Read Online The Gift: Book 1 (The Billionaire's Love Story) by Lily Zante - Free Book Online Page B

place troubled him. It had been hard enough when he was growing up, but his parents had never had to go to a food bank. He tried to imagine what that felt like, especially with a young son to look after. He noted she didn’t wear a wedding band. Where was the boy’s father?
    “Tobias.” Matthias approached him with a firm handshake. “Sorry for the mix-up with the files.”
    “So you should be,” replied Tobias coldly.
    One thing he did know was that a woman in her position didn’t need any more aggravation from a man like him.
     
     

Chapter 14
     
    It was an hour earlier than usual and Jacob was still bleary eyed by the time they made it into the sprawling office building.
    Savannah felt a touch of sadness that after tomorrow she would no longer be coming here. Or have a job. Briony hadn ’t said anything about whether her contract would be extended further or not and she assumed that it would end tomorrow. Most of the talk yesterday had been about the Christmas party.
    She had no proper work to do, having finished the last task Briony had given her and these next two days would be easy enough. She only needed to rearrange the files on Briony’s work area and keep an eye on the phone and email messages. She anticipated an easy time, with the only difficulty arising from having to sneak her son into the office and then to make sure he stayed there. She knew it was too much to ask of a six-year old, especially being cooped up into a confined space for a long time.
    “You can’t bring him in,” said the security guard, barring her way to the elevator. The trying-to-walk-in-casually-with-a-child approach had failed at the first hurdle.
    Jacob hid behind her legs, as she knew he would. She could sense her son was scared of the large, hulk of a man and that his unfriendly tone would scare Jacob. It always did.
    Remnants of life with Colt.
    But she wasn’t going to give up. She couldn’t not work and she couldn’t leave Jacob anywhere. The lobby was decidedly quieter and she hoped it was due to the fact that a lot of people had already started their holidays. Hopefully Tobias Stone had, too.
    “You can check with Mr. Stone. He’s fine with this. But I’d think twice if I were you, about challenging his decision. I work on the same floor as him,” she pointed to her security tag, and tried to sound as if she didn’t care. But her nonchalance was only skin deep. Inside she was a quivering mess. After the recent run in with Tobias and the Dalton file fiasco, she didn’t want to give him a good reason to throw her out. That man seemed to take pleasure in making people suffer. Maybe she should have dialed her response down slightly. But she’d been that other type of woman when she’d been with Colt and it hadn’t served her well. She wasn’t going to become that person again.
    She prayed that the guard wouldn’t check, and then she also prayed that Tobias Stone wouldn’t be in, just in case he did. The guard eyed her warily and picked up the phone. Savannah’s heart thundered as if she was getting ready to race 100 km.
    This was definitely dismissal. Her lying, and Tobias finding out. But the man appeared to reconsider and put the phone down. “If Mr. Stone okay’d it, then it’s not a problem. Go ahead.”
    “Thanks,” she beamed, closing her eyes and silently thanking the universe.
    “Have a good, day, Ma’am.”
    “You too,” she said, and rushed towards the elevator.
    “This is a big place,” said Jacob, looking around excitedly as she ushered him in. “You work here ?”
    “Yes, honey.”
    “For Tobias?”
    “Mr. Stone.”
    “Can I go see him?”
    The elevator doors closed.
    “No, Jacob.” She crouched and looked at him level in the eyes. “He doesn’t know you’re here, Jacob. He won’t like it if he found out. And he will throw me out.”
    “He’ll be nasty to you, like daddy was?”
    Oh god. He still remembered every nasty thing.
    “No, honey. He’s not nasty. It’s just