CHAPTER TEN

Aurora's pov 

  I met up with Simone again for lunch in the company cafeteria and asked him about Mr Gregor.

 His face immediately paled when I mentioned that name and he nearly choked on his food.

 “Ugh! This is my fault Aurora, I  should have given you a heads up or something, it completely slipped my mind,” he said apologetically.

 He leaned closer and whispered in my ear.

“Well? How did the boss react?” 

 “He was very unreasonable, if I'm going to be honest…shooting me dirty glares whenever he thinks I'm not looking,” 

   He looked at me with wide eyes and then placed his hand on my shoulder. 

“Don't worry, you can confide in me. What did he really do?” 

  I was at a loss for words, “exactly what I just said,” I reaffirmed, “... that's not all, today I clocked in only 5 minutes late and he was already giving me an earful about it,”

 “You came late?” his eyes were like saucepans now. 

 “Yes,” I admitted, a little bit of shame trickling into my voice.

 “It's not like that was my intention or anything, the traffic was just completely horrendous and that was the best I could do,”

   Without his hand leaving my shoulder, Simeon said, “Are you sure that we're talking about Mr Quin right now? I can hardly believe he's capable of letting anyone off with just a slap on the wrist,”

 “He said he was going to the deduct from my salary, and the way he talks…it's just so condescending and–”

  I noticed that Simone's face suddenly looked quite frightened and paler than when I had mentioned Mr Gregor.

 Before I could ask him, a familiar voice penetrated my ear.

 “I'm condescending and–”

  Good thing I didn't have any food in my mouth yet if not I would have choked that very moment, I slowly turned around to see his frame behind me with a wickedly amused smile, except it lacked all the warmth and friendliness that a smile normally carried.

 “Mr Quin!” I called out almost in panic, “how long have you been behind me?”

 He buried his hands in one of his pockets. 

“Long enough to hear all of your flowery descriptions of me, but don't stop yet keep going, it looked like you had a lot to say a moment ago,”

   I turned around hoping for some kind of support from Simone just to see that he had vacated his sitting position next to me and apparently left the cafeteria altogether.

 “Coward,” I whispered below my breath, he didn't even get to explain why Mr Quin disliked Mr Gregor so much.

   “Ehmmm, Mr Quin. We're going to be late for your meeting if we spend any more time here,”

 I said sprinting up to my feet with this awful feeling hanging above my head telling me that I had forgotten something, it only clicked after I followed him outside at the cafeteria and my stomach turned with hunger.

   Oh no, I hadn't taken a bite from my food!

 It was already too late to go back, so I decided to nip my hunger in the bud. I was used to starving myself anyways to make ends meet so this wouldn't be really different. 

    The elevator ride seemed to take forever and just when I thought that nothing could be worse than the thick silence that held the air, a handful of people rolled into the elevator leaving me backed into a corner.

   When I looked up there was this unfamiliar face looking down at me with a creepy cheeky smile.

 “Hey, princess, you look really good,”

 I looked away, trying to pretend that his breath wasn't about to send me to the great beyond. 

“Thanks for the compliment,”

 

“Let's exchange numbers, do you work here?”

“Actually, she does.” I saw Mr Quin's fingers grab the man's shoulder and pull him aside like a ragdoll. 

 He looked down at the man's employee ID, “but I'm afraid you don't anymore, Joe. Good luck on finding a job in this city,”

  He reached out without looking and grabbed my finger, entangling it with his own and pulling me along with him as we stepped out of the elevator on the next floor while *Joe* remained in the elevator when it went down.

   “Mr Quin?” I called out as he hadn't let go of my hand once even as we stepped into his office.

 “Mr Quin!” I called out again, louder this time and it seemed to finally catch his attention.

 “What is it?” He turned around to face me.

  “Your hand,” he looked at our entangled fingers and released me in a snap.

 He had his hands crossed.

“Somebody could have seen us holding hands like that,” I said cautiously reminding him about his own arrangement for us to keep our *relationship* out of the office.

 Back there he had been Xander, not my tyrannical boss Mr Quin.

 “They wouldn't make a big deal out of that, don't worry,” 

 I brushed my fingers, trying to wipe off the traces of warmth still left from where he had touched.

 “...More importantly…” I could tell from his tone alone that he was about to complain. “That man was obviously harassing you? Why didn't you call for me or at least accost him yourself?”

 I brushed my side awkwardly.

“It didn't come to mind,” I admitted honestly, it really hadn't. All my life, I've always let people walk over me like a doormat. Truly speaking up for myself was a foreign concept compared to just begrudgingly swallowing mistreatment.

 “Are you really going to fire him?” I asked.

 “I'm going to blacklist him too, he'll be lucky if anyone hires him to clean toilets,” 

“But why? It was me who he offended, right?”

 “You don't know what he did wrong?” He asked me as if it couldn't be more obvious.  

 “No,” I said, shaking my head.

 “Then that's an assignment for you,” he said, clasping his palms together, “I want the answer before you clock out,” he said, then turned to breezingly walking over to his desk while I stared at him dumbfounded.

  I made my way to the door and there was a man waiting. There was a middle aged man with thick beards and a conspicuous golden tooth that he showed off with all confidence when he laid eyes on me.

 I turned around to look at Mr Quin and said;” Sir, Mr Gregor is here,”