"Of course," I grind out, holding out my hand to Lex. He stands there for several seconds, completely frozen. It's not the answer either of us was expecting. The moms and Maxi are going to freak out. Oh well. Just because I'm going to be wearing this ring and doing Lex a favor by saving face in front of these a.s.sholes doesn't mean I have to actually marry him. I mean, even if we do keep dating, we could just stay 'engaged' for like five years.

Lex takes the ring from the box and slips it onto my left hand. We make eye contact and a thrill whispers through my body. Not at the engagement ring or a wedding or any of that I don't really care about it to be honest with you but at the look in Lex's eyes. He's ... gorgeous, yes, but he's also ... interested in me. Interested in getting to know me. I can see that burning there behind his steel gaze.

"This is just ridiculous," Lara snorts, shaking her head and touching her fingers to her perfect hair. "I came all the way over here to be insulted."

"The only person here who should be insulted is Lex," I say, withdrawing my hand and crossing my arms over my chest again. The ring feels like it weights a million pounds, but I choose not to look down at it, keeping my attention on the crowd in front of me. At least Grandpa Art looks happy about the situation. "And maybe me considering the insults and the disdain that's being thrown my way." I pause. "Okay, and also probably Claudia since you used her to get information. I think that about covers the range of insults being thrown here. You really weren't one of them."

Lara looks at me like I'm sc.u.m, but I don't care. Her opinion really doesn't mean anything to me. She digs around in her purse and withdraws a pair of sungla.s.ses that probably cost more than my car.

"Congratulations, Lex. I hope you realize the mistake you just made." Lara spins on her heel and exits my office with a flourish, pink suit flashing as she storms away and heads directly for the elevators. Once again, I catch sight of Maxi mouthing something like is that an effing ring as her eyes bulge out of her head. The door swings shut, leaving me with the Lyndons. Right now, though, there's only one Lyndon I really want to talk to.

"Congratulations, Alexander," his grandfather says, apparently satisfied that our pending nuptial solves the current problem just as well as a payoff. He gives me another hug which I return, trying my best to remain genuine when I feel like this whole thing's kind of a sham. The marriage part maybe, but not the way Lex looked at you. Art gives his grandson a hug which Lex awkwardly returns before leaving the room. I refuse to look at Maxi again.

Allan stares Lex down for an entire minute before shaking his head and leaving without another word.

Silence descends as I look up at Lex, my heart pounding in the awkward quiet.

"Lex, we need to talk."

I feel nauseous, standing there in the suddenly silent office with Olivia's green eyes boring into my skull. My mouth is dry and my fingers won't stop twitching. Yes, I spent all of Sunday getting her dress for the symphony prepared, the shoes, my matching tie. But then I saw that ring. The richness of the ruby complimented the red soles of the Louboutin heels I picked out, the ones I'm absolutely desperate to feel against my skin while we're f.u.c.king. It matched the silk of the ties I had made, that even now are sitting in the trunk of my car.

I grind my teeth together and let my eyes shift to the side, giving up control of the situation to Olivia.

"Lex." I stare at a photograph of her mothers that hangs in a gold frame next to her bookshelf. Olivia's office says everything about her while mine, mine says nothing at all about me. It still has my father's stamp on it. Something that I intend to change if I survive today's board meeting. "Lex."

I take a deep breath and look back at Olivia. Since I stopped looking at her, she's changed her gaze to the ring, staring at it like it's a foreign object, something she's never seen before. She looks mildly uncomfortable, not at all as I'd intended. My initial plan had been to wait for Friday, present her with the dress and the shoes, the private box with the best view. Not that I expected any of these things to impress Olivia, but I thought they would at least add a sense of whimsy to the occasion. I was going to wait until after the music had started, but just barely, when the three French horns began to play the wolf's part in Peter's story. My fingers would curl around hers and hopefully she'd return the gesture. I'd pull away slowly and slide my hand up her thigh, using the slit in the dress to find her heat. In my mind's eye, she'd be hot and bothered. I'd touch her wet heat and maybe she'd return the favor, we'd f.u.c.k, and then I'd sweep her away and out the doors, before the mingling and the backstabbing and the business talk began.

I'd take her back to my place and we'd visit the rooftop garden again. I'd try my best to explain myself without comparing her to an investment property and maybe just maybe she'd accept the ring from me. That was the plan. I had a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon waiting, along with another princess cake. A little cheesy, much cliched, hopelessly romantic. It's the best that I know how to do, given the circ.u.mstances. A little rushed, some might say, but I was serious when I told her that when I've spotted something I want, I go for it. Granted, Olivia isn't the type of woman to be bought with diamonds and romantic gestures, but I was hoping at the very least that she'd feel the honesty in my intentions.

My family has derailed everything.

Now my gesture really feels rushed, broken out of me in anger instead of ... I think hard about the word I'm looking for. Love? Is that what this is?

"Lex."

Olivia's staring at me again.

I swallow three times before my throat's moist enough that I can actually speak.

"I apologize. This wasn't how I intended to ask."

"But you did," Olivia says, dropping her hands by her sides, "intend to ask, I mean. On Friday. Friday, Lex? Three weeks after meeting me?"

"Three weeks after discovering you." I rephrase the statement and try to figure out how to best explain myself. "I'm thirty-four years old, Olivia. I know what I want." She purses her lips at me and I almost smile.

"I'm not a prize, Lex, or a property that's up for sale. I'm a person. You can't just decide you want me and then bam, change your mind later. That's the point of dating. You get to know someone and you spend time with them and you decide if you want to create a partnership to tackle life with. The dating process occurs so that hopefully you figure out compatibility issues sooner rather than later."

"I thought dating was about love," I blurt and then have to pause and straighten my tie. The purple silk in my fingers makes me think of the black dress I had made custom, on a rush order of course, for Olivia. It's black silk, form fitting, with a plunging neckline that I intended to brighten up with the addition of a red tie the same kind she tied around my face and slipped between my lips. I was going to wear the same one. We'd have been a matching pair of black and red. I suppose we still will, even if I get dethroned at the board meeting. I can still take Olivia to the symphony, provided she doesn't throw the ring back at me and disappear from this office forever. It sounds like something she might actually do.

Her face blanches and a moment later, the door opens and her blonde friend Maxi is standing there, mouth agape and pale green eyes twinkling.

"Ring. Lex. What the h.e.l.l?" she asks, looking between the two of us. "I called the moms to ask if they knew anything about this, but they said they didn't, so I'm a.s.suming this is kind of a spur of the moment thing?"

"Maxi," Olivia says, her chest heaving with emotion what kind, I'm not sure. That makes me nervous. "Can Lex and I have a minute? I'll tell you all about it as soon as we're done."

"Oookay," her friend says, looking around my shoulder and up at my face. "But I need all the deets, Olivia. The moms and I had a bet going where they said you'd never get married because you hated the inst.i.tution so much, and I said you would because you're actually a hopeless romantic deep, deep, deep down. If this is what it looks like, they each owe me a hundred bucks." Maxi disappears and the sound of the door closing behind her echoes loudly in the office.

Olivia clears her throat and turns away from me, moving over to the window and staring out at the gray-blue sky.

"Love?" she asks the question like she's trying to come up with an answer to it that makes sense. The only problem is that it's a complex question with no single right answer, if any. An enigma. I run my tongue over my lower lip. "You came to me to get beat up and dominated and now ... you're in love with me?" Olivia chokes on the word and shakes her head. "I won't lie, Lex. I'm a little out of my comfort zone right now."

I move up to stand beside her and we exchange another look.

"Being in love is not a death sentence," I tell her, a strange thrill cutting through my stomach, making me wonder if that's what this is really about. Love. Do I love Olivia? I think about this for a moment. She's infuriating, c.o.c.ky, headstrong, bossy. After a moment, I decide the answer is yes. "I'm in love with you, Olivia."

She groans and spins away, putting her back against the window and sinking down to the office carpet with her legs outstretched.

"Don't say that," she groans, but I did and it's too late. I'm not taking it back. I wouldn't, even if I could. "Lex, come on. You are not in love with me."

"How do you know that?" I ask, sitting down on the floor next to her. Olivia slams her palm against her face and shakes her head.

"I only said I'd marry you because Lara Caliper was looking at me like I was dog c.r.a.p that needed to be sc.r.a.ped off the bottom of her designer shoes. And because your dad called me a wh.o.r.e. That is it, Lex. I "

Olivia gets interrupted by the sound of the door opening. A moment later, my grandfather's face appears above the desk. He smiles down at us in that strange way he always did when I was a kid and he caught me doing something my father would've beaten my a.s.s with a belt for. Only Grandpa never told him about those situations, not once. I imagine this is a similar situation.

"Lex, I pulled some favors with the other board members. Your father's not going to be happy about it, but that's too d.a.m.n bad." He nods his chin at Olivia. "I like this girl much better than Lara Caliper. Granted, that would've been a match made in heaven for the company, but I imagine it would've have gone over so well for you. I don't want you to end up like me and your father, Lex. Don't run away from situations that make you uncomfortable or twist you up inside or you'll end up like me, bitter and alone."

"Art," I begin, but he waves me off and smiles at us again.

"I don't want to hear it. Just keep on doing what you're doing, and I'll see you at the board meeting. I just wanted to let you know that your position's secure as long as I'm alive and ticking. And don't worry about Lara spilling your secret. I have enough dirt on that family to write a dossier." He grunts and disappears, the sound of his footsteps shuffling across the carpet. Once we're finally alone again, I love back over at Olivia.

"This is just the beginning, Olivia, and you don't have to marry me if you don't want to. Keep the ring. Don't stop working here. Keep that open invitation to my place. If you do that, I think that eventually you'll feel what I feel. Maybe you're just not capable of being romantic?" I goad her, trying to get a bite of that righteous indignation that comes out when we're together. We do arguments oh so well.

"I can be romantic," Olivia scoffs, looking back at me from her emerald eyes. "I can romance the s.h.i.t out of anything." I smirk at her and she frowns at me.

"So you'll stay?"

"Well, I'm not running," she says firmly. "And we can still date, provided you don't try to take me to Fisherman's Wharf. Friends don't let friends visit Fisherman's Wharf." I laugh as Olivia gets up on her knees and scoots closer to me, looking me in the eye with a narrowed gaze.

"This ring, this marriage thing, I don't know about it. But I'll give it a try. n.o.body ever accused me of being afraid to try new things." She looks down at the ruby. "If I can embrace Craig's commitment celebration, I think I can handle this. I think both situations are weird, and I don't understand either, but I'm willing to keep an open mind. The moms, at least, taught me that much."

"Will you say it for me?" I ask, reaching out and taking her hand, pulling her into my lap and brushing her hair back. "Just once." Olivia purses her lips.

"I don't know, Lex," she starts, shaking her head, red hair fluttering around her face. I wait patiently for several minutes, staring into her eyes, holding her gaze, communicating without words. After a while, she sighs. "Look, Lex, you're a d.i.c.k. This is a fact that can't be sugarcoated, denied, or contemplated. It just is. You are an a.s.shole." She holds up her finger before I can protest. "But ... I guess for now, at least, you can be my a.s.shole. How's that?"

"Cheating. But that's okay. If you can't say it, I understand. It takes courage to say I love you." She glares at me again and grits her teeth. We both notice that since she's straddled me, I'e become harder than a rock.

"I know you're using reverse psychology on me, but I don't care." Olivia takes a deep breath, closes her eyes and then sighs again. "I ... " Her face twists into a painful expression. I open my mouth to tell her that it's okay, that I don't even need to hear it when she blurts it out. "I love you, Lex Lyndon. Gah!" Olivia lifts her hands up and wipes at her tongue like it's been contaminated. "That was so gross."

"And unbelievably attractive. Miss Ashcraft, I hope you have horribly unflattering cotton panties under that skirt because I think we need a celebratory moment." I lean forward and taste her lips. She kisses me right back, winding her tongue with mine, leaning her body into me. "If you want to stab me with your high heels, I wouldn't be opposed," I whisper as I pull back an inch. Olivia's hot breath stirs my hair as she closes her and eyes and sighs. I think she's going to tell me no, to get out of her office and leave her alone for the rest of the day.

She doesn't.

"Let me make sure the door's locked this time. I don't need another repeat of what happened in my brother's girlfriend's bathroom."

So Olivia locks the door and we lock bodies and although everything isn't perfect, it is exciting. There's love, and the promise of love, and a boss who's been tamed (almost).

I can't wait to see what tomorrow will bring.

If it happens to be Olivia's high heel in my back, all the better.

If you enjoyed "Taming Her Boss", you might like C.M. Stunich's stand-alone Paranormal Romance novel, "h.e.l.l Inc.".

It's never easy to deal with supernatural creatures, especially when they've got the IQ of a doormat. And the clerk behind the counter wasn't your typical teenage drop out. Nope. This one was a special one. He glared at me with his one eye (which just happened to be lazy and seemed to be staring at the ridiculously bright fluorescent lights above my head instead of at my drowsy face) while I questioned him as to the whereabouts of a very specific item. I was looking for black candles. Spooky, huh? But that's what the newspaper ad had specified and so, that's what I was going to get.

"Um," the clerk, who I suspected was probably a Cyclops, mumbled under his garlic scented breath. It was so bad that I actually had to take a step away from him, press my spine against a display of cheap romance novels, and choke back a sob. His breath was so terrible, in fact, that I thought I saw a puff of green float out past his thin lips and join the CFC ga.s.ses in destroying the ozone layer. "I think we've got some Glade Flameless Candles in the clearance aisle. They're eggplant purple, but they look black." I tried not to scowl. The Cyclops didn't know what I needed them for. I thanked him politely and wandered off. Served me right for trying to go to Target for dark arts supplies.

I found the aisle my halitosis challenged friend had been talking about and stared at the little white boxes with their red clearance stickers. Yeah, I thought sourly, feeling defeated before I'd even begun. That's what the Devil wants, candles without flames. In eggplant. Fantastic. I scooped several of the boxes into my basket anyway and tried to ignore the pixies that were swooping and giggling and pulling my mussy hair. If I swatted at them, if I paid them the tiniest bit of attention, then they would do worse. Had done worse. Focus, attention, belief, it was what made them real. When a girl and her mother sauntered into the aisle, tossing their identical peroxide manes and glaring at my ripped jeans and my faded Shrek T-shirt, they walked right through them.

The pixies giggled and darted towards their shopping basket, shedding sticky glitter dust all over the white linoleum as they heaved a packet of pens out, twiggy arms straining with the effort, and dropped them on the floor. The mother picked them up absently, hardly noticing what she was doing. I sighed. How nice it would be to live so ignorantly. To not know that anything other than humans walked this world. I squinted my gaze at the shelf and tried not to kick something. It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair.

But this was why I was doing this. Following the directions in this stupid ad. I picked at my pants pocket until I found the crumbled square of newsprint. As I reread it, I couldn't help but have terrible flashbacks to Brendan Fraser and Bedazzled. But he'd been stupid. He hadn't been clear with his wishes. I would be. I'd rattle 'em off like the best of bureaucrats. The key was to be specific. Very, very specific. I mouthed the words aloud as I walked, swinging my basket and trying to stay positive.

"WANTED: Souls. Single adults only. We are a professional organization looking for talented persons of marriageable age to enter into a trade agreement. Willing to offer three wishes in exchange for a signed contract. Please contact us at our office by arranging three black candles into a semi-circle in front of a mirror. Anoint with blood. Recite address. h.e.l.l Incorporated, 666 Gladiola Lane. This solicitation posted by the Devil. No sales inquiries. Offer ends 08/16."

Okay, so it sounded shady and well, just plain bizarre, but I was getting desperate. Two years out of high school had left me with a c.r.a.ppy apartment and a c.r.a.ppier job. I had no friends (except for Erin, but I didn't even really like her), my family was too busy to ever come and see me (and I never went to see them either, I know, I know), and I had absolutely no romantic prospects of which to speak. Well, there was this guy that worked at our local museum, William T. Smidden's Palace of History, that was pretty smoking hot, but I knew I didn't stand a chance. He always had this group of people swarming around like he was the queen bee, buzzing and nodding and kissing his a.s.s. He was young with sandy hair and a strong jaw and pale eyes that shimmered like the aquamarine jewel on my pinky finger. I raised my hand to my lips and gave the ring a light kiss, pretending for just a moment that it was that man's mouth, confident and strong.

I was so entranced in my thoughts that I forgot about the pixie dust and ended up slipping, rather comically, my legs flying out from under me, worn rubber soles of my shoes parallel with the ceiling for just a moment before I ended up slamming into the floor so hard that I was seeing stars. I knew it was bad because the stars weren't just spots of light; they were yellow and smiling and singing the theme song to My Little Pony.

The Cyclops I had spoken with earlier raced towards me, red vest flapping, as he pounded over to me and knelt quickly, waving a hand in front of my face and asking a bunch of stupid questions that I wouldn't have known the answer to even if I hadn't just given myself a concussion.

I waved him away but ended up with the store manager and several rubber necking customers surrounding me, jabbering away, and making my head spin while the pixies laughed and sprinkled more of their sparkling c.r.a.p over my face and arms. I'd be visible from s.p.a.ce for the next week. I groaned and sat up while the manager sweated and mumbled things about lawsuits. I rubbed my head and pointed at my basket, just wanting to get the heck out of there.

"I won't sue you," I said, pointing at the candles and trying not to drool. "But can I have these for free?" The manager licked his lips and nodded. This is too easy, my brain tried to convince me. Ask for more. "And do you happen to have any chicken blood?"

A half an hour later, I was strolling out the automatic doors of the Super Target and mouthing the lyrics to some pop song that I only actually knew half the words to. They hadn't had any chicken blood, but they had given me several containers of chicken hearts. There seemed to be quite a bit of b.l.o.o.d.y residue sloshing about in the bottom of the Styrofoam containers, so I decided that would count. It would have to. It was getting late, and today was the sixteenth, the last day for me to try the spell.

I trudged up the rickety, cement steps to my apartment and tried to ignore the permanent smell of moth b.a.l.l.s and dog urine that seemed to permeate the dreary hallway. My neighbor, Gene, a lady of questionable age with a sneer as sharp as cheddar and a smell to match, kicked open her door and proceeded to glare at me as I fumbled around with my keys. She always did that. Opened her door and stared at me. I think on some deep level that she recognized that there was something different about me. Sometimes people did. Though they never seemed to be able to get what that was. If only I felt confident enough in my own sanity to share the simple fact that I could see things that they didn't. I sighed and managed to get into the eight hundred square foot s.h.i.t hole before Gene began shouting. She did that, too, sometimes. But that was only because she was crazy. She shouted at everyone: the super, the PG&E guy, the mail lady. That act wasn't just reserved for me.

I slammed the door behind me, locked it, handle, dead bolt, chain, always in that order, and headed immediately for my bedroom. If I was going to meet the Devil, I was going to do it in style.

I found a slinky, skin tight dress as red as a hooker's lipstick, and since I'd bought it used at Goodwill, probably something that had actually been worn by a hooker, and paired that with some black pumps and a quick slash of eyeliner. I grinned at myself in the wavy mirror that hung crookedly on the back of my bedroom door. I was as hot as a book cover bimbo. Perfect. I fluffed my black bob, punctuated by neon streaks of pumpkin-bright orange, courtesy of Punky Colour, and sashayed into the bathroom. I was in a better mood than the day I'd bought my Rabbit Habit, though not by much.

The candles, once I'd taken them out of eight, stiff, plastic layers of protection and about a dozen twist ties, looked absolutely ridiculous arranged around the edge of the porcelain sink in my bathroom. They flickered weakly, the cheap lights inside dimming and brightening in a pathetic imitation of a true candle. I frowned at them as I opened the plastic top to the chicken hearts. They smelled gamey and a little bit like iron, leaving a heavy, metallic burn in the back of my throat.

"G.o.d," I choked as I dipped two fingers into the cold, watery bird blood. My spine bucked involuntarily as I rubbed the runny ooze down the side of one candle, and then the next, and the next. Let's just say it didn't get any easier or any less disgusting.

After I was finished, I tossed the unused hearts into the bathroom garbage can and sc.r.a.ped anything resembling so much as a fingerprint off of my skin in an attempt at cleansing myself. Once I had decided that liquid soap, a squirt of shampoo, and half a travel sized bottle of Purell would just about do it, I was ready to begin.

I flicked the lights off and grabbed the newspaper sc.r.a.p off its temporary home on the back of the toilet. I squinted at the words which were incredibly difficult to read in the flickering light and took a deep breath.

"h.e.l.l Incorporated," I began, trying to pitch my voice low so that it came out as eery and mysterious as possible. "666 Gladiola Lane." I set the newspaper down on the edge of the sink next to one of the plastic eggplant monstrosities and waited. And waited. And waited.

Nothing happened.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n it," I screeched at myself, fighting back tears and gripping the sides of the mirror with a frenzied fervor. "Why do I do this to myself?"

I had a tendency to get really, really involved in things that most people could tell weren't going to work out for the best. It was one of my special talents. I punched the mirror once, in a juvenile fight of rage, cracking the gla.s.s and cutting my hand open along with it. Tiny droplets of red dripped into the sink and swirled down the drain, turning the residual water a pinkish color and staining the edges of the white porcelain.

"Ah, h.e.l.l," I cursed, unaware of the swirling black vortex beneath my feet. "I'm going to need st.i.tches."

And then I was falling down a hole, screaming like a B-list actress in a horror movie, until I found myself landing face first onto some terribly itchy, navy carpeting. I pushed myself up quickly, tugging down my dress in the back in an attempt to cover my a.s.s, before taking a look around.

My exploration ended before it even got started because the very first thing I saw was the demon.

And he was p.i.s.sed.

I gazed at it through the thick gla.s.s of the display case. There the necklace sat, in a bed of blue velvet, glimmering in the store's soft, yellow overhead lighting. In that "Have you ever considered yourself to be lacking in propriety?" asked the demon at the front desk; orange eyes glared at me over wire rimmed spectacles. "I said, how may I help you?" He was drumming his long, red fingernails on the polished mahogany of his desktop and clutching a book in the other hand. I had the feeling that that was at least the third time he'd asked me that very same question. I took a deep breath and blew a puff of hot air out and up in an utterly worthless attempt at getting the hair away from my eyes.

"Well, can't you see I'm about to have a panic attack here?" I retorted weakly and wiped the sweat from my brow. The demon shrugged and turned his fiery gaze back to his book. I studied him carefully for a moment. He didn't seem as if he were about to pounce on me. He was situated quite comfortably on one of those ridiculous exercise b.a.l.l.s in a horrifyingly bright shade of fuchsia. His wings, which lined his back in two pairs of three, spread out behind him like black shadows, creeping across the white walls from one corner of the room to the other. I continued to stare at him until I was absolutely, one hundred percent certain that I was safe, at least for the moment, and let my gaze sweep the room. Okay, so I was wholly and utterly responsible for bringing myself to this place, wherever the h.e.l.l (was this really h.e.l.l or just a place named after it?) it was, but it couldn't hurt to at least check the room out.

It was a normal enough office with its row of plastic chairs, outdated magazines, and an excessive array of indoor ficus trees. The one thing that did stand out to me however was a single row of portraits that bordered the beige wall above a small bookcase. I took a step closer and peered at the bright photos tucked inside the gilded frames. They were all snapshots of people being tortured: the iron maiden, the rack, jury duty. I shivered and not because I was cold. Well, I guess that's what I should have expected to find in the Devil's waiting room. That and a room temperature that was easily around a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. I fanned myself and cleared my throat, hoping to catch the secretary's attention.

The demon sighed and set down the novel he was reading. The cover caught my attention immediately sweaty man chests never really get tiresome to look at. Red alert, I thought, chuckling stupidly to myself. Romance novel! Then my mouth opened, and I started speaking before I could stop myself. "Even demons like erotica, huh?" The demon's pretty little mouth twisted into a grimace, and his eyes flicked over me once in utter distaste.

"Humans today have the most incongruous of manners. What is it that you want, human? I'm on my break, and if you'd be so kind as to hurry yourself along so I can finish reading my erotica " He rolled the word across his tongue as if it were toxic, and the corner of his mouth twitched in disgust. "I would be most " He paused again, and the next word was more than dripping with disdain. "Grateful." He may as well have slapped me in the face and said, "f.u.c.k you." I swallowed hard and reigned in my temper. Arguing with a demon, even a secretary demon, was probably a bad idea.

"I answered the newspaper ad," I said instead. It sounded stupid, even to me, but how else could I explain how I had ended up there? However, this startling revelation did little to change the demon's general att.i.tude of disinterest towards me.

"I see and how does that pertain to me?" he asked rudely, picking up his book again as if he'd given me all the help that he intended to. Which is to say, none. I clenched my fists and tried to count to ten. I stopped at six since it wasn't helping anyway, and I was starting to feel like I was going to pa.s.s out from the excessive heat. Stupid f.u.c.king newspaper ad.

"You work for him, don't you?" I asked, irritated but unwilling to engage him in witty repartee. His eyes lifted up from the page for a brief second and met mine before he decided the print was more interesting.

"Who?" he asked, this time with a touch of amus.e.m.e.nt in his voice. The d.a.m.n demon was stringing me along, and he knew it.

"The Devil," I said angrily. Now I was getting p.i.s.sed. "You're his secretary, aren't you?"

In a flash of momentum that I could barely follow, the demon slammed the romance novel onto the desk, cracking the dark polished wood and sending the exercise ball rolling into the wall behind him. His eyes were literally glowing with rage, and smoke was rising from where his hands were pressed into the desktop. The demon's next words were stilted and indignant.

"I ... am ... not ... a ... secretary," he all but snarled at me. "I am an administrative a.s.sistant."

I blinked slowly at him, my anger and irritation disappearing in my shock at his outburst.

"Alright, sorry. Administrative a.s.sistant. So you do work for the Devil?" The smoke coming from the desk ceased, and he smoothed his hands down the front of his white, b.u.t.ton up shirt before turning around to retrieve his makeshift chair, giving me a closer look at his ma.s.sive bat wings and a tight little a.s.s. Too bad he's a complete p.r.i.c.k, I found myself thinking as I scoped him out. What a waste.

"I suppose you could say that." He looked at the charred remains of his novel with a sincere regret and a remorseful sigh. "Now, if you're quite done ruining my afternoon, I suppose I can make you an appointment to see Mr. Lucifer if it will stop you from continuously hara.s.sing me." He turned to his computer screen and began typing. I fidgeted uncomfortably and cleared my throat. The demon put a hand to his forehead and began ma.s.sing his left temple. "What now?" he moaned, sounding drained, the loftiness all but gone from his voice.

"I can't see him today?" I asked, wanting to get my three wishes and get the h.e.l.l (no pun intended) out of there. He stared at me as if I were the craziest, or maybe just the stupidest, person he had ever laid eyes upon.