I jammed my fists in my pockets. “Because she’s…”
He folded his arms across his chest. “Go on…”
“Because I’m….”
“Yes?”
“It’s different with her man. I’m—ah hell, I love her.”
Adam sucked his lips into his mouth for approximately two seconds before he burst out laughing. “Shit!” he said. “Emilia’s going to be so pissed she didn’t hear that straight out of the horse’s mouth.”
I grimaced. “Sorry to disappoint.”
“So yeah, we already figured that out. It was just fun getting you to admit it. Damn, I should have recorded it on my phone.”
“Fuck you.”
He whipped out his phone and pressed the record button. “Can you say it again so I can send it to her?”
“You’ll have to beat it out of me, dude.”
“That can be arranged.” He tucked his phone back into his pocket and sobered. “So, after I leave here, I’m going to contact April and offer to let her finish her internship. Then you’re going to have to figure out a way to dodge the bullets after you tell David that you despoiled his daughter on camera.”
I gulped.
“And then, you are going to have to get your lazy son of a bitch ass dressed and into the office before I have to fire you.”
“So about David…”
Adam glanced away for a minute, clearly uncomfortable. “I have no idea how David will take this, to be honest. That’s going to be on you—and on her. I had Walt’s team track down the people at the company party who tweeted and posted those photos of her. They’ve been asked to look elsewhere for jobs. There were five, and three of them were interns. Cari, the one who tore April’s swimsuit, was already dismissed with no recommendation.” He paused, shifting. His gaze flicked away from mine. “I think it would be appropriate to inform the officers of what happened. That’s not going to be easy for you…”
I took a deep breath and let it go. “I’ll take my lumps. It’s only fair.”
He smiled. “And, of course, I’ll have to document all this humiliation so I can savor it for years to come…”
“That’s out of the question,” I said, grinning. “No deal.”
He paused, almost at a loss for what to say, and then met my gaze again. “So we’re good?”
“Yeah, except you don’t have to go anywhere if you want to speak to April.”
His brow went up and he threw a glance at the stairway. “You want to get her down here so I can talk to her, then? And for God’s sake, put a shirt on.”
It took me a little time to quickly explain to April what had happened and then convince her she looked decent enough to go downstairs. She washed the sleep from her face, got dressed and pulled her hair back, but still mumbled about how she looked terrible. Impossible, in my opinion.
Finally, she came downstairs. By this time, Adam and I were both drinking fresh cups of coffee in the kitchen. April was pale—more so than usual—and looked sheepish, but quietly congratulated Adam on the successful IPO. He thanked her and explained that he wanted to offer her the chance to finish her internship at Draco.
She took a deep breath and let it out, stirring her coffee while appearing deep in thought. Then, she looked up. “Thank you for the offer. And thank you for taking Jordan back. He shouldn’t lose his job over what was basically my fault.” Adam’s eyes widened and I frowned, about to open my mouth to object. She stopped me, holding up her hand. “I hit record on my phone without his knowledge. He would never have done something that stupid.”
“I’ve done stupid shit before. We all have. Adam has too.” Adam rolled his eyes at me and returned his attention to April.
“How did it end up on the Internet?” he asked.
April straightened and looked at me. “Well, even Jordan doesn’t know this because I just found out. I’d always thought it was an accident. Just so you know, I’m probably the most non-tech-savvy person you have ever employed. But my roommate traced what happened using my phone and figured out that one of the other interns—Cari—found the video on my phone when I showed her some pictures, and she sent a copy to herself and uploaded it.” She turned to me when I reacted to this news with a curse. “With everything going on yesterday, I forgot to tell you. Sid figured it out the night before.”
Well, now I was really pissed. Adam rubbed his forehead, taking that in. “Wow, she ended up being a real troublemaker. Wish I’d known that six months ago.”