“Why do you think?” he asked.
Honestly, I had no idea, but my heart sped up and did a little flip. “I don’t know.”
“I haven’t seen you for weeks.”
For a moment, it sounded like he missed me. But obviously, that was ridiculous. “You mean…for therapy.”
“What else would I mean?” he said stiffly.
Just when I’d begun to feel like life was getting into a normal, manageable groove, he threw this at me. Well, I didn’t want this anymore, whatever “this” was.
“I can’t. I have plans,” I said. “And I have to get back to work; Mike’s waiting.”
“I don’t give a shit about Mike having to wait. And whatever plans you have, you’ll cancel them.”
“No. I won’t. I’m not your dog who comes when it’s called. I have a life. And a date tonight.”
His eyes narrowed. “With who?”
“None of your business.” I stood and fully intended to leave, but then he said something that reopened a few too many fresh wounds.
“Why did you kick me out of your hotel room that night?”
I froze, and my mouth sort of moved, but no words came out. There was way too much emotional content contained in the answer. “I…I…don’t want to talk about this right now.” Or ever.
“Is it because you have a boyfriend and you cheated on him?”
“What? No. I’d never do that.” And Mr. Cole knew he was my first everything—I’d told him that. There were clearly no other men.
“Then why?” he demanded.
“I told you; I don’t want to talk about this.”
“I do,” he replied firmly, in that deep authoritative tone.
I gave him a pleading look. “You promised me we’d be professional.”
“No. You promised me. And I’m not asking for anything other than an answer. There’s nothing inappropriate about that.”
I stared at this beautiful man, wondering why the hell he even cared. Was it some ego trip he just couldn’t deal with?
I shook my head. “If you want ‘therapy,’ it’ll need to be through our normal interactions, during office hours. And discussing anything having to do with that night is off the table.”
He laughed.
“What? You think playing with me like this is funny?” I asked.
“What’s funny is your goddamned sense of humor.”
“I’m pretty sure I don’t have one anymore.” I noticed he’d gone back to looking away again. No real eye contact except for a few brief flits here and there. Otherwise, the eyes were back on my chest, hands, or feet.
“Of course you do,” he said snidely, “because you believe you’re in charge.”
Damn him. “Even if you’re my boss,” I hissed quietly, paranoid someone would overhear us somehow, “I am in charge—of me, my life, and my body. And right now, I’m telling you that having this conversation here in your office is crossing the line, Mr. Cole, and making me feel uncomfortable.” I turned to head out before I blew my top.
“Be at my house at nine o’clock, Miss Snow. And bring your running clothes.”
I huffed and slammed the door behind me, returning downstairs to the conference room where Mike waited.
Sonofabitch.
“How’d it go?” Mike smirked, blinking those big blues at me, noticing my flustered face when I entered the room.
I let out a frustrated breath and took my seat across from him. “Fine. He just…never mind. Let’s get back to work. I don’t want to end today feeling like we fell short.” We still had a few more hours of work do to in order to be ready for the monthly staff meeting on Monday where we’d be giving an update. And I really, really needed not to do any work this weekend.
“Don’t worry. We can stay late and still go for that drink after.”
I immediately thought about how late that would be—would it be later than the time Mr. Cole wanted to see me?—but then I pushed the undermining thoughts from my mind. I was not going to see Mr. Cole tonight. “That sounds great.”
“I’m sure the others won’t mind if we show up late,” he added.
Others? “Oh, who else is coming?”
He shrugged. “There’s a big group of us in Sales. We try to meet up once a month.”
“That’s…cool.” I sucked at reading men. Seriously sucked at it. I swear I’d gotten the “date” vibe from Mike.
“Actually, it’s one of the things most of us like about C.C. We work our asses off and compete like hell, but when office hours are over, we all check our crap at the door and have a little fun. Blowing off steam keeps us sane.”
“Yeah. That’s pretty great.” Maybe they offer classes on this stuff—Speaking Man 101.
Mike looked at me. “Oh. Wait. You didn’t think that I…?” He toggled his index finger between us.
“What? No. God no. A lot of people prefer to do creative work offsite.” I shrugged. “That’s what I figured you wanted.”
“Oh good. Because I know how uncomfortable women get sometimes with all that.”
If you only knew. “Nope. I’m good.” Which was a complete lie. I wanted to go to Mr. Cole’s house now more than anything. Maybe I still felt I owed him a little gratitude.
You’re not going, Lily. You deserve better.
I took any thoughts about seeing Mr. Cole, mentally tossed them to the floor, and stomped them to a pulp.
The awkward moment passed, and Mike and I wrapped up the work faster than I’d expected. We were on schedule, prepared to present our recommendation Monday—we were going with recommending the shimmery pinks and light orange pallets so in style at the moment—and I had nothing but a relaxing weekend ahead. The more I thought about it, the better I liked the idea of a little Sales department after-hours fun. It was a great opportunity to get to know a few more people.
Around eight o’clock, I pulled up to the Rusty Bucket, a beer and wings sports bar, in downtown Chicago about ten minutes from the office. The people in Sales were eighty percent male, so I wasn’t surprised by the venue.
When I walked in, probably lagging Mike by about ten minutes because I’d stayed behind to freshen up, I immediately spotted our group amassed around the corner of the bar, most of them standing and talking, a few seated along the wall at several small tables.
Even though his back was to me, I recognized Mike’s black hair, but one of the guys—I couldn’t remember his name—waved to me. Mike turned to see who’d come in and that’s when I caught a glimpse of another face his body had been blocking.
Fuck. Mr. Cole. Mr. Cole. Mr. fucking Cole. I hid—pretty poorly—my shock and approached with a smile.
“Hi, everyone. And Mr. Cole, I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”
“I never miss beer and wings night with my sales team—besides, who do you think pays for it?” he said.
I swallowed. “It’s ummm…great that you make the time, Mr. Cole.”
“Call me Max.” He held his eyes to my face, and I noticed a slight strained look in his eyes.
Mike elbowed me. “But only when we’re off the clock. Unless you want your ass chewed out.”
I’d had sex with this man. I’d had his cock in my mouth. But had he ever asked me to call him “Max”? No. But apparently beer and wings night was an appropriate occasion for that.
Of course, even if he’d asked, I still didn’t feel comfortable using his first name. Barriers were good.
“Okay…Max,” I croaked out his name.
“So, Miss Snow, I’m surprised to see you here. What happened to that date?” he asked.
Kill me right now. Someone please. Because while “Max” thought the date thing had been an excuse to blow him off, right about now Mike was figuring out that I had thought we were going to go out on a date.