Something Beautiful
Chapter Eight: Baptism of Fire

Angel – as Cordelia had so often pointed out – was not exactly a people person. Which, he supposed, was odd for the CEO of a large corporation like Wolfram and Hart. It was also odd that this so essential of skills was so vital for a mere conversation with a friend.

He glanced distractedly out of the glass walls of his office and returned his attention to the paperwork before him. What he had seen through the wall suddenly registered with him and his attention snapped back to the world beyond his office.

Harmony was laughing with someone Angel vaguely recognised as a member of the Accounting department. His name was Joe or something… But that was besides the point. The point was, Harmony was flirting. She was batting her eyelashes coquettishly and giggling.

"I'm thinking heavy flirting, perhaps with a male interest thrown in for jealousy."

Angel stood up. He really couldn't let this go on. When Wesley finally realised what Harmony was after and found out that Angel had known, well, that would cause problems. Angel got up from his desk and left his office. Wes was coming into the lobby from his office and stepped up behind Joe. He glanced back at Angel and smiled.

"Angel," he greeted. "You know, that was a fun that other night. Especially the part where you owe me five dollars."

"What?" Angel asked, shifting his attention from Harmony and her flirting to Wesley. "Five dollars? For what?"

"I do believe we had a bet on a game of pool," Wes smirked. "And I thrashed you."

"You didn't!" Angel protested.

"I won," Wes insisted.

"It was a fluke."

"Care for a re-match?"

"I'm… busy," Angel muttered, looking away.

"Then pay up," Wes said calmly, holding out a hand.

With a sigh, Angel dug through his pockets and found a five dollar bill.

"Nice doing business with you," Wes said, his lips pursed as he tried to refrain from laughing.

Finally, Joe from Accounting moved slowly away from Harmony's desk.

"I'd like to see you in purple more often," Harmony said, eyeing him up and down. "It does wonders for your complexion."

Joe blushed, grinned and stepped on Angel's foot as he left. Wesley stepped forward, extending his hand to give Harmony a piece of paper.

He still had a triumphant smirk on his face and her heart leapt. This is it, she thought. This is a note to say how much he adores me, but he can't say it in person and do I feel the same way and is it ok if he jumps over the desk to kiss me…!

She unfolded the paper, looked at the spidery scrawl and blinked. She glanced up at Wesley, her mouth opening in question.

"Afternoon, Harmony," Wes said, preventing Harmony's question. "Could you ring Stephan Rickhards for me?" he indicated the slip of paper. "Apparently he's the authority on Kun'Gai. I'd like to find out if it's true."

"Sure," Harmony said, swallowing hard as she stared again at the paper in her hand.

"I'll see you later," he replied. "Thanks."

"S'ok," she muttered, lowering her gaze and sighing. She shuddered. "I flirted with Joe from Accounting and he didn't even notice -"

"Harmony."

She jumped, looked up at Angel and pushed her hair back, trying to look professional. She smoothed her hair, scrunched up Wesley's note a little too fiercely and tossed it to one side as she smiled at her Boss.

"Angel!" she said chirpily. "I didn't see you there."

Angel nodded, swallowing the instinct to reply "Obviously."

She looked at him, waiting, fingers starting to tap impatiently on the edge of her desk.

"Was there something you wanted?" she asked after a moment's silence, an annoyed tone creeping into her voice.

"Uh, no. I just, um, you know what? Take a break," Angel said, not exactly sure why he said. He had the vague impression that talking to Wesley would be a lot easier if his admirer was not within hearing distance.

"Really?" Harmony was suspicious. Angel didn't give breaks. She wasn't sure whether Angel actually knew what a break was.

"Really," Angel nodded, trying to smile reassuringly at her. "You've been working hard. Helping me, helping Gunn…" he gave her a measuring look through narrowed eyes "Doing a lot of work for Wesley…"

Her reaction was minimal. So small if he hadn't been looking for it, he wouldn't have noticed. Her eyes, which had held his so steadily flickered for a second, they glanced over his shoulder before fixing back on his again. It was the vampiric equivalent of a blush.

"In fact," he added quickly. "Why not take the rest of the day off?"

"What?" Harmony asked. "By take the day off, you don't actually mean I'm fired, do you?" she panicked, standing up with her hands on her hips and declared in a trembling voice, "you can't fire me!"

"I'm not firing you," Angel replied, holding up his hands in defence, wondering once again why he had such a highly strung PA. "I'm just giving you the day off. I don't want my workers burned out."

"You're being serious?" Harmony pressed, her voice low, absolutely mystified by Angel's transformation into Boss of the Century.

"Do you want me to change my mind?" he asked.

She shook her head, grabbed her things and turned off her computer in record time. She only paused when she was free of her desk.

"Angel?"

"Yes, Harmony?" he answered heavily.

"I just need to make that call for Wesley. Is that ok… Boss?"

"I guess," he shrugged and watched as Harmony made the phone call.

He thought she was possibly praising Wesley slightly too much, as she tried to convince the person on the other end of the line that he really needed to come see Wesley.

Angel shook his head and headed towards Wesley's office. Harmony had it bad. Which meant that it wasn't just Wesley who was in danger of being hurt.

"You want your money back, don't you?"

Angel jumped; the finger that had been tracing the rounded side of an ancient urn slipped and knocked the urn off the shelf. Angel grabbed it and it danced in his hands before he got a firm grip on it and set it firmly back on the shelf.

"What?" he asked, looking at Wesley who hadn't looked up to deliver the question that broke the tense silence.

"Your five dollars. You want it back, don't you?"

"Oh. That. No. No, it's fine," Angel sank into the chair on the other side of Wesley's desk and drummed his fingers on the arms.

The silence fell again, broken only by the low and steady thump of Angel's fingers on the leather arms of the chair and the swish and scratch of paper and pen as Wesley scribbled notes and turned pages.

Angel had a plan. He was the Boss and he was also Wesley's friend, which meant he knew Wes well enough to have the suspicion that Wes might not deal with the situation properly. He didn't think Wes would have the heart to dash Harmony's hopes. Which, given Harmony's nature, would do no one any good.

And when it came to a choice between Harmony and one of Angel's closest friends, there really was no choice at all.

"Out with it," Wes said finally, laying down his pen and leaning back in his chair to regard Angel evenly.

"Out with what?" Angel asked. "I'm just here to keep you company."

"You've never felt the need to before," Wes pointed out. "Anyway, you're actually rather distracting. So come on, what's wrong? What do you want to talk about?"

"Harmony," Angel replied bluntly.

"Ah," was all Wes said.

He bowed his head slightly, feeling his stomach churn with the possibilities of this conversation. There was always the possibility that Harper had returned and had kidnapped Harmony or staked her. Then there was the somewhat more horrifying prospect of Harmony going haywire and massacring everyone in the lobby.

Or there was the infinitely more amusing possibility that Angel was about to announce his engagement to his fellow vampire, which would be hilarious given that Wes had always felt that Angel was slightly intimidated by Harmony.

"Go on," Wes said after a moment, lifting his head to meet Angel's eyes once more.

"It's just… Well, I've been thinking…. And I heard some stuff… About you and Harmony."

"The rumour mill in this place genuinely astounds me," Wes said, shaking his head, slightly disappointed that there was no engagement. "So tell me, what have you heard? Are Harmony and I dating? Are we in love? Is she having my secret love child?"

Angel blinked. The reference to child stirred the memory of the only child ever actually born to vampires. The memory was painful in itself, without the added imagery of Wes and Harmony and Harmony as a mother.

"Love child?" he repeated. "Are you and Harmony… sleeping together?"

Angel practically clasped his hands in prayer in the hopes that this was untrue. It wasn't that he didn't want Wesley to have a girlfriend, it was just that Harmony was hardly suitable, given her penchant for biting and blood.

Wesley stared at him, his mouth twitching upwards in a smile.

"Angel, you do realise the absurdity of that statement, don't you?" he asked.

Angel squirmed and Wes frowned at him.

"What on earth is wrong, Angel?" Wes asked, frustration creeping into his voice.

"It's just…" Angel tailed off, glanced at Wes, who was obviously waiting for an explanation.

Angel could handle this. He was the CEO of this company, dammit, and he could give advice, pass on messages, without falling into teeny tiny pieces.

"It's Harmony," Angel said.

"We had established that," Wes replied dryly.

"I overheard her talking to Fred… She was telling Fred you, uh, wouldn't be able to resist her," Angel chuckled self consciously and rubbed the back of his neck. "She's, um, fallen for you, Wes. Kinda hard."

"Pardon?" Wes asked, turning white.

"Harmony has a crush on you. Only I have a feeling it's fast heading out of the area of a crush. She, um, wants to date you, Wes. Y'know; be your girlfriend."

"But that's… I mean…. It's… It's not that I don't… Well…" Wesley stared, turning an alarming shade of red.

Angel, who had never been very good at dealing with Wesley when he was like this, stood up, trying to be authoritative. He had been right, there was no way Wes would break Harmony's heart, which would only cause friction in the office. Thankfully, Angel was strong, he was a Champion, it was about time he saved the situation.

"I told you, Wesley," he said. "Because I don't want it getting out of hand, we both know what Harmony's like. Either you talk her out of this… this crush. Or, uh, or she gets fired," Angel's expression softened at Wesley's obvious surprise and odd resemblance to a fish out of water. He cleared his throat. "Um, Wes? You ok?"