Edited by luvtaread
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The next day Lloyd arranged to meet Jill for lunch. As one might expect she seemed to have mixed emotions on the phone and Lloyd hoped he could sort out the trouble between them. However it would be difficult, he had completely forgotten to call her and seemingly had ignored her calls for several months, that would be hard to forgive. Still Jill was an understanding person and he hoped she would be able to look past his rude behavior.
When she entered the restaurant he nervously awaited her greeting and he was right too, she slapped him hard across the face.
"That's for ignoring me you self absorbed jerk." She said in a hard tone of voice. Then he heard her switch tone as she said, "But it is good to see you again." Her voice suddenly full of that sincere caring tone it usually had when she spoke to him. Lloyd had rarely heard the other tone and hoped he would never do anything stupid enough to hear it again. Still there was something about seeing her angry over his lack of communication that he found oddly comforting.
Before he could respond, they were led to their table, but as soon as they sat down Lloyd gave his response. "Nice to see you too Jill, and sorry about not calling, I was rather busy."
"So I heard from Crystal, by the way she was right you do look different what did you do to yourself, but why didn't I hear about it from you? I thought we were better friends than that."
"We are!" Lloyd said defensively. "It's just I..."
"Forget it," She said cutting him off, "We're talking now so tell me about what you've been up to." Jill said.
"But you just said Crystal..."
"Told me some stuff," Jill said cutting him off again, "But I'd rather hear it from you if that's okay? Or does Crystal do all of your talking these days?"
"Of course not."
"Glad to hear it, I rather like your voice, now get talking buddy you're in a deep hole and you can start getting out of it by telling me what you've been doing besides calling your good friend Jill back."
As she said that on odd thought occurred to him, yes he was in a deep hole, but why did he suddenly feel the need to get out of it? Why had he called Jill in the first place? He could literally have any woman he wanted and yet here we was trying to prove to Jill that he was not a bone head and more amazingly she seemed very willing to forgive him, despite his gross-mistreatment of her. As he launched into his story he realized for perhaps the first time that their bond was deeper than friendship, he had just been too thick to see it before. Either that or too blinded by the glamour of Crystal or the draw of the massive amount of sexual temptation that was Las Vegas.
He knew the draw of that better than anyone, it was his cash cow after all, but now he was master of it, above it all, and now he saw what he truly hungered for and it was right in front of him, love. If only he could convince the woman in front of him of that he felt he would need no other thing in the world.
When he had finished laying his case before her she seemed satisfied that he had been busy, what's more she seemed happy for him.
"That's great Lloyd, I'm glad you got on your feet and are doing so well, I get you were busy but why didn't you call me back?"
Lloyd attempted to explain how the messages never got through, but she seemed not to buy it.
"Lloyd you had me convinced but this is lame, even for you, a computer glitch, is that the best you can do?" She then looked at him expectantly.
"Look Jill I swear to you the messages just did not get through. I know it sounds crazy I don't believe it myself but something kept your calls from reaching me, the first I heard about them was when I talked to Crystal the other day. I will swear on anything that they didn't get through to me." He looked deep into her eyes hoping she would see the sincerity of his message. After a bit she seemed to figure he was not lying and begrudgingly accepted his explanation.
Seeing this he jumped on the dead air with an attempt to distract her, "So enough about me, how have you been?" She seemed suspicious of the blatant distraction but decided to answer.
"Well after what Mr. Draper did to you I almost quit."
"I appreciate that Jill, but we don't need two lives ruined by his greed."
"Yes well, that, and I wanted to make sure the finished product was as close to your vision as possible." She said quietly and Lloyd again found himself in awe staring at her. She had really cared about him, how could he have missed this? What's more how could he have spent so much time on Crystal when a clearly much better option was right in front of him? It was then that he took another look at his lunch companion.
He had always found her attractive, after all you didn't get her job without being semi-attractive, but just not in that way before. In part it was because he had rarely seen her away from work and he had to say her casual look actually made her look sexier. She had light brown hair that she usually kept tied in a bun, but today hung loose to below her shoulders. Her beautiful hazel eyes were far more noticeable now that they were not hidden behind the reading glasses she wore at work.
Seeing her in a simple shorts and a tank top combination also gave him a better appreciation for her body that her stuffy dress clothes had never shown. The shorts revealed nothing new as Jill's skirts were generally rather short, likely more by request from her boss than of her own choice. In truth Lloyd had always admired Jill's legs and butt, which due to the fact that she was on her feet most of the day running errands for Mr. Draper, were quite exquisite and toned.
Jill didn't really have much in the way of boobs, in fact hers were only slightly bigger than Jackie's, but Jill seemed proud of her chest nonetheless. It was part of her personality that Lloyd had always admired. She may not have been the most attractive of Mr. Draper's many assistants, but she exuded confidence and was proud of her various assets as they were.
As Lloyd admired Jill from across the table, he could not believe just how much a casual look made her so much more attractive to him than her business attire had. Not to mention he could not get over how a few simple statements of hers had made him realize just how much he had missed. He had offed himself thinking no one had cared and yet Jill had just proven him wrong.
Lloyd's thoughts turned back to her speech in time to hear her say that she had stopped working for Mr. Draper as soon as the hotel opened, which was just before the deal Lloyd had made.
"Well Jill as you may have heard Mr. Draper's not in charge anymore, Crystal is, she and I own the hotel now and she manages it. I'm sure if you want to come back we'd both be glad to have you." He saw a hurt expression on her face and realized his mistake and said, "Of course that has no bearing on our relationship whatsoever. If you so choose to come back to the hotel it does not change the fact that I want to see a lot of you in the near future. I just figured that while we were on the subject I would extend the offer is all."
She smiled, "Well it would be nice to come back, but tell Crystal I want a raise and a promotion."
"Done. I also think our relationship is in need of a promotion Jill." He reached out and held her hand, "It seems the past few months have made me realize just how much you mean to me, I think it's time we were more than friends."
Jill smiled, "Really? You mean that?"
"Of course, that is if you'll have a bonehead like me for a boyfriend?"
"Well, I guess so," Jill said after a fake sigh, but she was clearly ecstatic.
They finished their meal then parted ways. Lloyd made two calls back at the office, one to Crystal about Jill's request for employment, which Crystal gladly accepted, happy to bring Jill back into the company, the second to Jill to arrange their next date.