Free The Personal Assistant by Penny Ward

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    Love can be a bitch.
    I found out the hard way because in fairy tales, no one writes about the handsome prince being a liar and a cheat.
    My ex-boyfriend Greg compiled massive gambling debts and then left me as soon as I was laid off my job. I’m not sure which of those situations hurt most.
    The restaurant that I was waitressing for went bankrupt three months ago and I have been hunting hard for a job ever since. I must have completed one hundred job applications and visited twenty employment agencies in search for work. Day in, day out, I have hunted for another job. That is my life now.
    The night that I announced that the restaurant was closing down, Greg walked out the door. He said that if I didn’t have a job, then I was of no use to him. Bastard.
    Apparently, he had been sleeping with my hairdresser for months. At least that explained the bad haircuts I received on my last two trips there. Bitch.
    As I slowly make my way to my bus stop with my head hung low, a slick red Ferrari pulls up next to me and winds down a window.
    A deep smooth voice calls out, “Hello. May I request a moment of your time - I have a proposal for you.”
    I stop to glare at the car. “Oh, I bet you do.”
    Before I let loose the string of expletives queuing up on my tongue, I wonder if the director of the employment agency realized how unfair it is to deny me a job, and he came to find me...in a Ferrari?
    I scoff at my absurd knack for wishful thinking.
    “Get lost. I’m in no mood for bullshit.”
    I walk on, but the car purrs beside me.
    “Won’t you please stop? I promise you, you’re in no danger.” The voice is seductively smooth.
    How am I dressed?
    Do I really look like a street-hooker?
    Looking down at my clothes, I check my nice white shirt and tight black business skirt.
    Nope.
    I absolutely am not dressed like a street worker.
    I’m glad to see a few people watching this spectacle, so at least if I am grabbed off the street, someone will get this driver’s license plate for the police.
    Still, I pick up my walking pace.
    “No, I’m not stopping,” I shout over my shoulder. “So far, I’m having a lousy day and being kidnapped isn’t top of my to-do list for the rest of it. I’m sure you’ll understand.”
    The sports car stops behind me but I carry on toward my bus stop, deciding he wants a hooker, not a broke waitress.
    Why he is looking for prostitute outside an employment agency in the middle of the day is anyone’s guess.
    I hear a car door slam shut behind me.
    Instinct spins me around, and I raise my heavy handbag in feeble defense. “I said no, you’re in the wrong part of town for this.”
    While I protest, I blink repeatedly to grasp the gorgeousness of the man marching towards me.
    Tall at over 6’6,” slim but broad shouldered, and dressed in exquisite tailoring made from Italian cashmere—at a guess—he peers down at me from his lofty height with the palest, most beautiful gaze.
    He holds out his arms at his sides. “You see? I’m not scary, am I?”
    The dark-haired man contorts his perfect sculptured face into a grin that would make most panties moist.
    “We’re out in public, so you can see I mean you no harm. Please spare me one moment of your time, yes?”
    My mouth becomes a hammock. A useless, wordless hammock, “Um...”
    “Thank you. Thing is, I watched you enter the employment agency with your head held high and your chest puffed out, all full of hope - strong. Then I watched you leave the agency so deflated. Of course, for most people employment agencies aren’t wonderful places, but you’re...forlorn.”
    What? I have a stalker now?
    “Bet you don’t have employment problems.” I snap back.
    “No, I don’t. But I’m talking about you. You...intrigue me.”
    “Sure I do,” I say. “Are you so rich you’ve got nothing better to do than bother ‘forlorn’ women with no job?”
    “Perhaps I need a distraction? Either way, I think I know how to make