The Delivery Girl

26. Happy hour

Julie

I can't wipe the stupid grin off my face as I walk down the hall towards my office.

Callen is in the middle of a call when I enter. He briefly glances over from his screen and gives me a quick smile. Even just that is enough to give me flutters in my stomach.

I answer a few emails before Callen finishes his meeting and comes over.

"Hey," he says, leaning over and kissing my temple. "Morning going ok?"

"Better now." I giggle and tilt my head upwards. He places a soft kiss on my lips.

"Great. Hayley and I are going to be out for most of today, by the way," he says. "One of my dad's old contacts reached out, and he says he has a proposition."

I try to hide my disappointment. Even though we're dating, I know Callen still has a job to do. "Proposition?"

"Yeah, no idea what it might be about." Callen pauses, seeming to sense the drop in my mood. "Sorry, I wish I could stay here with you. I'd normally never say yes to a meeting like this, but he was close with my dad so it's mostly out of courtesy."

"Don't worry about me." I wave my hand casually. "But we're doing happy hour tonight, you should come!" I suggest. Erica told me about it this morning; it's a small bar down the street the team likes to go to from time to time.

His tone shifts and there's a protectiveness that I see in his eyes. "I'll probably be busy, but will you be ok?" he asks.

I pout. "Of course, I learned my lesson last time."

"Alright."

–

Callen plops a latte and croissant in a paper bag on my desk.

I look up from my computer. "What are you doing back already?" I check the time, it's barely noon.

"I brought you food. You haven't eaten all day," he says sternly. "You skipped breakfast, don't skip lunch too."

"I ate!" I whine.

He sighs. "You ate one bite of plain toast and gave me the rest."

I pause, recalling this morning when I went over to Callen's house before class. I was at the dining table on my laptop, working on an assignment due tonight. Once I finished that, I went to the kitchen to make breakfast... and got distracted replying to my students' emails from my phone.

"Now that you mention it... I think you're right," I admit. I don't even remember giving him the toast.

"You have a lunch break for a reason," he adds and peeks at my screen. "I don't even need that report until Friday."

"You're one to talk," I retort. "No one here puts in as many hours as you do."

If I didn't physically pull Callen away from his desk, I'm sure he'd work through the night until morning.

He chuckles dryly. "Julie, I own this company. I have to do more than the average person here."

He has a point.

"Ok that's fair," I say. "But I'm also a full time student. If I want to be successful, I need to work hard too." I tap my textbook sitting next to my keyboard. I usually work on assignments or study during my lunch break.

"You know I have enough money for you to live comfortably without having to work a single day for the rest of your life, right?" he asks. "What's mine is yours, Julie."