Pinned

Chapter Three

The next morning, Lina met Sophie in the break room, and they both grabbed matching coffee cups and prepared the Keurig brewer.

"You still feeling down?" her friend asked with a sympathetic expression. She'd left her curly, black hair to fall free about her shoulders, the strands framing her face and creating a contrast against her caramel skin.

Sophie sighed. "I have to tell Sal as soon as he's in the office."

"What are you going to say?"

"The truth." Sophie poured creamer into her cup and stirred. The smell of hazelnut hit her nose and made her mouth water. "That Nate never had any intentions of hiring us."

Lina raised a brow. "Oh, it's Nate is it?"

Sophie frowned and looked at her friend out of the corner of her eyes. "Stop it. You think that there's something going on between Mr. Anderson and me, but there isn't."

"Now it's back to Mr. Anderson."

"So he asked me out, big deal." She shrugged, like it was everyday she got hit on by one of the most successful bachelors in Los Angeles.

"He asked you out?"

She sipped her coffee and exhaled in contentment. "Yeah, he wanted to make a bet and if I lost, I would have to let him buy me dinner. I don't want to get into it."

"Wait, wait, wait, wait a minute." Lina grabbed her elbow and pulled her to the corner by the fridge. "Wait."

"I'm waiting."

"I don't believe this. Start over. He wanted to make a bet with you?"

"About me and a glass of wine."

"Whoa, girl!"

"Ssh." Sophie glanced around, but they were still alone in the kitchen.

"He asked you out, and flirted with you, and wanted to bet you over a glass of wine. And you don't think there's anything romantic going on? Honey, you say I'm the delusional one?"

It sounded suspicious when Lina put it like that, but she knew Nate wasn't interested in her. Oh sure, he liked the way she looked. Sophie wasn't overly modest about her body but she didn't have any overblown insecurities about herself either. She also knew that most guys saw her as their "type," the blonde hair and the blue eyes and the curvy figure that was curvier than she would have liked.

She just wished that everyone who took a look at her stopped and looked past all that. Enough to see her seriously, as a professional who was ready to make things happen. Instead, all men like Nate or her boss saw was a blonde bimbo, and they treated her like she didn't have a head on her shoulders. If they even looked at her above her shoulders at all.

"So when are the two of you going to go out?" Lina asked.

"Who said we're going out?"

"The man asked you out for dinner, Sophie. When a man like Nathan Anderson asks you out for dinner, you go to dinner, and you eat your heart out."

Sophie frowned. "I can't go out with Mr. Anderson. That would be unethical."

Lina placed a fist on her hip and glared at her. "How the hell is that unethical?"

"Because he's a potential client. Or was. Before I messed that up."

"You said it yourself-you never had a chance since he'd made up his mind before he even got there. And it's not unethical. He doesn't work in this office, which means you can sleep with him and knock his socks off and no one would know. Even if it was unethical, who cares?"