Taming the Playboy CEO

Fight for love.

Ethan company

Ethan's PA, Tony, had just stepped in with the information on Mariana and Cole that Ethan had requested. He, Tony, presents it to Ethan who drops it aside to read later. Tony excuses himself.

Ethan picks up the documents after Tony has left and begins to skim through eagerly.

He did not want to show too much interest in front of his PA as it would have given the workers something to talk to.

Gossip, in the company, spread more than oil on a surface and gossip about the CEO was bound to fly around quickly.

As he skims through, he realizes that his suspicions were right. He always prides himself on his reliable intuition.

Ethan soon decides to disregard Cole's claim on Mariana and try to pursue his feelings for her.

Ethan soon figures out that both Mariana and Cole were in San Diego. Sly bastard, he cusses. He calls his PA back in and tells him to get ready as they are moving to their branch at San Diego.

San Diego

Mariana's company

It is already close to work and Mariana starts packing up. She packs up a few files that she might need to do some extra work on her at home including files for the presentation.

She moves to enter the elevator with Yolanda following suit with the rest of Mariana's belongings including the food tray as Mariana did not have time to eat it during work.

As she gets to her car, she notices that her tires were slashed. She was so pissed and frustrated.

As it was already getting late there was no way she could call her mechanic to come help her fix it up, she was basically stranded. She decides to call Cole to take her home.

Cole picks up and sends his driver to take her home as he was busy. He also sends a tow truck to tow her truck to the mechanic.

She thanks him and waits at the reception for his driver while Yolanda goes back up to pack up her own stuff.

As Mariana is waiting, the woman from earlier in the morning steps out of the elevator, bids the receptionist farewell before stepping out of the company totally ignoring Mariana.

Mariana lets out a sigh of relief she didn't even know she was holding. She was obviously not in a good mood and she knew that if the woman had tried anything funny, she would not have hesitated to give her a dose of her own medicine.

She continues sitting for a while trying to rest until about 10 minutes later, Cole steps into the reception.

The receptionist sights him and tries to adjust her shirt to expose her boobs and raise her skirt slightly so as to attract him. Cole is totally disgusted by this act.

She greets him with a sly smile on her face. As he was about to reply to her and ask about the way to Mariana's office, he spotted her sitting a few places away from him with her head down. He ignores her and walks towards Mariana. The receptionist huffs angrily as she watches them.

Cole taps on Mariana who straightens and on seeing him picks her things and follows him out. He helps her with some of them as they go out.

As they are about leaving the company, the receptionist hisses and rolls her eyeballs at them. Cole's temper flares up at this act and warns her not to test his patience.

Mariana holds his arm and he calms down a bit as she tells him to just let it be so that they could be on their way already.

The receptionist continues to challenge Cole by asking what he would do. The receptionist goes on to flirt with him by saying that he is too handsome to be seen frolicking with a guy like Mariana and tries forcing herself on him.

Mariana finally flares up and lands a slap on the receptionist's left cheek and warns her never to try such stupid behavior again and that she has not realized yet that she was literally ruining both her reputation and that of the company.

She goes on to tell her that she was not acting ladylike and her behavior was totally disgusting.

Mariana tells the receptionist also to learn how not to downgrade a fellow woman like herself and that women are meant to stand together and not to act like she was an animal on a rampage with a goal to devour.

Cole watches angry Mariana with an amused expression on his face. Mariana was not one to flare up easily and she always had her temper in check so this was a rare sight. He actually thought she looked hot when she was angry.

The receptionist soon recovers from the shock of the slap and prepares to retaliate with a slap of her own. Mariana notices this and mentally prepares for the slap.

Cole notices it too and catches the receptionist's hand when she was about to land on Mariana's cheeks. He twists it and decides to finally step in. He warns the receptionist never to try the stunt she just pulled to avoid losing her job at that instance.

Cole then proceeds to drag Mariana out of there not wanting to do anything rash, while the receptionist is left behind to tend to her twisted hand.

As they get to the car, he drops her belongings in the trunk before opening up the passenger seat for her and then turns over and gets in.

As Cole gets inside the car, he first checks Mariana's hand for any form of injury. Seeing none, he starts the car and gets on the road.

As Cole drives, Mariana tries apologizing to him on the receptionist's behalf. He asks her why she was apologizing and that it was not like she was the one that did anything wrong.

She says she feels that he was embarrassed by all the things the receptionist said as she was also embarrassed at how a fellow woman like her could cook up such mean things, let alone spilling it out.

As she recalls all the dirty things that were said she is utterly disgusted. Cole tells her not to worry that he was okay but promises to make sure the lady loses her job by reporting to the CEO of the company.

He asks why the receptionist had such awful things to say about her and if she had done anything wrong to offend her in the past, to which she replies that she does not know and that it was not only the receptionist but literally almost all her coworkers.

Mariana then tells him about the hate she had been receiving including the incident that happened earlier that morning. He promises to take action and tells her to be calm.

Mariana tells him not to bother that she would be okay but Cole kept insisting so she let him do what he wanted as he his mind was already set and she could not convince him to do otherwise.

They soon get to Mariana's apartment and Mariana gets down and carries her stuff from the trunk.

They bid each other goodbyes and Cole drives away Mariana steps into her apartment and as soon as she closes the door behind her, she drops the things she was holding on the desk before crashing on the couch and kicking off her flats as she was very tired because of the day's events.

She is about to doze off when she gets a call from her family. She picks up and is relieved to hear her mother and sister's voice behind the phone.

Her mom asks about her wellbeing, how she was coping and how her dinner with Cole went. She replies that she was okay and was about to ask how her mother knew about the dinner but refrains herself when she recalls that her sister could be a blabbermouth at times.

She proceeds to tell them every detail of her day including the terrible ones. They are shocked at how much hate she had received from her coworkers and her mum promises to look into it as the mother of the CEO was a friend of hers and according to her mother, his mom owed her a favor.

Mariana does not even try to persuade her mother to drop it knowing that she would definitely not listen. She asks them about their day and her sister said she lamented that the life of a model was tiring as she was one.

Mariana laughed at her and told her that she was just complaining because she actually loved her job. Choice laughs with her and agrees that she actually loves it.

Their mother said that she had a spa day and was definitely feeling refreshed. Her daughters turned to her immediately in envy. They talked and bickered for a while before hanging up.

After the call, Mariana ended the call and entered her kitchen with the food tray. She placed the meals in the microwave, before entering her room to begin her night routine and proceed to having dinner.