Free Made For Us by Samantha Chase

hand in.”
    “ Burden of my wrath ,” he deadpanned. “Seriously?”
    Crossing her arms across her chest, Zoe gave him a level stare. “You have a reputation. We’ll leave it at that.”
    He snatched up the paper and signed where she had indicated and then slid it back across the counter to her. “Anything else?”
    “That depends on the next piece of paper you give me.”
    He sighed—loudly—and raked a hand through his hair. “Is there some sort of problem here? I mean, you understand that I’m the boss and that you’re working for me, right? The only reason you’re here is because your firm screwed up.”
    If he had slapped her, she wouldn’t have felt this bad. Relaxing her arms at her sides, Zoe cleared her throat and picked up her tablet. “What time are the painters coming?”
    He went over the schedule for the day with her. Together they walked through the house, and this time it was Aidan who did most of the talking while Zoe took notes. An hour later, when they were done, he gave her his business card with his cell phone number on it, in case she had any questions about the house, and left.
    “Well, that was totally awful,” she said, sighing after she heard his truck pull away. She tossed his business card in the bottom of her briefcase and vowed that unless the house was on fire, she wasn’t going to call him. Pulling out her paint chart, Zoe quickly began going through it to find all of Aidan’s selections. She had a lot to do, and with the paint samples in hand, she could move forward with accessorizing and redoing everything Sarah had done.
    A glance at her watch showed that it was still early, so she gathered her things and walked out to her car. There was plenty of time to go through the showroom back at the office and do some online shopping in the comfort of her own space. She’d come back and meet with the painters later to make sure they had all the correct colors.
    She prayed they’d have the right colors.
    It was too early in the job for her to have to do battle with Aidan Shaughnessy…again.
    * * *
    She’d worked at a feverish pace to stay on schedule, completely consumed with the need to make everything perfect on this job. By the end of the day, Zoe was exhausted, and she looked it. Martha happened to walk by her office and did a double take. “Good grief, Zoe, it’s only been a day. Surely it’s not all that bad!”
    Slouching in her seat, Zoe combed her mass of curly hair away from her face with her fingers and tugged as if to pull it out. “The man is infuriating. I’m second-, third-, and even fourth-guessing every single item I pick out for this house. It’s…it’s…”
    “Maddening?”
    Zoe nodded. Pulling up a chair, Martha sat and looked at Zoe with a reassuring smile. “You have to be confident in what you’re doing. I think men like Aidan Shaughnessy feed on other people’s weaknesses. If you go in there with confidence and present what you’ve done, he’s not going to give you a hard time.”
    “Are we sure about that?” Zoe asked. “Because it seems to me that I could get every single item he handpicked for this place and he’d still find a problem with something.”
    Martha chuckled. “I know it seems that way, but things just got off to a rough start. You’re going to go in there and fix it and make it right. How can he have a problem with that?”
    Letting out a breath, Zoe sat back up in her chair. “Okay, you’re right. I know you’re right. I let him get under my skin and I should know better. Sorry.”
    “You have nothing to apologize for. I think it’s great that you want to make this work so badly, but don’t make yourself crazy,” Martha said with a laugh. “I knew you were the perfect person for this job. It’ll get easier. I promise.”
    “I hope you’re right, Martha.” Zoe knew she wasn’t but was too tired to argue about it. With a quick wave and a smile, Martha left.
    Zoe looked at her watch and saw it was almost