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“Assuming you still want it,” I add, nudging her to say something.
Penelope shakes herself and nods enthusiastically. “Yes! I mean… yes. Yes, I still want it. Thank you so much, Mr. Sterling. You have no idea what this means to me. That you’re willing to take a chance on me. Thank you.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I smile back at her. “I think you’re going to do good work for us, Ms. Dalton. Let me just send Sienna a message that she can take down the job listing, and she’ll get you all your paperwork to fill out and everything.”
“Of course. And I really can start today, if you need me.”
“No, no, I was kidding about that. You’ll start on Monday, if that works for you.”
“Monday would be perfect.”
“Perfect. Then there’s only one thing left to do. Well, two things.” I stand up and come around the desk, watching Penelope scramble to get up as well. She watches me as I approach her, her pale throat bobbing as she swallows.
I hold out my hand for her shake, offering her a warm grin. “Welcome to the team, Ms. Dalton.”
She blinks at me for a split second and then takes my hand in hers in a strong grip. “Thank you so much.”
“Thank me by living up to how well you sold yourself in this interview.”
“I will,” she promises. “You said there were two things left to do?”
“I did. The second thing is that I need to introduce you to the others.”
“The… others?”
“Dominic and Tristan, the other two Alphas who run the company.”
“Oh.” Her eyes go wide for a bit, but then she squares her shoulders and nods at me, making me like her even more.
We take the elevator down to the third floor, where I already know we’ll find Dominic and Tristan in one of the conference rooms. The two of them are supposed to be having a meeting about a client, but it’s not surprising when we approach the door and hear raised voices spilling out into the hall.
Penelope glances at me, like she’s unsure, and I shrug and push the door open. If she’s going to work here, she’s going to have to get used to Dominic and Tristan going at it this way.
“You put two Alphas in a room together,” I murmur to her, startling a smile out of her.
“That’s idiotic,” Dominic is saying. Yelling, more like it. “That’s not how this works at all, and you know it.”
“And I’m telling you that for this it’s going to have tobecomehow it works,” Tristan fires back. “Or do you want to explain to the client that we have to give them their money back?”
“So we just let them walk all over us now? Is that how we’re doing this?”
Tristan just gives Dominic a look that says everything it needs to say about that.
Before Dominic can get himself worked up to yelling more, I break into their argument. “Wednesdays, am I right?” I ask, glancing between the two of them.
Tristan sighs, rubbing a hand over his scarred face, but Dominic turns to look at me, glaring. “What do you want, Xavier? We’re in the middle of a meeting.”
“I just wanted to introduce you both to Penelope Dalton,” I tell them, stepping aside so they can see the woman behind me. “I’ve found us a new assistant.”
That stops Dominic and Tristan up short, and they both turn to look at Penelope.
Chapter 3
Penelope
My head is spinning, and it feels like so much has happened in the last ten or so minutes. Can it really have only been that long?
I went from being sure I was going to have to walk out of this office building in shame, resigned to another night of sifting through job listings and trying to arrange the meager offerings of my resume into something more attractive just to get my foot in the door, to… this.