Surrendering to Us Read Online Free PDF Page B

Cooper had given out a lot of sexual favors, or else she’d really nailed the initial interview (I hoped it was the latter) because she was on the short list when I opened my email a little while later. Due to Lilia’s fabulous flagging system, it was one of the first things I read. She’d learned that what I deemed important varied, which was what made the job slightly difficult.
    Follow-up interviews with everyone who made it through the first round were set for tomorrow and were going to take nearly an entire day. Lovely. I’d have to remember to drink an extra cup of coffee, or five, beforehand. Interviews, if you’ve done enough of them, can be horribly dull, unless someone says something unexpected. Or they answer their phone in the middle of said interview.
    I meant to go see Dad in the morning, but of course that didn’t happen. There was a snag with some of the html coding on the beta website page for the new software and no one seemed to be able to figure it out, so a group email had been sent around to see if anyone could fix it. I had a working knowledge of html, but I couldn’t find why it wasn’t working. I sent my response back that I had no idea. Two seconds after I sent it, there was another timid knock. Sometimes when I looked up, I still thought Lucah was going to be standing there, but it was Lilia. Maybe she was so scared because I always looked so disappointed to see her. It wasn’t her fault that she wasn’t Lucah.
    “Miss Clarke?”
    “Yes, what can I do for you, Lilia?” She shifted from one purple satin heel to the other. Today her dress was sunny yellow, with a matching purple belt around her waist. Too bad she was a twig, or else I would beg to raid her closet.
    “I’m sorry. I know it’s probably not my place, but I was just glancing at that code, and I think I found the problem.” Lilia, in addition to her own email account, had access to mine, but I forgot sometimes that she could see it whenever she wanted.
    “You did?” She nodded and kept her eyes on the floor. “Where?” I nodded and she walked into my office as if I’d asked her to enter the Dungeon of Eternal Torture. But she came around my desk and stood at my shoulder as I pulled the copy of the code up.
    She scanned it with her eyes and then pointed.
    “There. It’s missing . . . “ she stole the mouse and moved it to the spot and then typed a few things in. “There. That should work.” For the first time her voice wasn’t a whisper. This girl knew code.
    “I have no idea what you just did, but I’m going to send it back to tech and have them double-check it.”
    And just like that, timid Lilia reappeared.
    “I hope it’s right. I think it’s right.”
    “If it is, I’m taking you out to lunch. My treat.” I smiled, but the scared look on her face just got worse. “So you know html?”
    “Uh yeah. You know how some people can learn a foreign language really easily? That’s like me and code. My brother and I used to hack websites for fun in our spare time when we were kids. Oh. I probably shouldn’t have told you that. Please don’t fire me.” She looked like she was actually scared that I would use her teenage hacking as a reason to fire her. It made me laugh.
    “Um, if you knew about all the crap I did when I was younger, and still managed to be successful . . . So why did you want to be my assistant instead of working down with the tech guys?” She paused for a long time before she answered, and I started to think maybe she wouldn’t.
    “I thought about it, but I wanted to learn from you. I wanted to know how you did it, being so young and being surrounded by men. I can be a little shy, and you seemed so confident. I wanted to learn from the best.” Wow, what a compliment. I could feel my head swell and my cheeks turn red. That was rare, outside of Lucah teasing me.
    “You make me sound like some sort of corporate superhero.” I should put in an order for a cape. “I’m not, but it’s