Professional Boundaries by Jennifer Peel

but I stopped dead in my tracks and turned toward him again. “Did you just call me, Ms. Bryant?”
    “Yes,” he said with no apology. “I feel it’s important to maintain professional boundaries with my employees within the office.”
    There were so many things I wanted to say, including what a pompous twit he was, but I kept it together. “I see, Mr. Greyson.”
    He looked like he was going to respond, but he thought the better of it and just turned and went back to the conference room. I headed back to my office and shut the door harder than I intended to. I sat at my desk and just stewed. What was all this bull about professional boundaries? If he thought he was treating me like just another employee, he had another thing coming. Boss said this was a partnership, and Boss had treated me like a partner. Seriously, Ms. Bryant? What an idiot!
    As soon as my laptop came up, I immediately began to fill my schedule for the day. I smiled to myself. Looks like I won’t have much time for that meeting with Mr. Greyson after all . I almost laughed, thinking about his formality. It shouldn’t have surprised me, but seriously, this wasn’t the 1950’s, and I wasn’t some little girl that took orders. With more than a little glee, I emailed him my packed schedule and then went to work catching up on all the email I had missed on Friday.
    Halfway through me playing catch up, Delfia came in and gave me a big hug. “You don’t know how afraid I was you weren’t coming back.”
    “I’m sorry I didn’t call you back and made you worry. I just needed to … sort some things out.”
     “So what’s up with you and the new boss?” she asked quietly, but wickedly.
I knew I needed to proceed with caution. I had no desire for the whole office to know that Mr. Greyson and I once dated and that I was more than smitten with him. I loved Delfia, but she was the queen of office gossip.
    “What do you mean?” I said innocently. Or as innocent as you can get when you’re lying.
    She practically laughed at me. “Oh, honey. There’s definitely a history between the two of you.”
    I tried to answer with the truth without telling the whole truth. “He was my calculus tutor my freshman year in college.” That was the truth.
    Her eyes gleamed, and she pursed her lips. “Why do I get the feeling those were private lessons?”
    “Delfia!”
    “Fine, you don’t have to tell me, but I have a feeling it’s going to get real interesting around here.”
    I didn’t even bother with a rebuttal. I just let her walk out laughing to herself. She was right, though; things were going to get real interesting. In fact, “interesting” only took a few minutes. Mr. Professional Boundaries decided to grace my office doorway with his presence, and here I’d thought I wouldn’t see him all day.
    “Can I help you, Mr. Greyson?” I tried to keep the derision out of my voice, but my nineteen-year-old self begged for it to come out. I mean, for heaven’s sake, this man used to wrap me up in his arms and kiss me until I saw stars, and then he would whisper in my ear, “Kelli, I’m crazy about you.” Now here he was expecting me to call him, “Mr. Greyson.”
    He raised his eyebrow at me. “Do you have a problem with calling me Mr. Greyson?”
    I saluted him. “No sir.”
    So much for being professional. I looked at the time. That had lasted all of about forty-five minutes.
    “Kel—”
    I smirked at him
    “Ms. Bryant, in my experience, it’s important that someone in my position set the proper expectation. I’m not here to make friends. ”
    I so badly wanted to comment. I had the best comeback on the tip of my tongue; it took everything I had for me not to say what I so desperately wanted to. I wondered if Boss knew what an arrogant jerk he had hired to take his place. We were going from the man that was everyone’s friend to a man that apparently wanted to be an island.
    I held in my comment, but it was really hard.
    “Do you have