One Mad Night by Julia London Page A

going to go and process this. But I’ll see you tomorrow.”
    â€œRight,” he said. She turned to go, but Ian caught her mittened hand and pulled her back. He wrapped her in an embrace and said, “Whatever happens, I just want you to know that tonight was…it was incredible,” he said. “I know that’s a weird thing to say, but I really…I hope things are okay between us.”
    He lowered his head to kiss her, but she suddenly rose up and kissed him on the corner of his mouth and then patted him on the chest. “Not to worry,” she said lightly. “I’d better go.” She turned and disappeared into the entrance to the subway.
    Ian watched her walk down the steps until she had disappeared into the bowels of the subway.
    And still, Ian didn’t move. That was the worst brush-off kiss he’d ever received in his life. Hell, it may have been the only brush-off kiss he’d ever received. But that’s what it was and Ian didn’t like it, not one bit.
    It took Ian two hours to get home. He showered and collapsed, exhausted, onto his bed.
    A few hours later, he received a robo-call from Grabber-Paulson. It was Brad’s cheerful voice informing employees that work was canceled due to the unusual spring blizzard. They would resume normal activities on Monday.
    That gave Ian three full days to ruminate about Chelsea Crawford.
    He wanted to talk to her, to explain that the night in the office had meant something to him. He wanted her to understand it was a big deal to him, because those sorts of encounters rarely meant so much to him. He didn’t know exactly what it meant, but he knew he wasn’t going to let it go without fighting for it.
    Unfortunately, he didn’t know how to get hold of Chelsea. By Saturday evening, he wanted to speak to her so badly that he swallowed his pride and called Zimmerman to ask if he had her number.
    â€œChelsea Crawford?” Zimmerman said. “Why?”
    â€œAh…to tell her the pitch is rescheduled.”
    â€œWhy are you calling her to tell her? Why isn’t Jason?”
    Since when had Zimmerman been such a busybody? “Don’t know. They asked me to do it.”
    â€œThat seems weird, man,” Zimmerman said.
    â€œDo you have her number or not?” Ian demanded.
    â€œNo,” Zimmerman said cheerfully. “Tell Jason or whoever put you up to it that admin is not your job.”
    â€œYeah, okay. Thanks,” Ian said. He got off the phone before Zimmerman could launch into chatting about himself, as he was wont to do.
    Ian was cross and antsy, and his mood did not improve. He began to wonder if he’d just imagined the things he’d felt with Chelsea or if they were real. There was only one way to find out, but the city was only slowly crawling out from under the blizzard.
    By Sunday, Ian felt he’d explode if he didn’t get out of his apartment. He walked down the street to the gym and ran five miles on the treadmill.
    That wasn’t enough.
    He ran two more, and still he felt mixed up, turned inside out, upside down, by a girl.
    He ran ten miles, thinking about that night in the offices. Yes, he thought about the sex, but mostly he thought about Chelsea, and the way her eyes shimmered when she laughed, and how easy she was to get along with. Easy ! And for these last few months, he’d thought her uptight and inflexible. But she wasn’t like that at all, she was funny and warm and pretty and smart. She was all the things he liked in a woman.
    He thought a lot about how this thing with Tesla had gone down. It was a horrible way to treat a trusted, productive employee, and Ian felt for Chelsea. He pictured her in an apartment in Brooklyn, staring at the television or maybe maniacally cleaning the toilet—
    Okay, so he didn’t know Chelsea well enough to know what she’d do in a situation like this. But he wanted to know. More than anything, he