Read Online Her Favorite Rival by Sarah Mayberry - Free Book Online

ostentatious about his belongings. If anything, he’d been understated—to the point where she’d assumed his nonchalance stemmed from contempt bred from familiarity.
    She picked up the photograph, studying seven-year-old Zach again. How she could have gotten it so wrong for so long was a question that was going to keep her awake into the small hours, squirming with discomfort. Which was as it should be.
    “It’s not a big deal, Audrey. I just wanted to clear the air.”
    She looked at him, studying him through the prism of her new understanding. The bump in his nose took on new significance, as did the breadth of his shoulders and the bright directness of his gaze. It struck her that she’d been right when she’d judged Zach as being different—she’d simply misunderstood the why of it.
    The beep of her phone registering an email broke the silence. She blinked and looked away from him, suddenly aware that ninety-five percent of the reasons she’d used to keep him at arm’s length had just dissolved in a puff of smoke.
    Instead of being an arrogant, overprivileged pretty boy with cockiness to spare, Zach was suddenly an approachable, high-achieving man with a very hot body and the world’s most delicious aftershave.
    And she was stuck in a meeting room with him for the foreseeable future.
    “Well. We should probably get stuck into this, or we’ll be here all night,” she said.
    They launched into work, reading over each other’s proposals and suggesting areas where more research might be required. Zach was sharp and focused, and her pride demanded that she bring her A-game, too, no matter how off-balance she felt. By seven-thirty they’d agreed to the parameters of the report and identified the data they would require to complete it.
    “Right. I guess we need to write up our separate parts and then meet again sometime next week to go over everything,” Zach said, leaning back in his chair and stretching his arms over his head.
    She did her damnedest not to notice the way his shirt pulled across his belly and chest, but wasn’t sure she succeeded.
    “What day suits you? I’ve got late meetings Monday and Tuesday.”
    “We leave for conference Friday. Will Wednesday be cutting it too fine?” he asked.
    She called up the calendar on her phone and checked her schedule. If they had a first draft written by Wednesday night, they’d have Thursday night to finesse things into some kind of coherent presentation. A close call, but not impossible, and maybe they could find some time during the conference itself to do a dry run so they were prepared to present to Whitman when they returned.
    “I think it’s doable,” she said.
    “Okay. I’ll block out Wednesday and Thursday nights.”
    She sighed. Sleep and downtime were obviously going to be scarce commodities in the next week or so.
    “It could be worse. Gary could have asked someone else to do it,” Zach said.
    She couldn’t help grinning. He was totally on the money—she would be so ticked off if someone else had won this opportunity instead of her.
    “True.”
    They packed up their things in comfortable silence, the first Audrey could ever remember them sharing. Together they walked back to the merchandising department, both of them loaded down with files and laptops.
    “To infinity and beyond,” Zach said when it was time for them to part ways.
    It wasn’t until she was back in her office that Audrey recognized his words as a quote from Buzz Lightyear. It made her think of the photograph he’d shown her, of that skinny, raw-kneed boy with the too-long hair and too-serious expression.
    It was strange, knowing so much about him. What he looked like as a child. Where he grew up. The fact that he’d earned everything he had with his own efforts.
    And yet they weren’t friends. Not by a long shot. She wasn’t sure what they were.
    Not enemies anymore. Rivals? Colleagues? Both words didn’t feel quite right.
    Audrey gave herself a mental shake.