Killian

Chapter 2

Killian~

Posie Tinley was bothersome on so many levels that it was hard to count.

She had been since I first laid eyes on her four years ago, and she continued to drive me fucking crazy with her contradictory personality. Some days, she was quiet, reserved, and seemed almost frightened. Then other days, she was a spitfire like she was now. I had no idea which personality was really hers, and if they were both hers, then she was bound to give men whiplash with her mood swings. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that she had bi-polar disorder or multiple personalities. However, since all my employees had to do psychological evaluations to work at my call centers, I knew that she had neither of those disorders.

Her background check had also come back clean, though there’d been some curious instances. She had dropped out of college, then hadn’t done much after that. She’d had a bunch of odd jobs during her early twenties, but her family was worth a fortune, so she hadn’t starved. In fact, there was no need for Posie to work at all. Her net worth ran into the tens of millions, so it was safe to say that she was genuinely here because this was her passion.

Still, even though Posie was very good at her job, something haunted her, and she had trouble hiding it some days. At least, from what I’d seen. I didn’t work at any of the call centers full-time, so I honestly didn’t know if she broke down more often than I was giving her credit for.

There was also the way that she looked. Now, while I’d never not been professional in any matter regarding any employee, Posie Tinley was beautiful and there was no denying it.

The woman had light blonde hair and these intense brown eyes that were always watching and waiting. She had the sweetest face ever, and even though I knew that she was thirty-three, she could pass for way younger.

She was also only about five-foot-one, and she had the perfect body to accompany that small frame of hers. Her tits would fit perfectly in my hand, and I bet that my fingers would touch if I wrapped both hands around her waist. Posie was subtly feminine, and with the way that I towered over her, it’d be nothing to consume her completely if I ever took leave of my senses and made a pass at her.

However, since I was her boss, I was keeping it in my pants.

“What more do you want from me?” she asked, and if she had any idea that she had starred in a few of my fantasies, she wouldn’t have asked that question.

“I want you to be honest with me and yourself,” I told her. “This isn’t an easy job, and if there’s anything that might be too much for you, then I want you to admit it.”

Her light blonde brows rose in offense. “I always transfer calls to our psychologists the second that I recognize if I’m out of my element. I care about these callers just as much as you do, Mr. Warrick. I don’t appreciate you accusing me of putting myself first.”

I pulled my hands out of my pockets, then drug my right hand through my hair. “Alright,” I said. “Then tell me what made you need a moment after your last call. What made this last call different from the rest that you’ve answered today.”

Posie took in a deep breath, and I didn’t know if it was a sign of exhaustion or irritation. “I found myself getting frustrated because there was nothing tying the caller to her abuser other than love. They aren’t married, have no kids, and she has a job that pays her enough to live on her own.” I watched Posie take in another deep breath. “There is absolutely no reason for her to endure his treatment of her.”

“Other than love,” I pointed out.

“Abuse is not love,” she argued.

“I wasn’t referring to his love for her,” I clarified. “I was speaking about her love for him.” I let out a deep breath of my own. “A woman’s love is not a small thing, Ms. Tinley. That call wasn’t about how he feels or treats her, it was about how she feels and why she allows it.”

“I understand that,” she replied icily. “I really do. However, at some point, you have to start loving yourself more than you love your abuser.”

“Have you ever been in love, Ms. Tinley?”

Her head jerked back in surprise. “Wh…what?”

“I asked if you’ve ever been in love,” I repeated.

She stared at me blankly for a bit before finally answering, “Uh…no. No, I haven’t.”

“So, then it’s fair to say that you aren’t qualified to judge what is acceptable in someone else’s love story, don’t you think?”

“Are you actually saying that abuse is an acceptable side dish to love?” she asked, sounding positively astonished.

“Of course, I’m not saying such a thing,” I snapped. “Do not act obtuse just to win a debate, Ms. Tinley.”

“I’m not,” she argued. “All I’m saying is that I don’t have to try cocaine to know that it’s bad for me. The same goes with abuse. I don’t need to be in love to see what it’s not.”

“You have to be able to read in between the lines with this job, Ms. Tinley,” I told her. “You have to hear what’s not being said, and if you are too wrapped up in your own emotions, then you’re going to miss the whole point of being here.”

“Oh, believe me,” she hissed. “I know better than most the purpose of these call centers, so don’t presume to talk to me like I don’t, simply because I needed a moment to be human.”

There was a fire blazing in those dark brown eyes of hers, and she looked beautiful when she was fired up. Passions were a dangerous thing because they could be addicting; just ask anyone that’s ever been involved in a volatile relationship.

While I knew that there was something deep beneath the surface that haunted Posie, I hadn’t ever looked into her past beyond what I had needed to in order to hire her. I wasn’t one to violate an innocent person’s privacy, so anything that hadn’t come up in her background check or psychological evaluation had been off-limits at the time.

However, now…

“So, what is it that haunts you, Ms. Tinley,” I asked softly, crossing the line. “Why is it that you know better than most why these call centers exist?”

Her head jerked a bit as her beautiful face paled. “Nothing that will interfere with the good that I do here, Mr. Warrick,” she finally answered, her voice hoarse and full of emotion.

I regarded her for a long while before finally saying, “The hardest part about this job isn’t dealing with victims, Ms. Tinley. The hardest part about this job is not becoming a monster yourself when you’re surrounded by nothing but evil for eight hours a day. The second that you start to feel desensitized or start focusing on the abuser, it’s time to quit.”

“What about when you start judging the victim?” she asked.

“I suppose that depends on what you’re judging her or him for,” I answered. “Remember, these calls aren’t about what you would do in their situation, Ms. Tinley. It’s about what they should do in their situation, and the only way that you can offer effective advice is to keep that in mind. I don’t want my specialist handing out fortune cookie advice.” Her brown eyes blazed again, and I was finding myself more and more curious about her.

“I’ve never handed out fortune cookie advice,” she seethed, and seeing her backbone snap was better than seeing her looking broken. “Now, unless you are sending me home or firing me, I’d like to get back to work.”

“When is your next renewal week, Ms. Tinley?” All my employees were offered a benefits package that included three weeks of vacation annually. However, my call center employees were required to take a renewal week every two months in addition to their vacation weeks. Whether they realized it or not, it wasn’t healthy not to step away from their line of work regularly.

“In two weeks,” she answered through clenched teeth, not appreciating how I was insinuating that she was at a breaking point.

“Very well,” I replied. “I’ll leave you to return to work.”

“Thank-”

“However, I will be keeping an eye on you for the next couple of weeks,” I warned her. “And if I feel like I might need to push your renewal week up, I will.”

Posie looked livid, but she knew better than to say anything. Regardless of our current conversation, I was still her boss, and she knew it.

“Of course,” she bit out.

I released another heavy sigh as I watched her walk away from me and down the hallway back to her workstation. While there’d been a bit of inappropriateness sprinkled into our conversation, I wasn’t going to stress over it. Posie could report me to H.R., or she could not. Either way, I wasn’t going to worry myself over something that I couldn’t control. I liked to focus my energies on the things that I could control, and everyone knew that you couldn’t control a woman that didn’t want to be controlled.

Nevertheless, it wouldn’t stop me from fantasizing about it a little.