Mr. Lawson's Assistant

Chapter 59

Just as the doors to the elevator opened, Damon dropped me. I landed on my feet, but stumbled. Damon had to reach out and catch the back of my shirt to steady me as a man and woman stepped off the elevator. Damon smiled easily at them as they passed, tugging me lightly to pull me into the closing elevator. As soon as the doors shut, I turned to Damon and slapped his shoulder as hard as I could.
He winced and frowned at me with a mockingly innocent expression on his face. "Ouch!"
I narrowed my eyes at him. "You deserved that."
Damon's lips twitched, "Maybe I did," he started, "but it still hurt." He murmured, winking at me when I rolled my eyes. I knew for a fact that he hadn't even felt it. His shoulder felt like it was made out of stone. I crossed my arms and leaned back against the elevator wall, staring at the floor level screen. As we reached the tenth floor, the elevator stopped and opened. Four other people flooded into the elevator, crowding Damon and I back into the right corner. Three of the business people were men, and the other one was a woman. She looked as though she was in charge of something important. At least, she held herself like she was. Though she was naturally tall, she wore three-inch heels, and had her peppered black hair pinned back in a perfect bun. If I had to guess her age, I would have put her somewhere in her late thirties, and by the tone of her skin, I guessed she was Latina. Her makeup was done impeccably, almost so much so that most people wouldn't have thought she was wearing any. When she felt my eyes on her, she turned and looked me over. Only then, did she catch sight of Damon.
"Mr. Lawson," she smiled a short, tight smile, "it's good to see you back in the office." She greeted him, catching the other three guys' attention. The three of them nodded at Damon in greeting, glancing at me curiously afterwards. I straightened and lifted my chin a notch,  uncomfortable from the attention. Damon didn't seem to notice my discomfort.
"I'm only here to deliver something." Damon answered, sending the lady one of his own charming smiles. His words drew the woman's sharp, brown gaze down to me.
I held the woman's gaze, waiting for her to speak, but she said nothing. After a moment, she fixed her eyes on the top of the elevator as the numbers ticked down towards the ground floor. Suddenly, the elevator jerked to a stop. I snatched the golden rail behind me to keep my balance, and the three other men shifted and bumped shoulders as the numbers on the screen also halted. We'd stopped at floor six. I glanced up at the screen, waiting for the doors to open, but instead, the elevator lights flickered then went out. Beside me, Damon shifted closer to me, his hand momentarily brushing my arm, before his hand settled on the rail beside mine.
"What on earth...?" The woman in front of me muttered, and I heard a rustling to my left. I reached for my phone so I could have a flashlight, but I realized that I'd left it up in my office. Just then, Damon, the woman, and one of the buisness men powered on their phones and lit up the elevator. I glanced at Damon and he peered across the elevator to where the man with his phone flashlight on was pressing the emergency button.
Damon dropped his phone and pulled up the dial pad. "Let me call Greyson." He murmured when nothing happened after the man pressed the emergency button. I chanced a look back up to the screen above the elevator doors that showed the flood number, but it had shut off.
"The men were supposed to be doing maintenance work on the elevator this morning." The woman muttered, checking her watch. "I'm going to be late..." She scowled to herself, dialing a number on her own phone and holding it up to her ear. I squinted when her flashlight shone directly into my eyes, but the woman didn't seem to notice. Damon was turned the other way, talking quietly to his brother through the phone, unbothered by the light. I glared at the woman's back, shielding my eyes with my hands as the other three men talked amongst themselves and fiddled with the elevator buttons. When the woman started to raise her voice at the person on the other end of her phone call, turning her head in annoyance, she blinded me yet again with her flashlight. Pursing my lips, I pushed off the elevator wall and tapped the woman on her shoulder. She scoffed at the voice on the other end of her cell phone and glanced at me as if I was unimportant.
Raising my eyebrows when she waved her hand dismissively at me, I crossed my arms and stared at her.
Seriously?
The woman continued to argue with the person on her phone, her light flashing into my eyes on and off as she shook her head. Two of the three men behind her were also shielding their eyes, squinting at the ground as she waved her light around carelessly. To shield my eyes, I turned back to see Damon hanging up with Greyson. He offered me a small smile in the dim lighting when he saw me stepping back towards him. In truth, I was putting distance between myself and the annoying lady with the phone.
"Greyson said he'd call down to maintenance and check it out. We should be out within the hour." Damon said to me, loud enough for the other four people to hear him. When I glanced around the elevator, everyone was looking at Damon with polite smiles on their faces. He didn't seem to notice, because he turned his back to them and started talking to me quietly.
"You know this is karma for slapping me, right?" He smirked, angling himself to block the rest of the elevator from my view.
I leaned back against the wall behind me and crossed my arms. "What about you dragging me in here?" I scoffed and the lady on the phone took a slight step backwards to look between Damon and I. "Who is that lady?" I muttered, switching my gaze back to Damon to avoid letting the woman know I was talking about her.
Damon's lips twitched. "She's the manager of foreign buisness affairs." When he saw my eyes narrow, Damon nodded and chanced a look back at the woman. "She's a very...nosy person..." He turned back to me, choosing his words carefully.
I furrowed my brows, "Why did you hire her?"
Damon leaned forward slightly to lower his voice. "First of all, Greyson runs this company, so he hired her. Secondly, she's the best in her field." He inhaled when the woman behind him answered yet another phone call, this time speaking in rapid Spanish.
This is going to be the longest hour of my life.
*
Twenty minutes later, we were all still stuck inside the elevator with no news from Mr. Lawson or the maintenance crew. Damon had called his brother three other times, but Greyson hadn't picked up. The three men had resorted to making phone calls and working as much as was possible with their cell phones. The woman beside me also kept glued to her phone. That was, unless Damon was talking to me. If he said a word, the entire elevator group turned their full attention to him. It made me wonder if he really didn't notice.
After standing for ten minutes, I decided to sit down, because my legs were tired. Now, I was sitting down with my back against the elevator wall, staring at a mismatched tile on the elevator floor. The only person who was not now sitting down was the woman on the phone. She was speaking in yet another language- and had been for the past fifteen minutes. I thought it might have been French, but I wasn't sure. Damon was texting someone next to me, but when he turned his phone screen towards me to show me his screen, I frowned. Instead of good news like I was expecting, I saw a text from Greyson that read: The maintenance guys shut off the elevator power, because the new assistant gave them the wrong time block. You'll be out in about two hours.
Damon glanced over when I shifted, and let out a short breath, but he said nothing.
The nosy buisness woman took a step in our direction after watching the exchange and lowered her phone. "Any news?" She looked to Damon, but I knew full well that she'd just read the entire text over my shoulder.
"Two hours max." Damon announced to the elevator and everyone visibly deflated. I was sure everyone had important things that they could be doing. I was mentally scolding myself for letting Damon drag me out of work to see a new pair of shoes. I could have been getting paid for the past half hour and the next two full hours. Pursing my lips, I reached up and pulled my hair back into a ponytail, feeling the air inside the elevator beginning to thicken.
"You ok?" Damon murmured, watching as I tied my hair back. I only nodded in response and glared at the elevator doors in front of me. This was going to be the longest two hours of my life.