Cara and Steph had a low-key weekend alternating between jogging the loop near their apartment and hanging out on the couch watching movies.
The weekend ended and was not nearly long enough as usual. Soon,it was Monday morning.
Cara sleepily walked into the office with a coffee in hand.
"Good morning," she greeted Melissa who had just walked in as well.
"Good morning," Melissa replied, sleepy as well.
The morning routine progressed as normal.
Cara printed out the company e-mails and checked the voicemail messages.
"There's a message on here from your brother," Cara said to Melissa.
"Oh damn, that's right!" Melissa said, clearly remembering something. "My cell has been dead since yesterday and I can't find my charger. My brother Jason is coming by to pick up my car - his car is in the shop and he had asked me if he could use my car to run to a few places today."
Cara nodded.
"He's even going to get it detailed, so how could I turn that down?" Melissa grinned.
Cara smiled in response.
Shortly thereafter, Tove and Hayden arrived, armed with scripts, notebooks and coffee.
"More meetings," Tove said.
Cara nodded in response and Melissa offered to help them with some boxes that were still in the car out front.
Hayden walked by Cara's desk, "did you have a nice weekend?" he asked in a quiet tone.
"Yeah, I did..." Cara said in an even tone. "How was your weekend?"
"It was pretty good," Hayden replied.
"That's nice," Cara said.
The two couldn't think of a single thing to say to one another beyond that so Hayden walked back to the conference area.
At that moment, a tall man with dark brown hair and gorgeous brown eyes stepped into the office.
"Hi," he smiled at Cara.
Cara stood up at her desk. "Hello," she smiled.
"Is my sister around here?"
"Hey Jason!" Melissa came in behind him with an armful of boxes.
"Hey, thanks for helping me out today," he replied, grabbing the box from her hands and setting it on the desk.
Melissa worked on fishing her keys out of her purse when Jason stepped over to introduce himself.
He stood smiling at Cara after he shook her hand.
Tove was grabbing the last of the boxes from the car and Hayden walked out of the conference room to see Cara and Jason, completely enthralled with a conversation they were having.
His calm morning demeanor once again took a turn toward less than pleasant.
"Hey Tove!" he called through the office. "Can we please get on with this? I don't have all day." He shot a direct look at Cara when he spoke the last sentence and found that she was looking right at him. She directed her attention back to Jason.
"It was nice to meet you," Cara said to Jason.
Tove gave Hayden a look and rolled his eyes as he brought the box back to the Conference room.
"Why don't you just go out there and talk to her?" Tove said. "Quit pretending like this is junior high school..."
Hayden looked at Tove. "Well I was going to, but apparently, she's otherwise engaged."
Tove looked at him in amusement, "Wow..."
"What?" Hayden asked.
"This girl is really getting to you. She has you seeing red when she merely talks to another guy."
"Whatever, Tove," Hayden said. "The guy was standing there holding on to her hand...thinks he's some sort of charmer...what a crock."
Tove stifled a laugh. Somehow, this whole scenario was oddly amusing to him. Too many times, he had been the one to field phone calls from various heartbroken girls that expected more than just a night with Hayden Christensen.
Now, Hayden was being beaten at his own game.
~~~~
A couple of hours later, after the first session of meetings, Hayden walked to the front office. Melissa was off on one of her errands for Tove.
"Excuse me, can I get some of the production forms?" he asked Hayden asked Cara in a low tone.
Cara nodded, getting a stack of forms from the top cabinet.
"Thank you," Hayden said, taking the forms. He stood there for a second.
Cara waited a minute and looked back up at him- this was becoming a strange habit between the two.
"Listen, maybe the two of us started out on the wrong foot..." Hayden said. "I know you don't like me, but maybe, if you give me a chance, you'll see that I'm not all bad."
Cara gave a small smile, "It's not that I don't like you Hayden...I don't agree with some of the things you say sometimes...and I let you know."
"That's for sure," Hayden said, smiling. A woman had never put him in his place so many times as the week he'd known Cara.
"I'm hoping we can find some common ground though," Cara said. "After all, you are my boss and its important for us to have a good working relationship."
"I agree, a good working relationship," Hayden said.
Cara nodded.
"How about, in honor of our working toward a good professional relationship...would you like to have dinner with me tonight?" Hayden looked at her, those stunning blue eyes boring into her brown one's.
Cara was quiet for a minute, thinking.
"Unless that is, your friend may object," Hayden said.
Cara looked confused, "what friend are you referring to exactly?"
"The guy who was in here earlier fawning all over you," Hayden said. "If he's your boyfriend...then....we don't need to delve into all of that."
"Oh, do you mean Jason?"
Hayden shrugged.
"Jason...as in the guy in here earlier?....Jason, Melissa's brother," Cara said, a smile forming on her face.
"I don't know who he is, I just saw him in here trying to charm all over you....you women eat that shit up."
Here we go again, Cara thought. Just when Hayden started to resemble someone who could be sweet and caring, he turned into this alpha male.
"That's the first time we've ever met actually, so no, he's not my boyfriend," Cara said. "...but I'm sure you would know all about trying to charm strange women."
Hayden gave her a wry look, "I'm trying here, I really am...so is that a yes or a no about dinner?"
"Yes, I'll have dinner with you...if you promise to be nice," Cara said with a small smile.
"Hey, I'm always nice," Hayden said, starting to grin.
Cara rolled her eyes, "yeah if that's what you call being nice..."
"Pick you up at 8 then?" Hayden asked.
"Sounds good."