Read Online The Boss by Abigail Barnette - Free Book Online Page A

instant I realized what I was doing.
    What the hell was wrong with me? I had no
idea why he was coming over. For all I knew, he was coming to tell
me he felt really bad about firing me, but he had to because he was
so creeped out to be around me.
    Then I opened the door, and he was standing
there, and I had no further doubts. He had come because he wanted
me, like I wanted him. I could see it in his eyes the moment our
gazes met.
    He was slightly out of breath, and cracked
some joke about a higher floor being unavailable when we moved in,
but I couldn't process any of it over the sound of the blood
rushing to my brain.
    Neil was here, on the threshold of my
apartment, looking apologetic and waiting for me to say something.
All my words completely deserted me.
    "Um... come in." I stepped back, and closed
the door behind him.
    "I'm sorry to come by so late, but I knew I
wouldn't be able to sleep without speaking to you."
    So, we were getting straight to the heart of
the matter, then. I had anticipated some uncomfortable small talk,
during which I could try to feel out what he'd come to say. Now I
didn't know what to do, or where to put my hands. I curled my
fingers into the sleeves of my sweater.
    "At lunch today, I may have given you the
impression - "
    "That we didn't have a chance in hell of
anything happening between us?" I supplied for him. I thought it
might make him laugh. It didn't.
    "I must admit, the age difference between us
does make me uncomfortable. It made me uncomfortable back then, as
well. I’m not the kind of man who needs to date younger women to be
happy. It’s not a status symbol for me. And I'm not the kind of
person who picks up strangers in airports, either."
    "Neither am I," I said, maybe a little
defensively.
    His face fell, and he took a slow step toward
me. "I wouldn't care if you were. What I'm trying to say is, this
is completely new to me. I spent that night with you six years ago
because I genuinely liked you, Sophie. You were so cute and direct
and a bit odd. And we did have an awfully good time together." He
smiled tentatively. "It does trouble me that you're the same age as
my daughter. But you're not my daughter. And that night was... it
was one of the best nights of my life."
    I was about to respond with something pithy,
but he closed the small gap between us and pulled me into his arms.
My feet tangled with his, but he somehow kept us upright. Our gazes
locked for a fraction of a second, and my mouth opened with a
surprised gasp just as his lips met mine.
     

 
     
    Chapter Five
     
    Neil Elwood was
kissing me, and it was every bit as good as my highly detailed
memories. His soft lips coaxed mine apart. His tongue swept in and
darted along the edges of my teeth. He held me with a splayed hand
at my lower back, an arm around my shoulders. Pulled up tight to
his chest, I gripped the lapels of his black wool coat and held on.
There was little else I could do. It was like the man exuded some
kind of pheromone that made my central nervous system go offline.
Standing without wobbling was not an option. It didn't help that it
had been so long since the last time I'd been kissed, I'd almost
forgotten how to do it properly. I tore our mouths apart and, with
a noisy gulp of air, inhaled the scent of him, the faint trace of
his cologne and the wooden cask ghost of whiskey.
    And that was my clue. "Have you been
drinking?"
    "Quite a lot," he admitted sheepishly.
"Otherwise I wouldn't have had the courage to come over here."
    "And when the hangover hits you, you'll
probably regret that you had the courage." I pressed my palms to
his chest and pushed back a step. "As romantic and like-the-movies
as you may have imagined this whole scenario, you've jerked me
around so much in the last twenty-four hours that I don't even know
how to respond."
    Apparently, drunken honesty was contagious.
And thank god for that, because I could have easily been swept
along in what he wanted, without a single thought to