A/N: 100 reviews and only two chapters. You're all nuts and I appreciate you. Here's part 3 of "Chuck Versus the Coincidence"!
Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck. I'm not making a cent from writing this story.
He didn't know how to handle this.
He was currently following her up a couple of flights of stairs, and her apartment was at the end of this journey. Her home. She'd invited him into her home. Into her personal space. They'd shared a handful of kisses—and what kisses, holy shit—some really comfortable, entertaining conversation, and he was going to be walking into her home now.
This had never happened before.
Sure, he'd had dates, and he'd had sex since the college girlfriend catastrophe, but the way this was going down, he had chills cascading through his body, his fingers and toes were tingling. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
"So this is…my hallway…"
She looked at him over her shoulder as she stepped into the hallway, a closed-mouth smile on her face.
"Cool hallway!"
"Thanks. Actually, technically around the corner is my hallway. This is the precursor hallway." She giggled and faced forward again, leading him around the corner into another hallway and finally stopping at the door at the end, next to a large window that looked out over a small park, the lights of the buildings shining for miles, and he imagined you could see the Pacific Ocean off in the distance during the day. Now it just blended into the dark horizon.
"Nice view out here," he chirped, pointing out of the window.
"Yeah, I really love it." She unlocked her door and opened it, turning on the lights as she stepped inside and holding the door for him.
Chuck cast his eyes around the place and grinned. Apparently she had a pretty cush job, whatever it was, because it was a really nice, neat, tidy place. Well-maintained. Nice and open. At least the living area was. He could see a corner of the kitchen off to the side. "Wow. Wow, this is nice!"
"Thanks," she said, smiling, shutting the door behind him and setting her purse down on an entryway table. She ran her hands down her business skirt and cleared her throat. "How about another drink?"
"Oh, yeah! Yeah. Yeah, that sounds—Thank you."
"Follow me."
He did, then paused. "Oh. Should I…take my shoes off…or…?"
She gave him a look. "Why? I didn't."
That was true. She had her high heels on still. On her feet, which were attached to long legs and he swept his eyes right back to her face. "Right. Okay."
The kitchen was pretty spacious and a hallway led off towards what he assumed was the bedroom (or rooms), the bathroom, and maybe some sort of closet space or laundry? He didn't know. He also didn't know why he was fixating on what else might be in her apartment. Maybe because he was freaking out a little bit.
Maybe he needed to stop freaking out and take some deep breaths. He had no idea what this woman was thinking, why she'd asked him here. And he needed to stop making assumptions. For all he knew, they'd have drinks and then he'd go home. He needed to freaking chill.
"What do you want?" she asked, already pulling a bottle of gin down from a cabinet.
"World peace and one of those Dole whip floats they sell at Disneyland." She laughed and rolled her eyes at him. "Oh. You mean—Right." He gave her a teasing look. "I'll stick with whiskey I think. If you have it."
She scoffed. "Do I have whiskey…pfft."
He chuckled and watched as she pulled it down and set it on her counter. "Where are the glasses? I can get 'em."
A quiet smile on her face, she gestured to the end of the kitchen near the sink. "Up there. Not much of a selection—guess I'm not a big entertainer, if I'm being honest—but I've got a few glasses good for this sort of thing. Thank you."
"Oh, sure. My pleasure."
He didn't mean to snoop, but when he opened the cupboard, he saw she wasn't kidding. The difference between the glasses cupboard in his sister and her boyfriend's apartment and the cupboard he was peering into now was stark. Ellie had water glasses, short and tall, she had champagne glasses, she had martini glasses, wine glasses, snifters, old-fashioned glasses (that was mostly for Captain Awesome), and highball glasses. This cupboard had three water glasses, a snifter, and two glasses that could pass for old-fashioneds. She really wasn't a big entertainer.
He didn't judge her. She seemed to live alone and if she didn't invite guests often, why have a bunch of glasses you aren't going to use when you could spend that money on something you would use? Ellie was more old-school about her kitchen, and she and Awesome entertained often.
Chuck brought the two old-fashioned glasses back to his hostess and set them down on the counter.
"Thanks. Good choice."
He bowed his head and moved to stand at her shoulder, watching her pour with an expert flourish.
"You ever sling drinks for a paycheck?" he asked. "You're doing that super gracefully. Though I'm thinking it's probably because you're just generally graceful in everything you do. It's hard for non-graceful folks like me to really have gracefulness compute in our brains when we see it happening in front of us." He thunked his head a few times with the heel of his palm.
She smirked at him. "A short stint while I was getting my degree. Nothing too impressive. Those tips were helpful for the grocery bills."
"I bet they were!"
Then she picked up their drinks and handed him his. He took it with a grateful head nod. "Well, here's to…um…" She pursed her lips thoughtfully and seemed at a loss for words.
"The absolute best distraction from the stress and anxiety of the night before a new job and every other stressful thing going on in my life I could've possibly stumbled onto."
She gave him an empathetic look but then she narrowed her eyes. "Mmm, no, actually, the stumble was just that damn step on the bus."
He cracked up and she grinned, looking pleased with herself. As she should. She'd caught him completely by surprise in the best way. He really liked this woman. A lot. "You're right. Fuck that step."
Her tongue poked out a little between her teeth and she lifted her glass again. "To finally being able to take a deep breath."
He smiled slowly and clinked his glass with hers. "Cheers."
"Cheers."
Their eyes met and that feeling he'd had in the bar, the utter warmth flooding through his entire body, came back, took over from the slight discomfort and awkwardness since she let them both into her building, the reality of what they were doing dumping a bit of cold water over the proceedings.
But the chill from the cold water was gone now. And the warmth was back in its place.
He took a sip of his whiskey, not breaking her gaze. "This is some really good whiskey," he muttered quietly, setting the glass down.
She swallowed her gin, looking down at the glass, and just like that she was closing the foot of distance between them and cupping his face, pressing her lips to his again. He hadn't been prepared for how quickly it had happened, and then at the same time he was fully prepared, ready, and honestly hoping.
The air around them felt like it was crackling with electricity as he kissed her back, rounding her waist with his arms and pulling her in tight.
He was more than okay with this. Just standing here, tasting the gin on her lips, a hint of rose and something else refreshing on her tongue as it swiped over his. And when her hand dragged into his hair and her fingers twisted in his curls, he unconsciously let out a quiet growl.
She froze a bit and pulled back, just enough for their eyes to meet, noses still brushing.
Chuck let out a rough breath. "Oh my God," he whispered.
She just nodded.
"What is—?"
"I don't know."
"Me neither. I'm…just going to let that be okay."
She nodded again and he kissed her harder, smiling into her lips as she grabbed his blazer and pushed it over his shoulders, down his arms. She broke the kiss and desperately tossed his blazer over the counter, grabbing his hand and pulling him after her as she backed towards the hallway. "Bedroom," she muttered.
God, what in the hell was even happening?
He just nodded and leaned in to keep kissing her. He kissed her with enough of a wild abandon, getting her out of her own blazer in the meantime, pawing and clawing at her blouse to pull it out of her skirt, that he didn't even know where they were going or how fast until she bumped her back into the doorframe and broke the kiss with an, "Ow. Graceful, you said?"
He laughed breathlessly against her smiling lips. "Still applies."
And then he looked down at her blazer in his hand, wondering where he was supposed to put it, halfway inside of the hall that led to her bedroom, their eventual goal.
She snatched it out of his hand and threw it on the floor.
"Oh."
Giggling, she grabbed his face and pulled him down to kiss him some more. And then she was suddenly shorter and he blinked down her body, still pressing pursed lips to hers. Oh, she'd taken her heels off. That made sense.
Even while none of this made sense and all of it made sense, the first God damn sense he'd experienced in a really long freaking time.
When they got halfway down the hallway, Chuck found his back pressed against the wall, his shirt pulled out of his pants, and while her fingers attacked the buttons of his dress shirt, her lips pressed against his, before dragging down his jaw, and fastening to his neck just under his ear.
"Oh."
She giggled into his ear. "You're saying that an awful lot."
"Just…yeah, ignore it."
Her teeth caught his earlobe gently and he groaned out another, "Oh" without even meaning to.
Chuckling breathlessly, she grabbed and loosened his tie, breaking the kiss with a manic grin on her face as she pulled the tie off over his head, getting his shirt down his arms and off as well. "Can I leave these on the floor?"
"I don't give a fuck," he breathed quickly, kissing her again, and she giggled into his mouth. He stepped closer to her, and he kept stepping, until she was the one with her back against the wall. She let out a surprised gasp and he swallowed it with an open-mouthed kiss, which he eventually trailed down her jaw the same way she'd done to him.
Whimpering, she gave him a tug and they stumbled the rest of the way down the hall until their shoulders slammed into the bedroom door to open it all the way. He didn't take the time to look around him, to take in where she slept every night, where she woke up in the morning and got ready to tackle her life, the same life that was apparently giving her stress, too.
She broke their kiss as they neared her bed and he found her fingers latching onto his belt buckle, tugging at it, unbuckling it.
And then something occurred to him.
This woman was taking his belt off, unbuttoning his pants, clasping the zipper tab between her fingers, about to give herself more access to him, and that. And he didn't even know what her name was. And she didn't know his.
Swallowing hard, he took a step back and gently pulled her hands from his front, before he let go of her and met her wide-eyed, purple-hazed look with one of his own. Before she could get the wrong idea, he stuck his hand out in the space between them for a shake. "Chuck. I'm Chuck."
The confusion was gone, realization spilling through her features, amusement there for just a second. And then she dropped the smile and replaced it with a smirk. She eyed his hand and slowly, methodically unbuttoned her blouse, before peeling it off. He bit his lip to keep from breathing out the word she'd just teased him about. But God, help him, he was in so much trouble.
When her blue eyes lifted back to his, there wasn't that beautiful sparkle anymore so much as there was a delicious spark. "Nice to meet you, Chuck. I'm Sarah."
He pulled his lips between his teeth and narrowed his eyes. "This is so much better than a handshake."
She laughed and grabbed his hand, using it to pull him in against her, shoving at his pants to get them down to his ankles, before giving him a gentle push. It was enough for him to crash down onto the mattress with a yelp. And then he laughed as she undid her skirt, let it fall to her ankles, stepped out of it, and crawled over him.
He returned her kiss with vigor, putting his hands on her bare skin and feeling her shiver on top of him.
She grabbed his hands and slammed them up against the bed over his head, kissing up and down his face, lowering her lips to his jaw and neck.
Chuck groaned. "Sarah. You're Sarah. Sarah's a good name. I like your name, Sarah. I like what you're doing with…that. Right there." His eyelids fluttered. "Did you ever think we'd be here? A few hours ago, the two of us watching a couple tear each other apart together from the back of the bus? Laughing together? And now this. Life's crazy… It's so crazy."
Sarah giggled again, her chest bouncing against his. "You're rambling, Chuck," she breathed, kissing the spot right behind his ear.
"S-Sorry. I know. I know, I'm just—I do this when I'm nervous. Sorry."
She pulled back and raised her eyebrow. "You're nervous?"
"I've never done this before," he admitted. "This is so crazy and I've never done this before."
"Me neither," she said, shaking her head, smiling down at him. And then she took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
"This is…unconquered territory," he breathed, swallowing hard.
She kissed his cheek, then his lips, letting go of his arms and propping herself up with her elbows on either side of him. "It's cute you think I'm the one about to be conquered."
Chuck blinked, his face crumbling in awe, outright desire coursing through him. As she lowered her face to kiss him intentionally, emitting a quiet whimper, he felt her hand drape over him below the proverbial belt and he decided to just shut the fuck up.
}o{
Sarah woke up a whole thirty minutes before the alarm she'd set. She hadn't wanted to set an alarm, but she had a job to get to. And with everything else Graham was pinning on her, she didn't want being late, or worse, skipping work, to give him more fodder.
Even so, she regretted it.
She regretted that she had to go to work. What she really wanted was to stay cocooned in her bed, all wrapped up in the covers, this guy's face buried in her neck, his arm draped heavily over her side, the other one smashed between her and the mattress. She wondered if his arm would be asleep when he woke up. She wondered, would he mind much if it was?
And she also wondered how she was supposed to function at her damn job when she'd gotten almost no sleep at all thanks to this guy.
Chuck.
Sarah smiled as she recollected how long they'd spent together last night before he realized they'd never even told one another their names. And they'd been mostly undressed, seconds away from climbing into bed together.
Chuck was right. This was nuts.
And she wasn't lying to him when she told him she'd never done this before. She'd never done anything even remotely close to this before.
But it was incredible.
Not just the sex—as good as the sex was—but the moments that slipped in between the sex, too. The teasing, laughing, and warm looks. How well he fit pressed against her, her arms wrapped around him, and how as they chatted about everything besides what gave them stress—an unspoken agreement between them—it had felt like when you're doing a puzzle and you try to jam pieces together to no avail until you finally find the one that perfectly slides into place without forcing it. Listening had always come so easy to her, but the words had come just as easily with him.
He knew that the neighbor down the hall spied on everyone else on the floor. He knew she'd grown up closer to San Diego but that she moved to D.C. for a few years before coming back to Los Angeles for school. He knew she loved LA and that D.C. had felt oppressive by comparison.
And she knew that he had a sister, and his sister had a boyfriend he'd dubbed "Captain Awesome". And she knew that the nickname annoyed his sister but left her boyfriend overjoyed. She knew that his best friend had been trying to set him up with women ever since he got out of college but that he'd successfully fended off his attempts for the most part.
She also knew what the curls she was playing with between her fingers now felt like against her body. And his fingers. His lips.
…God, his tongue.
Sarah took a deep breath.
It had been so worth the broken car. She might literally hug that damn car when she saw it again.
Because if its battery hadn't died on her way home from work, she'd be in bed alone at that very moment, still dogged by the day she'd had yesterday, dreading having to face another day in which she'd have to sit in one of her boss's offices and either get yet another assignment, or get chewed out for not miraculously solving all of his problems in one fell swoop.
Instead of that alternate fate, she'd had to climb onto a bus where she had witnessed a blow-out between a married couple and heard a cute guy behind her try in vain to suppress his laughter over how over-the-top the fight at the front of the bus was. And all of that had gotten her here, with his body cuddled up against hers, his warm feet covering her much colder ones she noticed. Even in his sleep, there seemed to be an innate kindness to him. He was so effortlessly sweet.
And as hot as last night had been, there'd also been laughter. A lot of laughter.
God, she'd just had fun. She dove in headfirst and let it all wash over her. And it felt so good to just let herself have fun and enjoy. She couldn't remember the last time she'd allowed herself to just enjoy life.
He'd forced her to last night.
Sarah found herself flooded with gratefulness.
But then he shifted a bit, letting out a quiet, tired groan, nuzzling deeper into her embrace, before slowly blinking his eyes open and pulling his face back just enough to look at her. "Oh."
"There it is," she drawled, giggling.
He blushed. "I didn't realize how often I respond with that until last night."
"Sorry I ruined it for you," she said, smiling. "You sleep well?"
"What sleep?" he asked a tad cockily, and he rolled onto his back to stretch, but found his arm still jammed under her. He turned back to blink in adorable confusion at his arm being trapped.
"Sorry." She lifted her body just enough for him to pull his arm back. "You can have that back."
"Thanks," he said with a smile, shaking it out a little. Then he stretched, giving her a good view of his bare torso. She checked him out for a moment, then turned her gaze back to his face. "Holy crap, I'm so glad I got onto that bus when I did. I regretted it so much when Brett and Tammy started to go at it. But what a complete one-eighty."
She laughed, rolling onto her back and blinking up at the ceiling. He couldn't even imagine how much of a turnaround last night was for her. "I can relate."
It felt so strange, lying in bed like this, with him, even as the sun had already come up…this man she'd only met maybe twelve hours earlier still cuddled up under her bed's covers. He'd been a total stranger last night, and now… Well, now they'd had a lot of sex. They'd slept together, actually sleeping, even if it wasn't much.
And then at the same time, she was so befuddled and thrown off by how…not-strange it felt. It just felt good. It felt real and human and maybe it had even been risky.
But she was still breathing, deep calming breaths. She didn't feel the pressures she'd felt yesterday. That horrible lump had been resting in her chest, her eyes stinging as if she was on the edge of tears, the whole time she was trying to call her insurance company for a tow. And somehow, Chuck and his snorting, his self-deprecating jokes, the way he was surprised at first by the fact that she flirted with him and then dove into the flirtation in his own right headfirst, and finally the full-body release she'd experienced when they embraced late last night…all of it had made the lump in her chest disappear.
Suddenly, the stress and that feeling of being totally overwrought by life in general didn't seem like that big of a deal. It felt manageable.
She'd let it all get the best of her.
And all she'd really needed to do was figure out how to breathe again.
Chuck had made room for her to breathe last night without even realizing that was what he was doing.
So she rolled over and just peered at him for a few seconds, letting him catch her staring a bit, and then he turned his head to stare right back.
"I need you to know that you're just as extremely beautiful this morning as you were last night."
She felt herself blushing, turning her grin into her pillow and burrowing a bit.
Sarah turned her grin back to him and shook her head. "Thank you. And you're just as sweet. If not more so. What with your cute li'l curls going every which way." She reached over and played with one of said curls.
His giggle made her chest fill with warmth.
But before she could say anything else, her alarm went off. She groaned. How had it already been thirty minutes? Had she watched him sleep that long? Was she that creepy?
Rolling over, she smacked at her nightstand until she felt her phone against her fingertips and she grabbed it, turning off the alarm before putting it back. "Damn it," she breathed.
"Work?"
"Yes." She groaned again, rolling onto her stomach and burying her face in her pillow, letting out a frustrated growl.
She felt his warm hand against the skin of her upper back, rubbing comfortingly. And she smiled into her pillow again. But then his hand froze.
"Wait, what time is it?"
Sarah lifted her face. "Seven-thirty. Why? Oh shit! Your new job! Did I—?"
"Oh, thank God." Relief swept over his face. "No, it's okay. I'm not late for my first day. Don't worry. I've got a few hours." He whistled and chuckled. "I was terrified for a second that it was ten o'clock or something."
But then he sat up, the covers falling into his lap, and he stretched again. She felt a longing ache in her chest, knowing what it meant. He'd be leaving now. And she'd be getting dressed and going to work.
"I'm gonna get outta your hair, though," he said, turning to look down at her, ruffling his dark curls vigorously and making them stick up even more. "So you can get ready for work and everything. And that'll give me plenty of time to psyche myself out for my first day of work!" he chirped with a toothy sarcastic grin on his face.
"You're going to do great, I'm sure," she said, reaching out to squeeze his forearm.
He grinned, then lunged down towards her to kiss her. It was a long kiss, and still it felt chaste compared to what she was hungry for.
She didn't have the time for an encore of last night. And wasn't she a damn glutton wanting more than what she'd gotten—which was quite a damn lot.
Then he swung the covers off of him and hurriedly stood up from the bed, affording her a very appealing view for a good fifteen seconds before he could find his boxers and slip them on.
Sarah finally got out of bed, too, grabbing a robe and throwing that on for now. "Want coffee before you go? Breakfast?" she asked.
He raised his eyebrows. "Oh, I—No, that's okay. I'm just going to let you do what you have to before work and snag something on my way back to my apartment. Thank you, though. I appreciate the offer."
She loved how sincere everything sounded and felt with this guy. Even the smallest things, he seemed to do with all his heart and soul.
She loved the idea of that. Maybe that was why it was so easy to breathe around him and to feel like it was okay for her to be herself.
She helped him find the rest of his clothes strewn about the room, finally handing him the sneakers she'd somehow missed him wearing last night. A nice suit and then sneakers. It felt so him.
And Sarah had to remind herself she didn't know him. His name was Chuck and he had a sister with a boyfriend he called "Captain Awesome". And he had a job interview today.
And he also really, really liked when she put her hands anywhere near his hair. He also wasn't shy at all about how much he enjoyed giving her pleasure.
Those were enough to know that he might actually be that very rare one in a billion type of guy.
The type of guy she wanted to see again.
Sarah went over to her phone and grabbed it off of her nightstand as he straightened to his full height from where he'd just put on his socks and shoes, his shirt and tie somewhere out in the hallway as she remembered it.
She crossed to him and held it out to him. "I'm gonna need a phone number."
"Just any old phone number?"
Giving him a look, she chuckled, spotting the cheekiness in his features. "You know damn well I mean yours. If, um…" She shifted her weight then, pulling the phone back a little. "If that's okay?"
His grin was answer enough, but then he took her phone from her and put his number in, handing it back. "Text me and, um, wherever my phone is, I'll have yours…" He patted his pants pockets and let out a cute little, "A ha!" tugging it out of his back pocket.
Sarah input his name, realizing she'd never put another Chuck in her phone before, then she sent him a text. She waited with bated breath for him to receive her text.
His phone buzzed and he looked at his screen. She saw him almost laugh but then he said with a straight face, "What the hell? Some random number just sent me a text and all it says is 'Naughty emoji'. This is weird."
She cracked up and he let himself laugh then, shaking his head.
"Annnnnd…Sarah." He typed her name in. "In parentheses, blue eyes."
She raised an eyebrow. "You have another Sarah in there with green eyes?"
"I…don't. There are no other Sarahs in my phone. Just you."
"Hm…" She smiled at him for a long time, and he smiled back. Then he shook himself a little and put his phone back in his pocket. "Gotta go?" she asked.
"Yeah. Unfortunately. I should, um…get the rest of my clothes, though." He blushed as he led her down the hallway and knelt down to sweep his shirt and tie off of the floor, tossing the shirt on and slinging the tie around his neck.
She didn't know what prompted her to do it, but she stepped in to button the shirt for him. And he let her, his eyes fastened on her face. She could feel it, but she kept her own eyes focused on the task at hand.
"Don't, um, don't forget the suit jacket." She cleared her throat. "In my kitchen."
"Right. I almost forgot."
She followed him to the kitchen. "Sure you don't even want a cup of coffee? One cup?"
"Oh, I want. Trust me. I want more than that, even." He draped the jacket over his arm and leaned in to kiss her right at the corner of her mouth, making her heart race. "But…we've both got places to be."
"You have my number," she said, trying not to sound too desperate as they reached her apartment door. "Use it, huh?"
He bit his lip. "Let me put it this way: if you don't hear from me in the next day or two, I'm definitely dead. Because that's literally the only thing that's gonna keep me from calling you." She made a face and he winced. "Sorry, that was macabre." She giggled. "Let me instead finish this incredibly beautiful interlude we had in these last twelve hours or so with this."
And he leaned in to kiss her square on the mouth, holding her close as she slung her arms over his shoulders and held on tight.
She hummed as he pulled back finally. And then he grinned in that way of his. "See you soon, Sarah."
"Mmm. You will."
She let him pull away and walk out of her apartment, shutting the door behind him, and she slumped forward, her head thunking lightly against the cool wood of the door. She beamed and sighed, before a happy laugh spilled out of her.
}o{
Chuck looked up at the office building and let out the long breath he'd been holding pretty much ever since he climbed off of the bus. He had his messenger bag slung over his shoulder, his laptop inside, a folder with some of the documents they said they may need from him from for his first day, and a smattering of programming samples.
He lightly pat his hair, having done his best to control it at least a bit, considering the outfit he was working for now had to have an actual dress code, unlike Roark Industries where a bunch of nerds sat around in flip-flops, jeans, and sweatshirts.
He finally walked inside and went to the front desk, giving the intern-aged looking young man the name of his new employer and being sent to the eighth floor.
Stepping into the elevator, he fixed his tie a bit and took another calming breath.
This was it.
He'd gotten the job already. He'd done the tough stuff, the nerve-wracking stuff. He'd gotten through the interview, he'd apparently really impressed them since he'd gotten the call back the very next day telling him the job was his.
He had Roark Industries in his rearview mirror. Well, in the bus's rearview mirror.
Gladly. He wouldn't even look back.
Screw Ted Roark and his whole damn corporation.
He felt so much better about everything now. It was like everything was finally starting to fall into place. He'd had a skip in his step all morning.
He'd escaped the shitscape that was Ted Roark's warped world. He'd found himself a much better job with employers who had actually sat and listened to him, encouraged him and his ideas, and then hired him. They had faith in his abilities, even expected him to rise to the occasion. He'd moved to a new place that was closer to his new job. Pretty soon here he'd be buying a car, too.
And yet, somehow all of that had been eclipsed last night, and into this morning.
He'd met a woman.
In the craziest way. But still.
She'd turned his entire world upside down in just twelve hours. And then she'd asked for his phone number. Granted, if she hadn't asked him, he would've asked her before he let himself leave her place.
He was ready to text or call her right now, actually. Even if it broke some sort of rule about how soon you should call a woman after a date, or a…spur of the moment, met on a bus and got drinks then slept together non-date.
But he had to be on task now. He had to bring his A-game. This was Day One of what he hoped was an illustrious journey with this firm. Something rewarding finally. Something that challenged him but didn't grind him into the dirt every damn day.
Something totally and completely disconnected from his personal life.
He didn't think his new bosses would be rattling on about knowing his dad back in college and asking whether Chuck thought his dad would be proud or disappointed in the work he was putting into his job.
Roark was such a patronizing, manipulative bastard.
"Excuse me. My name's Chuck Bartowski," he said to the first person he saw. She was standing by herself at the empty office assistant desk, thumbing through some documents.
She looked at him over her shoulder and smirked.
"Well, well. Cute name. Cute suit, too," she said, turning to face him and raising an eyebrow.
"Uh…th-thank you. I'm, um, the new guy. This is my first day. I was told to ask for—Oh. Okay."
She waved for him to follow her. "Through here. You'll find her in her office. I imagine she's expecting you if she hired you."
"If she…? Okay, thank you. B-Bye…" he finished quietly as she pat his shoulder and hurried off. "If she hired me?" he muttered to himself. He'd been hired.
Shaking it off, he straightened his suit and made his way towards the office the redhead had pointed him towards.
}o{
Sarah looked up at her door when she heard the knock and sighed, shutting her eyes. She really thought she could sneak into her office and get work done for a few hours without being interrupted. But what was she thinking?
Getting work done without being interrupted?
When was that a realistic possibility?
"Come in," she said loud enough for whoever it was to hear.
The door opened and Langston Graham strode in. "Sarah. Good morning. Do you have the case files for Mr. Noraga?"
"The ones the LAPD sent over?"
"Yes."
She nodded and moved her chair to the file cabinet on her right, pulling open the drawer, thumbing through the files, finding Noraga, and tugging it out. She rolled back up to her desk as she shut the drawer, thrusting the file out towards him. "Here it is."
"Thank you." Then he turned to leave, but paused. She got a bad feeling about that pause.
This was his modus operandi. He would pretend to come for a case file or something else, and then he'd start to leave and he'd stop, and he'd ask her to do a job on top of everything else she was working on. Or he'd offer some "friendly" advice on how she was handling a case.
"You know what, Sarah? I think you'd be perfect for this."
And there it was.
"Perfect for what, Mr. Graham?"
"Are you in the middle of something, or can you come with me?"
She inwardly sighed, but outwardly smiled at him and nodded. "Of course."
She saved and closed what she was handling on her computer, then pushed away from the desk and stood, fixing what Carina called her "power suit" and coming around the desk. "What can I help you with, sir?"
"Quit with the 'sir' stuff, first of all. It makes me feel old." She rolled her eyes a little where he couldn't see her. "But we're trying something new here at the Beckman Graham firm. Granted, we'll need a trial period, but you are absolutely by and far the most patient person we have in our firm. Including Diane and I. That's what this is going to require."
"Great," she drawled. "Mr. Graham, I've been with this firm for years. I have a lot to do. Work piling up on my desk, as you know. And now you're tasking me with something that's going to require a lot of patience? That doesn't sound good to me."
He smirked over his shoulder at her. "I knew you'd say that. We'll make sure we get some paralegals to help you handle the busy work. This is top priority stuff."
Sarah raised her eyebrows. Top priority? He was tasking her with something that was top priority?
She just nodded when he caught her eye.
"We're trying to streamline our practice. As it is, Diane and I feel our attorneys are busy with paperwork eighty percent of the time…and actually working on the meat of a case? More like twenty percent. We think we've just hired someone who has the potential to make it easier for us to cross check our work and make sure actions are compliant with the law." Sarah raised her eyebrows at that. "You know, the menial tasks, but also things that are replicable…tasking that to a computer program."
"A what? Do you mean…foisting our work off onto a computer?"
"We're representing contracts with programs. Imagine how many clients we could pump through this thing without lifting a finger?"
"Mr. Graham, I feel like…trusting a machine to handle an entire case is just asking for a malpractice suit, wouldn't you say? What if it…makes a mistake?"
"Humans are far more liable to do that," he said, chuckling. "And if we have this kid we've just hired running this all through his programs, scaling it all for us, you'll get to actually focus on the stuff you went into law school for. The fun stuff. Everything that makes what we do worth it." He turned to face her as they arrived at the door to one of their firm's conference rooms. "You know, those edge cases that you love working on so much."
"The meat?" she asked, smirking a little.
"The meat." He winked and opened the door to the room. "Diane, I brought our translator with me."
Translator? Oh, shit. What did that mean?
"Oh, good." Diane was leaning over someone's shoulder, looking at a large computer screen. That must be the kid.
This all sounded like such a bad idea to her.
"Sarah, we want you to be the first to meet our new hire." She clasped her hand down on the man's shoulder and he turned away from the computer to face her full on, swiveling in his chair.
She nearly fell right on her ass.
"Sarah Walker is one of our lead litigators at the Beckman Graham firm," Diane announced, gesturing toward Sarah. But Sarah was still hyper-focused on him. "Sarah, this is Chuck Bartowski. He's our new legal engineer."
"Oh."
No.
Fucking.
Way.
A/N: I know. I know I know I know, some of you thought I'd do it and kudos to you, but also damn you. (shakes fist) Hahaha! Please keep reviewing. I genuinely appreciate you all.
-SC