The Blossoming: XO Trilogy (BWWM) incompleted

Chapter Fourteen

I'm back and covid free now :)

Chapter Fourteen

Even though my first day at work had been so great, I was still scared that things would go south. People were always nice on the first day, it always took a while for true colours to show. But I was wrong. It was fine and it only continued to get better. By the end of the first week Jada had invited me for some afterwork drinks with one of the admin assistants. I was hesitant to say yes but decided to go anyways. It would be good for me to put myself out there a little bit.

The bar Jada had mentioned was a new one in town. It had angel wings on the wall so you could take pictures and also a really cute and fantastically lit flower wall too. It was the kind of place that I would go with Khalida on the weekend except that, seeing as it was in Wilmington, drinks were half the price of what I'd usually pay. Jada and the other girl that came along, Emile were good vibes but I came to the realisation that they were there to drink, drink and whilst I was being humble with my two Martini's they had already backed three rum and mixers and were getting lit. I debated trying to keep up but at around 7:00 the DJ changed and the atmosphere went from a 6 to an 8 and the girls were getting seriously lit. So, in order to catch up I took myself to the bar and ordered something with absinthe in it. The bartender was incredibly unbothered and took ages to prepare my drink so I guess I had a bit of a screw face on. He didn't even bother telling me the price of my two drinks, instead he just shoved the card reader in my face. Before I could even tap my card on the reader, a hand placed their own card on it and paid for me. Without changing the very bitchy look on my face, I looked up to see who had paid for my drink and found the elevator guy from earlier that week looming over me.

"I hope that gets a smile on your face," he shouted over the very loud music.

I rolled my eyes. "Are we seriously telling women to smile? In the 21st century? In this economy?" I shouted back.

He chuckled then took one of the drinks that I ordered. "I recognise you, you live in the Coombe apartments, don't you?"

"That's not creepy at all," I replied taking a sip out of the drink. I had forgotten that I had spent a small eternity trying to work out what would be the strongest drink from the menu and so was bitterly taken a back at how strong the drink actually was, and it showed on my face. If first, technically second, impressions were anything to go off I was sure that I was making a terrible one.

He laughed at me. "I saw you in the elevator, do you remember?" he continued gracefully ignoring my faux pas.

"I might do," I lied.

"I did want to say something to you, but you left so quickly. It appears that fate has brought us back together." He shouted. But this time, he leaned into me and spoke into my ear. I could smell the Tom Ford on his chest and feel the heat radiating off his body and I felt myself tingle. "You're gorgeous." He said in a lower tone.

Despite my quite brief responses, I was going crazy. Even in the dimmed lights of the bar, this guy looked amazing. He was tall, maybe around 6'2 and he, like many of the men out for drinks after work, wore pale blue shirt and tailored navy trousers. He hadn't turned around, but I could just tell his butt was doing the absolute most in them. His shirt wasn't obnoxiously tight, but I could see the shape of his muscles ever so slightly under it which told me that he worked out and I liked that. His skin was smooth and shiny without any blemishes and his voice was deep and gravelly. It was perhaps the most attractive thing about him. Him standing there made me realise that I had a type and he was it.

"Thank you," I replied taking a smaller sip out of my drink.

Without taking his eyes off me, he took a sip out of his own then leaned into my ear again. "I won't lie, I've been watching you since the minute I noticed you were here. My name is Julian, yours?"