What You Need

Over the next few weeks, Patrice and his department had been busy at work. The company got hired to work with the Planet Organic Market and they were all busy trying to finalize everything. Patrice and Lila were currently hard at work in his office on a dull Wednesday afternoon. They were busy setting up employee files for the workers of P.O.M, making sure that each employee would get paid.

Lila let out a big yawn as she lazily pulled her hair back into a pony tail. They were almost finished with the files but had been working for a few hours straight. They were both exhausted and just wanted a little break.

Patrice rubbed his tired face as he leaned back into his office chair. He didn’t realize how much paper work would be involved. He knew it would be worth it though. Andrew was a great friend so he owed Patrice big time.

“Okay, I think we need a break,” Lila sighed, being careful as she rubbed her eyes. She didn’t want to ruin her eye makeup. “I’m gonna head to the cafeteria and grab a snack. Do you want me to grab you anything?”

“I’ll walk down with you. I need to stretch my legs,” he said with a tired expression.

Patrice followed Lila out of his office and waited as she grabbed her wallet out of her purse. In the elevator, they stood in a somewhat comfortable silence. He glanced at her every so often because he liked how she looked for work. When she caught him staring, he quickly looked away and shoved his hands in his pockets. She giggled quietly as he pretended that nothing had even happened.

When the elevator came to a stop, he was a gentlemen and let her step off first. After entering the cafeteria they each bought a drink and a bag of cookies to share. Lila tried to pay but of course Patrice wouldn’t have it.

“God, I can’t wait for the weekend to come,” Lila groaned as she sat down in the semi-crowded room. She tried twisting the cap off of her iced tea but struggled to do so. Patrice bit his lip to prevent himself from laughing and simply reached over to grab her drink. With a little flick of his wrist, he twisted the cap off.

“Here you go,” he smiled.

She grabbed her drink with a frown. “I loosened it up for you.”

“Of course you did,” he replied casually as he grabbed the bag of cookies. He could feel her glare at him as he opened the bag of chocolate chip cookies. “Any interesting plans this weekend?”

Lila shook her head as she grabbed one of the cookies. “Just doing some laundry. What about you? Have a hot date?”

Patrice barked out a laugh. “No, no hot date. Milan is throwing a party this Saturday and wanted to know if you and Rachel wanted to go.” He finished off his first cookie in seconds. Men.

She raised her eyebrows, surprised that they were even invited. “Really? Are there going to be a lot of people there?”

“I'm not too sure, honestly. Milan is still pretty young so anything could happen,” Patrice said with a shrug, grabbing a second cookie. “He just asked me to invite you and Rachel.”

She had to admit that she was pretty excited for the party. She hadn’t been out in a while and she thought that meeting new people would be fun as well. But she wondered if Patrice was going to be there. The idea of him in a relaxed environment surround by all his friends sounded too good to be true. Maybe she could finally break down that barrier and get inside his head.

“Are you going to be there too?” He didn’t verbally respond; he nodded his head. “Are you going to be okay with me being there?”

He looked surprised that she would even ask. “Of course I’ll be okay with it. Are you going to be okay with being there?”

She rolled her eyes as she pushed the bag of cookies over to give him the last one. “I just want to make sure you’re okay with it since I work for you. I know you’re not too crazy about hanging out with people from the office.”

He didn’t know that she knew that about him. If it were anyone else he would’ve been uncomfortable with it. Since it was her, she made the exception. And what drove him crazy was that he didn’t know why she made the exception.

“I’m going to be okay with it,” he confirmed.

She smiled at him, “I guess you’ll see you Saturday night then.”

“I will?”

She nodded her head and crumbled up the empty bag in her hand. “Yeah. Maybe I can get you drunk enough to have an embarrassing story to hold over you when it’s time for my Christmas bonus.”

The devilish wiggle of her eyebrows made his cheeks flush.


Patrice walked into Milan’s house where there was already a big crowd of people dancing and drinking. He knew that Milan would be out in the backyard since that was where he spent most of his time whenever he threw parties. He grabbed a beer from the cooler before trying to find the host of the party.

Once stepping outside in the cool Boston air he spotted Rachel and Milan sitting at the patio table. He knew Lila couldn’t be too far away if Rachel was nearby, and he was right. As he approached the table in the backyard, he saw that Lila and Andrew were sitting across Rachel and Milan. It looked as if they were all on a double date.

He was surprised to see Andrew sitting next to Lila with his arm on the back of her chair. But he then remembered that on the following Monday morning, he and Andrew had a big meeting with Daniel and the other investors. He figured that when Milan had heard that Andrew would be in town, he invited him to the party. It had been a while since Milan and some of their other friends had seen Andrew since his move to Edmonton.

He could feel his heart beat irregularly as he watched Lila from the distance. She was dressed similarly to the night where he ran into her at the sports bar. Her outfit was so simple yet she made it look so damn good.

“Bergy! You finally made it!” Milan cheered with a big smile, “I was starting to think that you were gonna ditch the party. What the hell took you so long?”

Patrice joined everyone at the table and he could feel Lila’s eyes on him. “I was busy doing something.”

“You were watching TV again, weren’t you?” Andrew asked with a hearty laugh.

Milan groaned loudly, “seriously, Berg? You decided to come late because you were busy watching TV?”

“I only had four episodes left! I had to finish the season before I came over,” Patrice said defensively. “Lila knows how I feel!”

Rachel quickly cut in before the conversation could go any further. “No, don’t you two dare start talking about that stupid show! I’ll punch one of you in the face if you bring it up tonight.”

Patrice nervously glanced at Lila, who was giving him a small smile in return. He didn't know if Rachel was serious or not, but he didn't want to find out. As nice as Rachel was, she scared him sometimes. She was loud and dramatic and he could see how she easily got along with Milan.

“That’s fine by me,” Lila shrugged. “Patrice, let’s go inside and leave these losers alone. You can pour me a drink while we talk about how amazing Game of Thrones is.”

Lila stood up from her chair as she and Rachel began to playfully bicker with each other. Andrew had a little frown on his face as he watched her away from him and headed towards Patrice instead. Lila and Rachel exchanged some not so friendly words to each other before she tugged on Patrice’s arm, letting him know that she was ready to head inside.

The feeling of her cool skin touching his made him shudder in delight. Without a second thought, he stood up and followed her inside Milan’s house. He was hot on her tail as they squeezed through the crowed, much like how they had to do at the retirement party. He hesitantly placed his left hand on her lower back to guide her to the direction of the kitchen.

“So how long have you and Milan been friends?” Lila twisted her upper body slightly as he slid his hand away from her back. When they made eye contact with each other, he could see her lips curve into a flirtatious smile.

She found a clean spot on the counter to sit on while he tried to gather his thoughts together. “Uh, for a while now.” He slipped his beer, hoping it would help him relax a little more around her. “I’ve known him since he was 19. He worked on my car and we’ve been friends ever since.”

“You guys are so adorable,” she cooed. She slid over the bottles of juice and vodka in his direction and watched as he began to mix the drink for her.

He wasn’t sure how much she had to drink since he came a few hours late. Judging by her glossy eyes and the light flush of color that her cheeks had, she had a couple of drinks in her. “We’re not adorable,” he disagreed with her. “Why would you even say that?”

“Because,” she shrugged as she took the cup from his hand, “you just are.” She smiled at him before she sipped her drink. “So did you and Andrew hang out a lot when you guys used to work together?”

Patrice nodded at her. He wondered why she wanted to know about Andrew so suddenly. He didn’t like it and the burning sensation in his chest let him know that he was jealous.

“For the most part we did. He was still married when we worked together so he always had to go home to his girls and wife. Do you like him or something?”

You’re such an idiot, he cursed to himself. He knew he crossed his boundaries because it was none of his business. He just hoped that she would believe the lie that he was just concerned for his close friend.

“I don’t know, honestly,” she said, taking another sip from her cup. She didn’t realize how close he was standing to her until she felt him brush up against her knees. It didn’t bother her though. She liked how their conversation was so close and intimate. “I haven’t talked to him a whole lot, but he’s very sweet. His divorce freaks me out though.”

He understood why she felt the way she did. Andrew was a great guy but came with baggage and someone as young as Lila didn’t want to deal with that. For Lila’s sake, Patrice hoped that Andrew was just trying to flirt a bit with her since he hadn’t talked to a lot of woman since his divorce. He prayed that’s all Lila was to Andrew, just someone to flirt with.

He could see that she started to look a little bummed out about Andrew, so he quickly changed the subject.

“I’m gonna put my phone and keys in Milan’s room in case I lose them. Do you wanna put your jacket there?”

Lila eagerly nodded. The mix of people in the house and the alcohol was making her body temperature rise. He held her hand to help her hop off of the kitchen counter. Her legs wobbled a bit, but his solid frame was quick to keep her balanced.

She followed Patrice up the stairs until they reached the end of the hall where Milan’s bedroom was. He reached up above the door frame and pulled out a small key to unlock the bedroom door.

Patrice put his beer bottle down on the night stand and turned to the dresser to empty out his pockets. Lila licked her lips lightly as she admired his back and muscles. His dark gray t-shirt lightly hugged his muscles, and she knew that if his chest muscles looked as good as his back, she would be in some deep shit.

She took off her navy blue blazer and continued to eye him up and Patrice turned back around. Now that they were in a brightly lit room, she noticed some dark shadowing on his inner left arm. She squinted her eyes to try and get a better look of what it was.

Patrice noticed that she was staring at him and he wondered why she stared so intently at him.

“Is that a tattoo?” Lila had a smile on her face as she approached him. He gave her shy little nod as she lifted his arm up to see the ink on his arm.

Patrice looked down at her as she moved his sleeve up his bicep so she could get a better look at his tattoo. The gentle touch of her finger tips ticked his skin. Her body was so close to his that he could smell the light scent of her perfume. He had never been so close to her before and it excited him. His face was so close to hers that he could see all the little imperfections on her face. Those little imperfections just made her seem real to him, like he wasn’t stupid for being so taken with her so quickly.

She sent a few chills down his spine as she traced her fingers over the inked scripture on his arm. “What does this mean?” She drifted her eyes away from the artwork on his arm to look him in the eyes.

He had the cutest, big brown eyes she had ever seen. His eyes screamed innocence while the bags underneath showed how much of a hard worker he was. She knew that there was more to him that just Patrice Bergeron, director of the payroll department. She hoped that after this night, he would be able to open up to her more.

Patrice felt like he couldn’t breathe when she gave him another flirtatious smile.

“Um, it means master of your destiny,” he answered lowly.

“I can’t believe you have a tattoo,” she giggled quietly.

He chuckled lightly at her comment even though he wasn’t sure what to make of her tone. “Why? Do you not like tattoos?”

“I love them actually.”

Her flirtatious tone frightened him a bit. There was no way that she was flirting with him, he wasn’t important. He told himself that she was only acting this way because of the alcohol. In his mind, it was the only explanation.

Patrice opened his mouth to respond but was interrupted by someone opening the bedroom door. Milan stood there with a big grin on his face as Lila and Patrice quickly stepped away from each other. His smile somehow got even bigger when he realized that Patrice was showing off his tattoo.

To make things a little less awkward, Patrice pretended that Milan wasn’t even there and ordered Lila to grab her drink so they could leave. She walked by Milan with her eyes focused on the ground, embarrassed of what he had to be thinking about when he walked in on the two.

Patrice glared at Milan as he exited his bedroom. By the time he stepped outside, Lila was already at the bottom of the steps, most likely returning to Rachel or Andrew. He could hear Milan laugh quietly from behind him as he locked the bedroom door. He felt his hand slap his shoulder as he drank his beer.

“Oh man, tonight is gonna be an interesting night,” Milan said with a big grin.