Page 54 of My Forbidden Boss

“It’s never a good idea to piss off your CFO,” Tristan says.

“Not when you have Bourke’s reputation,” I say. Everyone’s business has a tipping point, good and bad, and this is Bourke’s. One little well-aimed shove in the right direction and Bourke will topple. I can’t wait to see that happen.

“This will be good for Blue Sky,” Tristan says.

“I agree,” I say.

If only being with Adeline was so easy, but business is black and white and Adeline is multi-colored. There’s no comparison. If I lost Blue Sky, it would hurt, but I’d rebuild.

Business is made from good or bad deals, and I’ve always manipulated the good deals in my favor. Making money, building business, is easy.

That’s where I’m going wrong, because Adeline is a mix of both good and bad deals. This is ground I haven’t walked on before. I haven’t cared to, but I know what to do. I’ll weigh each step, plot out a careful course, and steel the odds because Adeline is a deal I won’t lose.

Adeline is a non-negotiable risk I’m unwilling to accept.

Chapter 20

Adeline

Monday morning sitting at my desk and my stomach turns inside out and the taste of last week’s breakfast sits in my mouth. I took the early train to New York from Moss Creek. I wanted to stay with Mom as long as possible, even though it meant less sleep for me this morning. Delay tactic 101.

It’s eight in the morning and I’ve already been awake for six hours. I’m not tired. My nerves keep me awake better than any energy drink. I’m wired, my whole body attuned to every footfall coming down the hallway. My nerves are stripped. I’m raw. On edge. Jumpy.

Andrea comes in. Her gaze rakes my form as I hunch over my laptop and pretend I’m working hard, but my fingers are numb and I don’t see the computer screen. She doesn’t offer me more than that. No ‘good morning’, or ‘how was your weekend’. I get frost, but frost is good because I’m not capable of anything except waiting for David to come into work.

It’s been two days since I said those words to him. Those fatal, final words. There’s no us.

I haven’t heard from him since. Couldn’t stop my attention straying to my cell all weekend. Couldn’t help the bone-deep disappointment when I didn’t see his call, despite Mom propping me up.

Stupid, twisted me. Wanting something yet knowing it will do me no good at all.

Maddy knows everything. She thinks I should come clean and tell David what I’m really here for. She thinks David would help me, but Maddy is a romantic while I like to see reality. We spent hours talking about it yesterday, but she’s wrong.

What I’m doing is unforgivable. I’m leaving a stain so dark and ingrained nothing will wash it away. It will be there forever. A tarnish on any relationship that might have evolved. The longer it stains, the more of me is left behind, and that is exactly what I don’t want to happen.

It was hard enough leaving David on Friday.

I have no hope if I hand more of my heart to him. There’s a risk involved and I’m one hundred percent risk-avoidance. I have to protect myself because when the time comes, I’ll be leaving without a backward glance. The more I give, the harder that will be and I need my heart to be as intact as possible.

Anything less will destroy me.

Distance from David will be my crutch. My absolute coping mechanism.

Mom said she was proud of me. She wished me a good week at work. She thinks I’m on my way to a wonderful future and I did nothing to dispel that untruth. Guilt forms a knife and stabs my heart. My blood oozes through my veins as it turns my insides into molasses and I’m sinking, suffocating, crushed, not trying to fight because this is the place I deserve. I’m stuck in the quicksand of Blue Sky and my own doing up to my neck.

I can’t look in David’s office because I remember what he did to me on his desk and I can’t go to the break room because he took me against the door late one night. Every inch of this office space throws up a memory I need to forget.

I keep my head down, but my eyes swivel so I can see the elevator doors as they open. My entire being tunes into David as he steps from the elevator. My body prickles. Heat rises from my legs to my face and the little hairs on my arms lift. Awareness floods my veins as every sense locks on him.

His dark gaze spears me as he approaches. Andrea twitters something, but it’s background noise. David ignores her as he comes to my desk. He looks good in his designer suit. The navy enhances his dark eyes. Power and masculinity are an iron-clad aura. He forces nature to bend to him because there can be no other way.

“Adeline?”

My head moves by an invisible force. A soft smile forms on his face at odds with the sleek lines and sharp cut of his attire. I’m still wearing Friday’s clothing and I hope he doesn’t notice, but that’s false hope. He sees everything and that’s exactly why I need to distance myself.

“Good morning, My Chandler,” I say.

“Can I please see you in my office?” he says and I shiver at the sound of his low voice.

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