Page 37 of The CEO I Hate (The Lockhart Brothers #1)

MIA

I yawned and blinked away a wave of exhaustion. There was a headache knocking at the back of my skull, and I didn’t know if it was from being stuck in this room, the severe lack of sugar in my system, or if Lyle had finally made me burst an aneurysm.

“Am I boring you?” Lyle asked, voice heavy with sarcasm.

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “No, but I don’t think Cade’s character would say that. He sees the best in people, but he’s not naive, and right now he’s coming across as foolish.”

We were pulling a late night in the writers’ room, trying to make final tweaks on the penultimate episode, and I had clearly not caffeinated appropriately.

Even Ash was curled up in the corner near the snack table, half asleep, one ear twitching every time someone raised their voice.

He was the only reason the room didn’t feel completely soul-sucking right now.

“And you say I’m nitpicky,” Lyle pointed out.

He was. Very. “I’m just trying to stay consistent with the character. ”

“Consistency would have been keeping him in a supporting role.”

“He can’t just be eye candy,” Tanya said.

“Disagree,” Damien said, arching his eyebrow in a way that gave me the ick. “There’s nothing wrong with having someone around just to look good.”

Tanya glowered at him, but Damien hadn’t bothered to notice, trying to catch my eye.

“Fine, rewrite accepted,” Lyle said. “Use the previous dialogue.”

Jerome arched a single eyebrow but made the edits on his computer.

It was too easy. I narrowed my eyes. What was going on inside Lyle’s head? I was afraid to ask, given that I didn’t want to give him the chance to retract, so I hurried onto my next page of notes.

“I also think we need to add a bit more tension here, before the crew goes out on their call. Maybe we have the captain hesitate before giving the order.”

“Oh, yes,” Kait said. “Like he’s second-guessing himself.”

Lyle leaned back, rubbing at his chin. “Tension is too heavy in this moment. The captain is the leader. He wouldn’t second-guess himself in front of the crew.”

“Might undermine his authority,” Damien said, grinning.

I resisted the urge to glare at him. Now was not the time to stir up shit in the writers’ room. I focused on Lyle instead, determined to get these notes hammered out so we could all go home.

“I don’t think this will come across as undermining him though. It’s about making the decision not to immediately rush into this fire, to save one of their own, feel even harder. We’ve established his confidence in the field, but this is personal for him. We need to dial up the internal conflict.”

Lyle grew quiet, tapping the side of his clenched jaw—his thinking face.

If I’d learned anything about Lyle since we’d started working together, it was that I had to be prepared to debate.

And that’s where most people got steamrolled because he could be an unpleasantly controlling jerk.

But he was genuinely brilliant, and he knew a good idea when he heard it.

Once we’d actually sat down to talk through my ideas, he’d admitted the choices I’d made for the first half of the season had kept the plotlines intact, which had surprised him. I’d taken that as a compliment even though he was still a massive perfectionist.

“No…” Lyle said after a beat. “Too much internal conflict now will detract from his reaction later. And we risk slowing the pace.” He nodded to himself. “This is a high-stakes moment; we need the action to roll.”

I nodded slowly, taking in his point. “I agree we don’t want the action to drag.

But I do think we need a line or two where he acknowledges the stakes.

What if we don’t have that happen in front of the whole crew but just with the lieutenant, right before they head off?

I think that better sets the tone of the next scene. ”

Lyle hummed, and I knew he could swing either way. I was starting to understand Lyle Clemmens—as horrifying as that thought was—and I was just stubborn enough to keep arguing for this story I believed in.

“I want to see the new dialogue before I agree,” Lyle said. “Make it good. Something that will twist our audience up in knots. If you can give me that, we might have something there.”

“One emotional gut punch coming up,” I said, already exhausted but committed to delivering, even if I didn’t know how I’d make the time.

The release date for the Heart and Hustle print run was coming up quickly, and I’d been trying to do as much promotion as I could, but it was hard to put together enough hours in the day, especially when nights in the writers’ room were running longer and longer.

Plus, I was still trying to find time to be with Liam, even if that meant sneaking around behind Jake’s back and keeping things coolly casual at the office.

“Feels like a good time to break for dinner,” Lyle said. “And then you can wow me with this new dialogue. See you all in thirty minutes.” He headed out the door. James and Damien followed him.

“We should have broken for dinner two hours ago,” Jerome yawned, getting to his feet. “I need sustenance if we’re going to be here this late.”

I sighed. If I couldn’t iron out this dialogue, we were never going to get through this episode—and it needed to be finished tonight to keep filming on schedule. Because if we didn’t keep filming on schedule, Liam was going to flip.

“You coming, Mia?”

“What?” I said, looking up.

“Pizza?” Jerome hovered in the doorway. Tanya and Kait were already gone. “It’ll be quick.”

“I’m good. You guys go ahead.”

“You want us to bring you something back?” he asked.

I shook my head. After going nine rounds with Lyle, I just wanted to sit quietly for a minute and go through my emails. “Nah, but thanks.”

Jerome nodded and disappeared, the room finally empty. Something from the snack table would tide me over until I could go home and raid the fridge. I opened my laptop and scanned my inbox.

There were a few blog requests for interviews about Heart and Hustle , so I responded to those while cramming the protein bar in my mouth.

I kept scanning, my eyes locking on an email from Damien.

The glob of chocolate protein in my mouth went down hard.

He must have sent this while Lyle and I were talking through the scene.

I almost groaned, thinking about what the email might contain. He’d been attempting to hit on me a lot recently, and it was creeping me the hell out. How many ways could a girl say she was not interested? What did I have to do, stamp the words across my forehead?

The door swung open and—speak of the damn devil—Damien walked in, holding a salad bowl and some neon green juice.

“Fancy seeing you here,” he said, shooting me a sleazy grin.

“I did say I was staying to work,” I muttered.

“Must be my lucky day.”

Oh, for the love of…If he started back up with the shitty pickup lines, I was going to lose it. My eyes dropped back to my screen, but the hairs on my arms stood as Damien walked around the table, skipping over his chair to sit right next to me.

He touched my shoulder, and it took everything inside me not to recoil. “You have to be eating more than that,” he said, gesturing to my makeshift dinner.

A soft growl rumbled from the corner. I glanced over. Ash was still sprawled by the snack table, but his head was up now, ears forward, eyes locked on Damien. His tail was still, no wagging. Damien didn’t notice.

“Take my salad,” he insisted.

“Really, I’m fine. If I wanted something, I would have gone and bought it myself. ”

“Hey,” he said, “you don’t have some crazy idea that you need to starve yourself to be attractive, do you? Because personally, I like a woman with some meat on her bones.”

His hand came up to pinch at my waist—and that right there was where I reached my limit. I’d tried being professional, I’d tried being a “team player,” I’d tried to go along to get along, but there was only so much I could take. I shot to my feet, the chair behind me knocking against the wall.

“Keep your hands off me,” I said, taking a step back.

Damien blinked at me, lip caught between his teeth, shaking his head slowly. “Oh, Mia. You’re the same feisty girl you always were. The way you’re always arguing with Lyle.” He stepped toward me; I stepped away. “You really know how to get a guy going, you know that?”

Ugh, had this guy totally slept through #MeToo?

Did he think we were still living back in the golden age of guys getting away with being absolute, unmitigated pieces of slime to women in the workplace?

And had it somehow escaped his notice that I had a higher rank here than him?

Or did he still see me as the college junior I’d been back when I’d taken his screenwriting class?

That girl had done a lot of growing up since then.

He, meanwhile, had regressed. He’d always been a creep, but at least his behavior had been mostly appropriate back then.

There were some tasteless jokes, some stares that lingered a little too long, but he’d gone more for subtext and innuendo.

Not these blatant passes, reeking of laughably unearned confidence.

What the hell had I ever done to make him think I was interested in one single thing he had to offer?

“We have to look out for each other,” Damien said. “It’s a tough business. It’ll wear you down. I know all about that. About how frustrating it can be.” He came closer. “But you know what you need? A little stress relief. ”

He reached for me, and I knocked his arm away. “I told you not to touch me, Damien.”

“Oh, c’mon, Mia. We’re old friends, right?” He flashed me another slimy smile. He reached out again, got his hand on my waist, his fingers clumsy and grasping.

“And I said no !” I shoved at his chest as hard as I could.

Damien stumbled back a step?—

—and Ash exploded out of the corner with a bark that was all teeth and fury. He planted himself between us, growling low and deep, the fur along his back standing straight up.

Damien froze. “Jesus,” he muttered, backing up another step.

There was movement out of the corner of my eye, and I turned to see Liam standing in the doorway, as furious as a bull about to charge. I’d never seen him so angry.

“Pack your shit,” he spat at Damien. “You’re fucking done here.

” He marched in, gritting his teeth so hard I could almost hear it.

“And you can forget about ever doing any work with VeriTV again—on this project, on any other project, on mopping our damn floors. You’re not welcome here in any capacity. ”

I took hold of the back of his shirt. I didn’t want him to do something stupid that might leave him open to a lawsuit or even assault charges.

It turned out I didn’t need to worry though.

He didn’t move in for a punch or anything like that.

He just planted his feet and stared Damien down.

“And forget about working with anyone we’re affiliated with. ”

Damien blustered, choking out his words. “You can’t treat me this way.”

Liam scoffed. When he spoke, his voice was ice cold and full of contempt. “I can and I will. Good luck trying to pitch that show to anyone now. Within the hour, every producer on this side of the country will know better than to take a meeting with you.”

The door opened again. “Lyle will have a thing or two to say about this,” Damien said, gesturing as Lyle walked in, confused at the sight in front of him.

Lyle glanced from Damien to me to Liam, then held his hand up dismissively. “Don’t get me involved in whatever this is.”

At that, Damien’s jaw dropped, as if he was finally realizing this might actually end badly for him.

“But…but…” he stammered, “you’re the one who brought me in! You wanted me here!”

“Because I thought I’d need help straightening out the mess the new writer had made of season two,” Lyle answered.

“But it wasn’t a mess after all.” He turned to look my way, nodding slightly.

“So,” he said, gesturing back to Damien, “looks like I don’t need you.

If you’ve screwed this gig up for yourself, that’s your problem.

I won’t be sticking my neck out for you. ”

“Why are you still standing here?” Liam snapped. He still hadn’t raised his voice, but I hadn’t missed the way his entire body coiled like a snake about to strike.

Damien grabbed his crap and marched through the door, staring Liam down. I half expected him to utter something ridiculous, like “you’ll be hearing from my lawyer,” but he probably knew better because he just left.

Liam was on the phone in an instant to security at the front desk. “Throw him out of the building,” he growled. “I don’t care if he lands in the Pacific. And he is never allowed in again, is that clear?”

Jerome, Kait, and Tanya walked through the door a moment later .

“So,” Jerome said. “We saw Damien walk out while we were walking in. He looked pissed.” He glanced around the room, noticing the tension. “Umm…What happened?”

Nobody said anything.

Ash let out a soft huff from where he’d settled near my feet, like even he was waiting to see what would happen next. His body was still tense, ears up, eyes tracking Liam. He hadn’t moved from his spot since Damien left. Like he wasn’t quite convinced the threat was over.

“Mia,” Liam snapped, hanging up his phone. “We need to talk. In my office. Now .”