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It came as quite a surprise to me when the person who'd bumped into me hadn't offered me a hand back up. Never mind that, they'd vanished as quickly as they'd appeared. I silently gathered up my papers and hastily made my way upstairs out of the way. Jordan was relatively easy to find, mooching around in the spare study. He was quick to agree to help me and directed me down the hall towards the library. All sorts of materials were waiting for us, it was like paradise. Once we were settled with our boards in front of us, Jordan and I started talking.

"So have you met any of Alec's family yet then?" He questioned, a funny look on his face. I looked back at him with a puzzled expression as I ruffled some pink fabric.

"I've spoken to Isabelle on the phone but aside from that, not really."

"You're in for a treat." He laughed, picking out different sized stones.

"Go on." I laughed, annotating my design.

"Well we'll start with Isabelle since you've already spoken to her. She's a handful to say the least. Not in a bad way, mind you. She's just very inquisitive. She likes to know what's going on. She's the reason you have your job essentially considering she sussed out that Alec's previous PA was stealing. A word of advice – don't piss her off because there's no coming back from that."

"Noted." I laughed, feeling somewhat intimidated. I much preferred Isabelle when she was just a voice on the other end of the phone.

"Then there's Max. He's a character. He's harmless but don't let him near your work-phone or your laptop because he'll schedule meetings, he'll delete meetings and he'll generally create chaos. I've learned about that one the hard way!" I smirked but made note of the advice, part of me wanted to know the rest of the story.

"Then there's Jace. He's like a mixture of Isabelle and Max. He loves chaos. Loves causing it, loves being amongst it. I'm surprised you haven't bumped into him yet, he's usually never away from the place."

"I might have bumped into him before, in a very literal sense." I thought back to before when someone had sent me flying alongside my papers. I told Jordan.

"That sounds like him." Jordan agreed, trying to unstick his fingers from the glue on the collage. "He usually comes into my room when I'm away and rearranges things just to nark me. It'll always be something little and pointless but I can always tell when he's been in there."

"That sounds annoying. Does he not have a job to go to?" I asked, genuinely interested.

"Nah, he's minted. Maybe he'll start aggravating you with you being the newbie and all." I shot Jordan a look, pouting.

"I bloody hope not." I protested, Jordan laughed.

"I doubt you'll be saying that when you see him. That's usually the case."

I laughed out loud. "I really don't think so. Its work, work, work for me. No antics."

Jordan and I finished in good time. I thanked him before hunting out Alec in the kitchen. He was eating out of a pan again, what looked like rice.

"Is this becoming a problem?" I joked, setting the collages down on the table.

"Shh – you saw nothing." Alec smirked with his mouthful.

"Whatever you say, boss." I laughed, feeling more at ease after our informal sketching session last night. Alec pointed the spoon at me winking, before grabbing a few more mouthfuls of his rice. Alec quickly got himself straightened up when we heard a knock at the door, taking the boards through into the lounge. I straightened my skirt, heading over to the door. Mr Verlac was stood waiting in a light grey suit, sunglasses adorning his eyes.

"Good afternoon Mr Verlac. Please come through." He smiled widely at me, reaching up and removing his sunglasses slowly.

"I'm sure we've already had this conversation my dear. Call me Sebastian." He smiled. "Please." I nodded, leading him through to the lounge. Alec had set the boards up onto little easels, and Sebastian's attention was immediately peaked as soon as he crossed the threshold. He headed straight over to the easels and Alec gave me an approving glance. Sebastian finally spoke after a good 20 minutes of analysing the images.

"How? How did you get these done so quickly?" He asked Alec bemused.

"I had a little help." He smiled in my direction momentarily. "But these are just the initial designs. I can make you up some test samples for the trial shoot based on these designs and we'll see where we are."

"That sounds perfect. I hope you don't mind me overstepping my mark but I'd very much like you both to attend the trial shoot. I think it would be very insightful for the both of us." Sebastian smiled at Alec, Alec returned his smile but I could see the confusion behind his eyes. Alec and Sebastian spoke amongst themselves for a while, bouncing ideas back and forth, all of which I noted down on my laptop just in case they came in handy down the line.

"So, Clarissa. What else are you apart from a PA?" Sebastian asked me as I was showing him out.

"Uh – I'm not sure. Hopefully an artist one day." I shrugged, not liking the spot light being on myself.

"Interesting. You're definitely in the right crowd then." He smiled, putting his sunglasses back on. "I look forward to seeing you later in the week. Until then I bid you adieu."

I was just closing the door after Sebastian when I felt a firm pressure on the other side of it, nearly knocking me backwards. A pair of golden eyes latched onto mine through the gap in the door. In that moment, he'd managed to shimmy the door open and was stood in front of me inside the house.

"You may want to close your mouth." He muttered lightly, his index finger pressing my chin up lightly. "It's not polite to stare." I snapped around, shutting the door and moving my face away.

"Excuse me, do you have an appointment?" I questioned, following him down the hall. He laughed heartily as I tried to keep pace with his long strides.

"No." He said, turning around just long enough to smirk at me.

"Jace, I'm assuming?" I suddenly cottoned on, planting my heels into the floor. He turned around to face me, bounding back across the hallway.

"Now that's not fair. You know my name but I don't know yours. Hold that thought – Shorty? No, that's not it. Ginge? Hmm, not feeling that either. Red! There we have it." He looked really pleased with himself. My hand sprung to my hip as I looked at him unimpressed.

"Very creative of you. Well done." I smiled, sarcastically before heading upstairs to grab my stuff so that I could finally go home. I didn't expect him to follow me.

"I like that. You've got a little bit of spirit about you."

"That doesn't give you more reason to antagonise me."

"In my books it does. I can see you being more amusing than Jorgie." I rolled my eyes, I could only presume he meant Jordan.

"Nope I'm boring – dreadfully boring." I muttered, heading into my bedroom to grab my bag. Jace uncaring followed me right through.

"Don't worry, I can change that."

"Do you mind?! I need to get changed." I grumbled as he made himself comfortable on the bed.

"Go right ahead." He joked, resting his hands behind his head.

"Do you not have anything better to do?" I sighed, just throwing my bag onto my back. He looked as though he was thinking about it before shaking his head.

"Nope, where are you going anyway?"

"Home." I said bluntly, heading back into the corridor. Jordan was there and he looked at me sympathetically. Jace followed after me, bumping into Jordan on his way.

"Jorgie! Have you found the difference yet? It's a cracker this time, I promise you!" He slapped his shoulder as Jordan stomped off to his room to go and rearrange whatever it was that Jace had done. Alec was still in the lounge when I finally got downstairs, Jace still biting at my heels.

"Alec, I'm off home now alright? I've got my phone and everything if you need me." I smiled, before heading out of the house. Jace was unrelenting, standing in front of my car as I climbed in. I gave him a few minutes to get bored but he was unflinching. I wound my window down.

"If you don't get out of the way, I will mow you down." I threatened as Jace smirked. "Really hard."

"Ooh baby, I love it when you talk dirty to me." He teased and I wanted to repeatedly slam my head off the steering wheel. Thankfully my prayers were answered when Magnus' car pulled into the drive. A few moments later Magnus was at Jace's side, whispering a few words in his ear before he bounded off towards the house without another word spoken. Magnus came over towards me.

"Sorry about him. He's harmless really – he just has a very strange sense of humour."

"Its fine, I think I can handle him."

"I'm sure you can. I'd just like to thank you for keeping my husband company last night. He gets a bit lonely sometimes, so again I appreciate it. If you ever need anything, don't hesitate to ask Clarissa. We're here to help you as much as you are to help us."

When I got home that night, Mum was out somewhere.

"Jon?" I called out, turning on lights as I went. It was strange going from Alec's house where so much was happening to my own that was silent. Concluding that no one was home, I made my way into the living room, shoes in hand and sprawled myself out on the sofa, glad to just be able to relax.

"RAHHH!" A voice screamed, grabbing me from over the back of the sofa. I screeched the house down, whacking the hand with the shoe I was holding in my hand.

"Ow Clary." Simon moaned from behind the couch. I climbed onto my knees, peering over the top of the sofa.

"Simon! What are you doing?" I barked at him as he lay on the ground clutching his hand.

"Jon let me in about 30 minutes ago before he went to work. I did think you'd be back sooner and I guess I got a little more vigorous the longer I waited. My hand though Clary, you fiend! What is that job turning you into, you absolute monster!" Simon smirked, hopping over the sofa and into the seat next to me. He pulled my legs into his lap as I rested my head back onto the arm rest.

"I met an absolute monster today." I muttered, launching into the story. Simon was quick to give feedback and tactics that I could try out.

"I'm glad you decided to come over Si. This is exactly what I needed." I laughed, cuddling myself into the crook of Simon's shoulder.

"That's what best friends are for. I think we're long overdue a movie night – how about it?" I hastily agreed and shortly after we found ourselves heading up the stairs with a handful of snacks each. I changed into my pyjamas before we both lay on the bed on our stomachs, facing the television with our heads resting on a pillow each.

Just as we were getting to a particularly gruesome murder in the horror film we were watching, my work phone started ringing. I sighed, praying to god that it wasn't Alec asking me to go over tonight as I didn't want to let him nor Simon down. I quickly checked the screen.

JACE CALLING

I grumbled at the phone, throwing it onto my bedside cabinet and letting it ring out. I wasn't going to let him aggravate me in my personal time as well.

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All of my love, until the next time ~Sapph