The Alpha King Call Boy
Chapter 103

Fiona

It had not been a lie that I was nervous about the impromptu and mysterious meeting that Conrad had requested with me. I was.

It had been a half-truth, though. A half answer to Alexander's question about what was troubling me.

I texted Nina again on my way in to the office, just to check in on her.

She replied: I'm totally fine, Fi. Pleeeease stop worrying about me.

It was a tough thing to do, but I told her I'd try.

At breakfast the previous morning, Nina had confessed that she'd had an unsettling incident after work a few nights before. I could tell that she had not been looking forward to telling me about it - she knew I was about to be horrified - so she kind of spat the story out quickly.

A customer at the club had gotten handsy with her and the bouncer kicked him out. After her shift was over, though, the guy appeared in the parking lot, apparently waiting for her. (I think all the blood drained from my face as she told me this part.) But because the bouncer had been walking her out, he spotted the creep before anything else could happen. And I guess beat the guy to pieces.

I was terribly worried for Nina now. I'd had my suspicions about her work being unsafe, but now I knew for sure that it was.

A couple things allowed me to not absolutely lose my mind over the whole thing. For starters, Nina was giving her notice at the club. She had a lead on some other work. "More on that later," she'd said. And she also revealed that she had a new hobby. The bouncer that had intervened with the stalker.

She'd been trying not to smile the whole time she talked about Ryker, which told me there was a little more going on with this guy than was typical for her. I guess they'd hooked up after the incident, and had been spending all their free time together since.

I still worried about her, of course. But the thought of her having, essentially, a bodyguard was enough comfort to mostly leave her alone about it.

Fortunately, Conrad did not keep me waiting on our rendezvous all day. After the morning meeting was over, he signaled for me to follow him to his office.

He closed the door behind us while I took my usual seat across from his big mahogany desk.

"So what can I do for you, Conrad?" I was eager to get on with this.

"Fiona," he said rather seriously, lowering his tall frame down into his big leather office chair. "You have been performing remarkably well in your short time here."

Conrad got to see a genuine smile. He'd surprised it out of me.

"Thank you. That means a lot. I'm pleased that I'm bringing value to the role."

A smile crept up one side of his mouth. Alexander had a very similar half-smile he did when he was feeling smug. He and his uncle Conrad did not look alike, per se- their coloring was completely different, and Alexander was built more like his father - but they did occasionally exhibit some uncanny family resemblances.

Suddenly Conrad stood, pushing back his rolling chair. He retrieved a lacrosse ball out of a drawer and began to pace the room slowly.

"I need to go out of town for a while," he said. "And I'd like to task you with running the morning all-staff meetings while I'm gone."

"Oh. Okay. I'd be happy to cover that for you. And anything else you need. How long will you be gone?"

He tossed the ball straight up in the air. Snatched it with an overhand grab as it fell. Then started doing that in a regular pattern. "At least one week. Maybe longer, depending on circumstances. I will keep you updated several days in advance if I need more time." Wow. This was a lot of responsibility.

"I know you still have a lot on your plate with the expansion," Conrad went on. "But looking at the reports you turned in last week, it appears everything is well underway. At this point you'll just be keeping tabs on the progress as the project nears completion." "That's true." I suppose the easing of my (still very demanding) project was to credit for the bit of extra free time I'd had on hand recently.

I felt very relieved to have my new home office in place before I got this news. Because it was going to mean a lot more work. I'd need hours to prepare for each of these meetings. And though I loved a challenge, leaving the office before sunset was highly preferable over pulling all my long hours on-site.

"So? You up for it?" Conrad grinned at me because he already knew the answer.

"Yes," I confirmed. "Absolutely. I look forward to it."

"Wonderful. We can discuss all the details tomorrow. I'll be leaving Thursday night. Thursday at the morning meeting, I'll announce our arrangement to the group."

The group that attended the morning meetings on the eighty-ninth floor consisted of many very important people. It was a wonder to me that Conrad wanted me, the newest and least senior of all the executive-level employees, to assume any sort of leadership role within such an elite group. He might have sensed my insecurity despite my best efforts to present only absolute confidence. Because he added, before I left his office, a comment about seeing a unique potential in my ability to drive high standards.

It might have been the most meaningful compliment I'd ever received.

The next couple of days flew by.

I was in the office at six a.m. and out at five p.m. like clockwork each day.

The late-night work-from-home life was a new part of my reality. Because I was doing more than just a few hours of extra work daily. The task Conrad had given me was even more involved, I came to replace as he worked with me to prepare, than I could have imagined. There was a lot of reading required before I could even start writing out the meeting agendas. A LOT. It was easier reading for the CEO, of course. He had been looking at these types of reports and documents daily for decades. It took me probably ten times longer to complete all the reading than it did for him. Or more than that.

But being able to do a good portion of this extra work in the comfort of our bedroom was a big help. A break for a proper dinner (not eaten at my desk while reading) and some physical attention from Alexander - these things were critical. After spending the whole day in the office, that couple of hours with my Alpha refreshed me from head to toe, so that I could afterward return to work with a sharper mind. And without shoes.

I did slip into wondering, at times, about how Alexander was spending his days while I was at work. This wasn't something I used to care enough about to let my mind linger on. But knowing, now, that Iris was there at the palace when I was not, and that he was spending at least some of his time with her regularly - it was unpleasant to imagine.

But the situation Iris had come here to help with was very, very important to him. The fact that she was so annoying was just something I had to tolerate.

And I knew that he was thinking about me when we were apart. I knew this from the texts he sent me, the notes and surprises he still intermittently had delivered to my office, and the way he was always waiting for me eagerly when I returned to the palace in the evenings.