Chapter Text
It was an early, quiet Friday evening. Most everyone had already gone home for the day, ready and eager to begin another weekend of rest and escape from the reality of real life work pressures. Robin sat alone in one of the conference room tables surrounded by neatly stacked piles of paper. It was always the same flurry of activity whenever there was a proposal submission deadline. He was the executive assistant to the owner, Regina Mills-Blanchard, who’d inherited the engineering and design firm from her late husband Leopold Blanchard. Robin had been hired during Leopold’s tenure with the promise that the firm would eventually fund his education as an aspiring designer himself, but he’d had trouble finding time to apply to design school as a single father and full-time employee with a demanding boss.
Ms. Mills-Blanchard was tough as nails and as much as she said she appreciated him she also seemed to take pleasure in berating him at any opportunity she got whenever he made a mistake, which was often. What could he say? The woman was an insufferable egomaniac but she was a savvy businesswoman who also happened to be incredibly sexy. Robin often thought of her intimately, wondering what she would be like on a date, what it would be like to kiss her, what she would feel like in the bedroom. But if anyone were to ask him about it, as his best friends Killian and John often had over a game of billiards, he stuck to denying any attraction and vehemently refuted he wanted any other type of relationship with his boss besides his current one.
Like clockwork Ms. Mills-Blanchard interrupted his private reverie. He barely registered the sharp sounds of her stilettos on the concrete floor before the door opened and she asked, “Mr. Locksley, do you have the firm’s current list of past port projects? The one that includes the project that was finished last August?”
He looks up at her with a blank expression and dumbly opens his mouth but not a word comes out. He feels his cheeks flush red with embarrassment and he stammers, “I uh, I…let me check, just a moment please.” Ms. Mills-Blanchard stands there and sighs audibly containing the urge to roll her eyes. ‘What is his deal?,’ she wonders. Locksley shows a lot of promise as a future designer but as far as she knows he hasn’t applied to a design school since no Request for Education Reimbursement form has crossed her desk for approval. She knows he came to work for Blanchard Snow, Inc. to learn the ropes about the engineering and design business, with the goal of eventually becoming a designer himself. Leopold had hired him as his own executive assistant and often praised the man’s ability to carry out complicated tasks with ease and professionalism.
When Leopold passed away two years ago, Regina was left as sole owner of the firm and she left her career in law to take the post as CEO of Blanchard Snow, Inc., a decision she doesn’t regret in the least, though she does often wonder whether or not Locksley is going to cut it in the long run. So far, he’s fallen exceptionally short of all the praise Leo had bestowed upon him as an employee. They don’t speak and the only sounds in the conference room are the ones coming from papers being shuffled and Robin’s breath now starting to speed up.
“Ma’am, the only ones Trina gave me were the ones that say they were last updated in January of this year. I don’t have the newer version updated in August.”
Regina’s nostrils flare with annoyance and she takes a deep breath. “Mr. Locksley, I happen to know for a fact that Trina gave those to you because I emailed them to her this morning and I saw her making the copies of them myself. Please return to your desk and check to see you didn’t miss them.” She turns to leave and he watches her, staring at her backside then quickly catching himself and taking a deep breath as he stands to head back to his desk. Once there he looks over everything, which is exactly where he’d left it two hours ago and he’s wondering what he could’ve missed when suddenly something catches his eye: a tiny corner of neon green. Oh shit, he thinks to himself. Trina is known for being the only one in the office to hoard and use neon green post-it notes. He curses himself, not believing he missed it. When he reaches for the stack, hidden underneath several office files and other stacks of paper, there it is:
Robin, these are the updated versions of the past port projects that the Boss Lady wants to include in the proposal.
You’ll note they’re dated August. Use these instead of the ones dated January. Have a nice weekend, T.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit. He’d already closed and mailed the envelopes to seven different proposals. Robin brought his hands up to his face and covered them in exasperation. She was going to be pissed as hell with him. Better to get it over with and face the music.