Chapter 2: Time Consumed

"The clients need this in blue, not white. The design has to inspire trust in their customers, and they will not have that same impact with white. Make sure to curve that end in there." Hunter told the woman quickly editing the design, taking notes of all of his comments. Hunter quickly moved from her to the guy trying to edit the animation for their website. Hunter watched him run what he had so far and immediately noticed a point that should be changed. "That frame runs for about a second and a half too short, I couldn't properly read all of the words. And lighten up the shading please, it reminds me way too much of 2018."

Hunter walked off, knowing that his employees would come to him later with perfect final products. They were professionals and would get the job done. Hunter quickly walked through the floor, nodding to people as he went.

As he walked up to the elevator, a woman was walking up to him, a tablet in hand. Hunter pushed back his sigh, hiding his frustration despite the fact that he knew that Kellie would hold him up for at least ten minutes no matter what she had to say.

"Mr. Dannings, we have just gotten a call from Universal, they want some of our animators for their new kids movie. They say that it is 'an ambitious project and they want the best for it.'" She told Hunter, a smile growing on her face, causing his brow to raise in surprise.

"Kellie, why hadn't I heard about this before?" Hunter asked a bit peeved that he wasn't the first one to hear the news.

"Because you were making your rounds and no one wanted to chase you around the building to find who you were bothering now." She told him bluntly, a small smirk coming across her brown skin. "Anyway, they scheduled a meeting for Monday but I wanted to give you a heads up to prepare any presentation or argument needed."

Hunter nodded, clicking the button for the elevator again in hopes that he would be able to lose Kellie soon.

"Thank you, Kellie, I will start preparing that soon." He told her, holding back a smirk when the elevator door dinged open. Kellie did not get the message through and followed Hunter in, scrolling through her tablet for the next note she wanted to tell him.

"There is also an issue on the west wing of this floor with a couple of computers." Kellie continued, frowning down at her screen before she seemingly understood what she had written. "The manager of that section suggested that you purchase new monitors but it was important that we brought this up to you first."

Hunter nodded, pulling out his phone to go through a couple of emails while he could.

"Can you send that note to my inbox, caps in the subject line so I can see it better. I will look into the situation." Hunter replied, knowing that he would not have an immediate decision just yet. Kellie nodded, writing something down quickly.

"Okay, and some of your employees are complaining about the hand dryers-"

"Kellie," Hunter sighed tiredly, turning the tall black woman that had paused with a look of confusion on her face. "Is there nothing else for you to do other than bother me with these random things. Why don't you, I don't know, go do some work?"

Kellie laughed, shaking her head at the annoyed Hunter.

"I am working. This is my job, remember?" She chuckled, making a note on her tablet as she did so. "I'll email you about it then since you don't want to hear it in person. But you will have to deal with me again, you know."

Hunter was already grinning widely, and Kellie just sighed. About once a week Hunter would pull something like this, Kellie was just impressed that she hadn't got fed up with her boss yet. The elevator doors slid open, and a thought suddenly returned to Hunter.

"Oh, Kellie." He said, watching as the woman's shoulder-length locks flew up as she quickly turned her head to him "Please call me Hunter. The whole 'Mr. Dannings' thing is getting old."

Kellie's expression went blank, and Hunter honestly heard what she was about to say before the words left her lips.

"The whole complaining about me doing my job is getting old too, Mr. Dannings." She replied, face stone-cold even as Hunter smiled due to her words. "It's never going to happen."

Hunter shook his head while walking out of the elevator, turning back around to look at the woman standing there.

"One day, you'll see." He told her, waving to her wildly as his cheek splitting grin returned. His expression did not falter for a moment despite the blank expression on Kellie's face. "Goodbye Kelly Rowland."

"That's not my name." Kellie got out before the doors closed. Kellie huffed heavily when the elevator doors closed again, upset with herself for getting annoyed by Hunter's teasing again. She knew that at times the man got bored and liked to tease her, but she still let it bug her.

"So childish." She muttered to herself with a small sigh, pressing the button to return to the second floor.

Kellie had worked for Hunter for a while now, nearly a year, but Hunter knew that she was worth every penny ever placed into her bank account. He valued her a lot.

Not that he would ever let her know that.

Hunter made his way over to his office, his being one of four on the floor. Meaning, he had plenty of space to work and have privacy during the day. Just how he liked it.

Hunter nodded at his PA Josh who was working diligently at his computer before he entered his office. After several steps, Hunter got to his desk.

But the moment he was sitting behind the large piece of dark oak, he let all of the energy drain out of his body. And honestly, there wasn't much there.

While Hunter appeared to be in his element, work had been extremely busy for him in the past month. He barely had time for his weekly sports club or the gym, and he hadn't found any time for anything more. Which included hanging out at bars for hours. Hunter hadn't had a sip of alcohol since he had been at Stanley's.

But, it wasn't the lack of alcohol that upset Hunter about the fact. After the first couple of days passed where Hunter hadn't been back, he felt overall fine. His thoughts would stray to the bar now and then, but he was fine. Then two weeks passed and any time he had a break to think, his mind was on curly hair and the next time he would be able to go back.

Over and over again he thought of that stoic face, or how it lit up when a smile was placed on it. How that man's smirk had him choked up or that those eyes seemed to draw him in again and again.

Hunter wouldn't admit to himself that he wanted to go back because of River. He couldn't admit that to himself, because the acceptance would lead to too many things that he didn't have time for.

Work now. Emotions later.

Except, once a month had passed, Hunter barely wanted to work at all. It was a struggle to be as insightful and helpful as usual because all he wanted to do was run out of the building and get a glass of whiskey and gin.

Hunter groaned, rubbing two calloused hands over his face.

Focus, He thought to himself, lightly hitting his cheeks to get back into the zone. You can deal with your desire for a drink later, get your work done so you can leave as soon as possible.

It was Thursday and Hunter was sure that he could leave early enough to be there for at least an hour before he had to be home.

With that goal in mind, Hunter got back to his work. He decided to handle all of his emails and memos first, responding to people and setting up appointments.

He even went as far as to head back downstairs and check out the issue with the computer himself before deciding that he only needed to purchase small pieces for the computers, which saved him a couple of thousand dollars.

When Hunter got back to his office, he stopped to take a breath, his mind wandering easily. He found himself curious about River, wondering about what his personality was like, or what his interests were.

"Maybe he likes drinking?" Hunter thought aloud, chuckling to himself. "It would be a motive for him to get a job as a bartender."

Hunter was pulled from his thoughts when his computer dinged and saw another email. One of the executives was asking him how his project was coming along, and he groaned, realizing that he had to get back to finishing it. Hunter lied, saying that it was nearly finished and quickly closed the tab to get back to work

The hours passed, Hunter working diligently with all of his focus now on getting out of the building. It took him some time, but he had finished several of his contributions to designs and animations and began to pack up to leave.

Hunter left his office, jogging away from his door and heading towards his PA's desk.

"Are you finally leaving, sir?" Josh asked jokingly, a smirk on his face as he tilted his head and eyed the late time, then looking back up at Hunter. Hunter sighed, shaking his head with a sigh as he spoke to his playful assistant.

"Yes, I'm leaving. Can you please email Dana today or tomorrow morning to clean up the image for the restaurant?" Hunter asked him, seeing the man quickly note down the information as Hunter spoke. "And don't stay too late, you need your rest." Josh grinned, barking out a laugh before he put out a hand to shake Hunter's.

"Hi, Pot." Josh said, smile sickly sweet. "I'm Kettle. Nice to meet you. Oh, I see that we're both very black this evening. Steel I presume?"

Josh laughed loudly while Hunter rolled his eyes, fighting off his smile.

"Oh, you're so funny." Hunter told him sarcastically. Josh shrugged.

"I know." Josh cackled once again before calming down. "I just seriously don't get how you could talk to me about staying late."

"What do you mean by that?" Hunter asked, unsure of how he was worse than Josh. Josh gaped, mouth hanging open stupidly.

"Are you serious?" Josh asked his question clearly rhetorical. "You have spare clothes, a toothbrush, and toothpaste in that office of yours just in case you have to stay the night. If that doesn't say anything about you overworking yourself then I don't know what does."

Hunter did not try to argue, simply leaning back and shrugged.

"What can I say, I'm a work-a-holic. I love my job." Hunter admitted, no shame in his voice whatsoever. "I'm just glad that I figured out what you were joking about earlier because you are the only one out of the two of us that is black."

The smile Josh had been wearing dropped as he understood how badly his joke could have been taking.

"Oh shoot, oh shoot, oh shoot-"

Hunter was now laughing heartily to himself, walking off as he waved back to Josh.

"Goodbye Joshua!" Hunter called over his shoulder, receiving a soft glare from the man behind him.

"Bye Hunt." Joshua replied, going for the last irritating comment he could think of before Hunter was out of sight. In reality, it was pretty effective, the name bringing a twitch to Hunter's nickname.

"I hate that name." Hunter muttered to himself, stepping onto the elevator that had just opened. The doors closed and Hunter stood there in silence, he considered humming to himself. He didn't think that he was a very good singer, but he carried a tune and thought that humming might amuse himself.

Hunter had just begun to hum a little Imagine Dragons when his silence was broken with the ding of the elevator and the loud conversations of several people all happening at the same time. Hunter's eyes went wide seeing the floor in front of him in a bit of a mess.

Several people were walking around and yelling at once, their voices blending together in an angry blur. There was a man off to the side crying like a couple of people yelled at this body and Kellie was standing right in front of me, stepping into the elevator. She stopped her pursuit when her eyes fell upon Hunter and the look of relief that passed over her face was intense.

What just happened to his company?

"Hunter! There has been an incident with the animation for our largest client at the moment." She rushed, as wide as she went back to her familiar tablet.

"What happened?"