. You could find yourself in serious legal trouble if an inspector for any of the preternatural groups felt you weren’t safeguarding their identities. There’s also the danger that one of the human rights groups would insist you weren’t treating the humans ethically. In the end, it’s not worth it.”
“The inspections would be easy to avoid out here,” Mrs. Whitmore argued.
Letting out a frustrated sigh, I tried to sound like I didn’t want to throttle them both. “Countless establishments have been shut down for breaking labor laws. I’ve heard of witches stripped of their power, and one was executed for having humans available to feed vampires.” I mentioned that last part in case they were considering using humans as unwilling blood donors. It would be foolish and reckless, but I wouldn’t put it past them.
“It’s done at vampire run establishments,” Mr. Whitmore pointed out.
“Not legally,” I argued. “While the vampires might not have any ethical reservations with this sort of thing, it violates their agreement with the rest of the preternatural community, and even they’ll put a stake in the heart of one of their own for it.”
“How are we supposed to have a competitive edge if we don’t have cattle for the vampires?” Mr. Whitmore demanded.
This couple had been pissing me off for the two months I’d been working with them. Every week, we had a new argument about what they could and could not legally do. They’d even asked about the legality of purchasing sex demons—not hiring, purchasing.
“You will just have to find a way to be competitive without doing anything illegal,” I ground out. “I was hired to keep you out of trouble, not to tell you how to make money.”
“Fine,” Mr. Whitmore huffed angrily. “We won’t hire humans, but this means I’ll have to rework my budget.”
“Did you have any other legal questions?” I asked, wondering if he’d ever considered the fact that he paid me by the hour, so these weekly conversations were costing him a fortune.
“No, I believe that will be all for this week,” Mrs. Whitmore said. “Shall we plan on the same time next week?”
“I’ll email my assistant to see if the time is open,” I said, because both office assistants got more than a little scary when I scheduled my own appointments without consulting them. “She’ll confirm the time with you when she gets in later today.”
“Fine,” Mr. Whitmore said, sounding annoyed that I wasn’t giving him an answer now.
I looked up to find Allie standing in the doorway dressed in faded jeans and a red hoodie.
“I’ll talk to you next week,” I added before ending the call and logging my hours.
“Good morning,” Allie said somewhat shyly when I finished and stood from my desk.
“It is now.” I crossed the room to pull her into my arms and kiss her. What I wanted to do was kiss her so hard and long that she wrapped her legs around my waist and begged me to take her on my desk. Instead, I just brushed my lips against hers. “How are you feeling?”
“Hungry,” she admitted. “You really need to buy groceries.”
“I was thinking the same thing this morning,” I said. “How about if we grab some breakfast, and then we can pick up groceries?”
“Sure,” she agreed, pulling away from me. “Just as long as we aren’t going anywhere I need to dress up for.”
Seeing Allie dressed casually with no makeup on took my breath away. “You know, I thought you were the sexiest woman I’d ever seen when you walked into Trevor’s house that first night.” Damn! I really wanted her.
“I know that look, Dylan,” she said, and I blinked twice to clear my head.
“What look?” I asked innocently.
“You look like you want to bend me over your desk,” she accurately accused. “While that sounds fun, I’m hungry, and something tells me you’re squeezing breakfast and shopping in between meetings.”
Looking regretfully at the time, I realized she was right. “While I only have a couple more meetings today, my next one is in less than two hours.”
“I’ll grab my shoes and purse,” she said as she hurried out of the room.
My eyes remained on her cute ass as it swayed back and forth in her tight jeans. Oh, yeah, I definitely loved seeing Allie in jeans.