AN: Finally. It took me forever to get this chapter out of my head and onto the computer screen. Well, it's here now. Hopefully the next thing I try to write won't be so resistant to being written ;) Enjoy

It seemed like hours in which Rory was locked inside the conference room with his father. Logan had lingered in sight of the door so that he could see exactly when she emerged. He was engaging in half-hearted introductions and small talk with a few of the employees with desks nearby, but a part of his attention was always on that door. Of course it was mostly because he wanted to know when she was free so that he could finally get to talk with her, but a part of him just wanted her away from Mitchum. He was distinctly uncomfortable with the idea of her being alone with 'Heil Huntzberger.' It was strange that he should feel protective of the girl when he barely knew her, but, so far, when it came to Rory Gilmore, nothing about how he felt made sense. She was like an addiction for him—a drug so powerful that all it took was one tiny, little hit to have him hooked. Besides, she seemed so innocent and impressionable and he knew how effortlessly his father was capable of destroying someone like that.

When the door finally opened up, he watched her slink out of the room—her shoulders slumped as she gnawed nervously on the fingernail of her thumb. Logan felt anger bubbling up inside him as he took in her defeated posture. What had his father said to her? He felt an unfathomable desire to go to her. He wanted to make her laugh and then tell her not to worry about Mitchum Huntzberger. Mitchum was an ass—he obtained pleasure from bringing other people down. Whatever he had said that had upset her was clearly unwarranted, especially if it concerned her writing. After all, once Logan had found out that 'Rory' was really 'Lorelai Leigh Gilmore,' he realized that he was familiar with her writing. He had done some research on The Voice before coming back to the States and he had been quite impressed with the budding reporter's work. Sure, there was room for improvement, but considering her inexperience, it was quite remarkable.

Beautiful, talented, classy, demure…an insanely good kisser—was there anything about this girl that didn't add to his addiction?

He wanted to go to her, but he didn't. He figured he'd give it a full twenty minutes before he made his way to her desk...well, fifteen at least. Being the friendly, new boss was one thing, being creepy and stalker-ish was grounds for a lawsuit. So it was settled—he'd waited all morning, he could hold out for ten more minutes.

Eight minutes later, his feet were padding towards the far end of the floor. Eight was almost ten, he was just rounding to the nearest five—a perfectly acceptable thing to do. His heart was trilling against his rib cage in anticipation. He was finally going to get to talk to her. He wasn't sure why he was so impatient; a few hours ago, he had expected to spend weeks just trying to figure out who she was and where he could find her. But now that he knew she was near, he just couldn't stay away.

He saw her cubicle coming into view. Through the entrance, he could spot her back. She was angled slightly to her left, hunched over something she appeared to be reading. Her feet were tucked up underneath her on her chair. She had taken her jacket off so that her slender shoulders were covered in nothing but the slim spaghetti straps of her tank top. Her chestnut locks were haphazardly thrown into a loose bun, exposing a wide expanse of tantalizing, yet appropriately displayed skin that was being revealed to him for the first time. He took a deep breath and tried to put a stop to his overactive imagination as he pushed away the thoughts of her revealing even more of her alabaster flesh to him. There was no doubt about it, Rory Gilmore was a drug—and he was already hooked.

No, that was no good—Rory scribbled out the awkwardly phrased sentence and then brought the pencil to her teeth to gnaw on while she contemplated what to replace it with. She ran through several versions in her head before bringing the pencil back to the page to write in the revision.

"Rory Gilmore, as I live and breathe." She jumped in her seat and the pencil that had been in her grip went flying backwards, bouncing off the wall of her cubicle and falling to the ground. She brought her hand to her chest and took a few calming breaths before turning around to face her interrupter.

"You scared the bejesus out of me!"

"Bejesus?" Logan questioned, raising his eyebrows mockingly as he bent down to retrieve the discarded writing utensil. He held the pencil out for her to take. "You seem to have trouble holding on to these. Do you have some sort of magical, pencil repelling abilities I should know about?" he questioned.

"Only around you," she mumbled under her breath. He needed to stop popping up out of nowhere. Sure, he had only just gotten there, but she seriously doubted she would ever get used to seeing him. After Friday night, all she wanted was to be able to repress the memory of her momentary lack of sanity (aka fidelity). Throughout the weekend it had proved to be harder than she'd expected, but now that he was here, the son of her boss-slash-boyfriend, and popping up every five seconds, all hope was gone. How was she going to move past what she had done when the—astonishingly sexy and persistent—evidence was right in front of her face and she had promised Mitchum she'd look out for him?

"What?" he asked, tilting his head to the side as though it would help him hear her.

"Nothing," she brushed it off, un-tucking her legs and crossing them in front of her, "you just startled me."

"Startled works for you." Logan gave her a charming smile and Rory felt her heart flutter a little bit in her chest. He was so much like his father—the looks, the charisma, the simple mannerisms—it was uncanny. It was no wonder she had been attracted to him at the bar. Of course there were other things that made him attractive as well. It was true that Logan had Mitchum's eyes and his smile, and the tips of both of their noses turned down a bit at the tip, but Logan was younger. He had a full head of golden locks and his skin was smoother, less damaged by the natural course of time. He was in better shape than his father, perhaps having a bit more time to work his body as well as his mind. The t-shirt he had worn the other night had hugged the muscles of his arms and chest and the suit he wore to the office emphasized his broad shoulders. Being young definitely had some advantages in the looks department.

Of course, along with Logan's lack of age came his lack of maturity. Rory liked the way the corners of Mitchum's eyes would crinkle up when he smiled. She liked the way he could command the attention of an entire room with just one look whether the room was full of a hundred people, or just her. She liked the debonair look the hint of grey in his five o'clock shadow gave him. These were things Logan had yet to inherit from his father. Sure she could admit—to herself at least—that Logan was attractive. However, despite the similarities, he just wasn't his father; he wasn't the man she wanted to be with. If she could just get that through her guilty conscience, maybe she really could work with, and even befriend, Logan. She could do it—for Mitchum's sake. And maybe she could even make things better between the father and son pair.

But first, she had to clear something up. "Look, Logan, about the other night…"

"Oh, you mean when we kissed and then you ran away? You didn't even leave me a glass slipper, you know," he jested with a smirk.

"Oh I did, but some drunk girl passed out on it and it broke."

"Ouch," Logan winced over-dramatically, "that sounds painful."

"Oh, I'm sure it was. Plus, I heard some of the shards punctured her silicone breast implants. A class action suit is pending."

"So it looks like a bad night was had by all. Good to know it wasn't just me."

Rory sighed, feeling genuinely bad for the way she'd treated him the other night. He seemed like a good guy and she had led him on unfairly. If they were going to have any kind of relationship—professional or friendly—it was only right that she let him know the limitations up front… minus the details, of course. "Look, I think things got a little out of hand at the club. You seem like a nice guy and all, and it's nothing personal, but I think it's best if we just forget what happened."

"Forget what happened?" Logan flashed another one of his smirks.

Rory smiled genuinely. "Thanks."

"No problem," Logan agreed, "so, what are you doing for dinner tonight?"

Her smile quickly faded. She should have known it wouldn't be that easy. Huntzberger men were persistent. "What part of 'forget it ever happened' stumped you, Huntzberger?"

"I'm not stumped," he insisted, "in fact, I think it's pretty clear. You want to forget about what happened on Friday. I've forgotten it—moved on. It's actually quite perfect because now after our date we can have a first kiss that doesn't end in deflated boobs or egos."

"That is not what I meant," she replied, trying to control the aggravation in her voice.

"Hmm, well then I guess you should have been a little more specific… is eight alright?"

"Alright for what?"

"Dinner, I know this great Indian place. Do you like Indian?"

"Arrgh," she growled in frustration, throwing her head back to look to the heavens for some kind of help. She didn't know how Mitchum could complain that his son wasn't focused—he sure as hell seemed to be focused when he wanted to be. Maybe if he was as persistent with his work as he was with his quest for a date, Mitch wouldn't need to worry so much.

"So that's a 'no' to the Indian, then?" he asked with raised eyebrows. He seemed to be trying to hold back a laugh. She glared at him. "I'm kidding," he finally admitted. "Well, sort of, I like you, Rory. I can forget about what happened the other night, but I can't just forget that. And I think you like me, too. I get that it's weird—working together and me kind of being your boss and all, but I'm sure we could work that out."

"It's more complicated than that." Obviously she could work out the logistics of having an illicit relationship with her boss—that was actually the problem.

"We can keep it low key; no one has to know if you don't want them to."

"No one can know. They can't know what happened and as for what's going to happen, there won't be anything for them to know."

There was a moment of silence and then Rory noticed a sudden look of realization cross Logan's face. "There's someone else…"

"What?" Rory asked, suddenly panicked. It would be so convenient just to be able to say she was already in a relationship, but that would bring up all sorts of other questions, especially since no one else knew. And what if he wanted details? It was too dangerous to admit to it.

"God, it's so obvious. Look at you." He motioned up and down her body. "That guy, from this morning, that's him, isn't it?

The panic quickly abated as the overwhelming desire to laugh consumed her. "The guy from this morning?" she asked incredulously, a few giggles slipping out. "Chase?"

"What's so funny?" he asked, obviously incensed. Although whether it was from her laughing at him, or the insane idea that there was something between her and Chase, she wasn't sure.

"Seriously, have you met Chase?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm sorry; I just find it highly amusing that you would feel threatened by Chase…"

"I'm not threatened," he interrupted angrily.

"…unless you have a crush on the copy boy that I don't know about," Rory finished, completely ignoring Logan's interjection.

"Huh?"

"Chase is gay, Logan," Rory finally admitted.

"He is?"

"Flaming," she laughed, "did you not see the poster of Cher hanging in his cubicle?"

"Oh," was all he managed to say. An uncomfortable pause filled the air and Rory could swear she saw a faint undertone of red spread through his features as he turned his eyes away from her.

The silence stretched on for a few more seconds before Rory finally took the reins and broke it. "Don't you have any work to do?" she asked good-naturedly.

The tensions dissipated and Logan latched on to the new conversation, apparently thankful for the change of topic. "Oh, you mean the ever important job of following other people around and watching them do stuff? I don't know how I'll handle the stress," Logan recapped the meeting from earlier that day.

Rory rolled her eyes at Logan's comment. "Mi…ster Huntzberger just wants to give you a chance to get to know the place," Rory replied, quickly correcting herself before calling Mitchum by his first name.

"No, 'Mr. Huntzberger' just wants to make sure it's physically impossible for me to screw anything up. If he doesn't give me any real work to do, then I can't cause any real damage when I live down to his exceptionally low expectations."

"Don't you think you're exaggerating just a bit?" she asked, making note of his hyperbole. She knew the relationship between Logan and Mitchum was strained, but surely Logan had to realize that his father cared about him.

"You obviously don't know my father very well."

Rory bit her tongue to keep herself from commenting that she knew him better than Logan thought. "He's your father. I'm sure he just wants to see you live up to your potential."

"The only potential Mitchum Huntzberger thinks I have is the potential to run his precious company into the ground."

"That's not true," Rory insisted. Could Logan really think his father thought so little of him? Mitchum had a big heart and she knew he loved his son, but she could understand how one could feel sub par next to him, and maybe even a little ashamed. It was hard to live up to the standards of the great Mitchum Huntzberger; he set the bar pretty high. But he just wanted the best out of the people he loved. Sure, his compliments—like the one he made on her article last week—were rare, but they were meaningful.

"Yes it is."

She resisted the urge to get into a 'yes it is-no it's not' argument with him. The last time she'd had one of those, she'd been a senior in high school, arguing with Paris in front of the headmaster. She'd been embarrassed by the juvenileness of it then and she sure as hell was too mature for it now. He wasn't going to believe it was true just because she said so—even if he had known what a credible source she was. She decided to take another route. "So, prove him wrong."

"There's no proving Mitchum wrong. He sees what he wants to see."

"So prove it to yourself," she tried.

Logan raised his eyebrows pointedly. "You think London was an accident? That paper was going under—now it's one of the biggest publications in the city. I already know I can be good." He sounded surprisingly non-condescending. In fact, he mostly just sounded bored, as though the accomplishments he'd achieved in his two years abroad meant nothing.

"Then what's the problem?" she asked, genuinely interested.

"The problem is that I don't care. This business—I do it because I have to, not because I want to."

Rory almost felt sorry for him. Her own mother had never wanted anything from her except for her own happiness. Well that, and for Rory to go to Harvard, but Rory had wanted that just as badly, and she knew that if she had chosen another path, her mother would have accepted it. Logan didn't have those choices in life. Sure, he had everything handed to him on a silver platter, but the price was his freedom and even then he didn't have a choice in the matter. It couldn't have been easy. Still, there must have been something he enjoyed about his job. "Don't you like anything about journalism?"

"Sure, the journalism, but that isn't my job." He stiffened up and his voice took on a mocking tone. "'Synergy and new media ventures in increasing shareholder value'—that's my job."

"The writing is important, too," she countered. "Your father worked as a reporter and editor for two of your papers before becoming CEO. He was short listed for the Pulitzer for his coverage of the Iranian hostage crisis when he was twenty-five. He's written about everything from foreign affairs, domestic policy, he even had a wine column. "

"You don't have a wall and a secret room with pictures of my father pasted all over it, do you?" Rory felt her face flush. She may have gotten just a little too gushy there. She just hoped she hadn't given anything away. At least she'd only gushed about his professional accomplishments. She could still rationalize that.

"I work for the man, Logan. It's my job to know about him.

"So what you're saying is that you're a big brown-noser."

Rory felt her face tighten up in annoyance—she was not a brown-noser. Of course, true or not, it was definitely the more acceptable explanation for her knowledge, so she let it go. "I'm just saying that if you like to write, you should write. Maybe just start with an editorial introducing yourself to the readers…I'm sure your father would appreciate seeing you contribute to the company and making a name for yourself, and you'd be getting to do something you enjoy."

"And again, I remind you—you don't know my father, at least not the man behind the Iranian hostage crisis. He just wants me to do what I'm told and not get into too much trouble. I doubt he'd appreciate it nearly as much as you think."

"What have you got to lose?"

"My dignity when my father tells me how much I suck for the eleven-thousandth time, my sense of hearing when his yelling reaches 150 decibels, and also—time spent flirting with you."

"I think you have a greater chance at retaining your dignity if you write the article than if you stay and flirt with me," Rory clarified.

"Oh, don't you worry your pretty, little head about that, you'll give in to my charms eventually."

"Oh really?"

"Really." Logan nodded assuredly.

"Tell you what," Rory offered, "if you write an article, I will give you the pleasure of my company at lunch...as friends," she clarified, "during a workday, here at the office."

"There are a whole lot of stipulations to this lunch, are you sure you're worth it?" he asked with raised eyebrows, crossing his arms over his chest.

Rory leaned back confidently in her chair and crossed her arms, mimicking his pose. "I don't know, you tell me."