Page 21 of Forbidden Boss (Manhattan Billionaires)

I gritted my teeth and turned, pacing in the opposite direction. Cole watched me from the corner of the room where he leaned on the wall, his arms crossed.

“You think she’ll go for it?” he finally asked.

“She will if she knows what’s good for her,” I fumed. The cheeky little thing. Painting her lips like she didn’t have a care in the world. Demanding more and more and more from me, even though we’d offered her a great deal to begin with. Munching on my truffles like they were her due.

Her dark-brown eyes had flashed across the table from me, that little black-and-white outfit taunting me with every movement of her body. She thought she could waltz in here and make a fool ofme? She thought she could get one over onme?

Ha!

“To be fair,” Cole said, interrupting my inner rage, “if she’s attending a full schedule of events, a grand wouldn’t be enough to cover what she needs. Twenty-five k is generous, sure, but at least she’ll be able to dress the part.”

“That’s not the point,” I snapped.

Cole arched a brow. “Oh? What is, then?”

“The point is, she thinks she can tighten the screw on me. She thinks she can play a tune and my feet will start dancing. I don’t appreciate it, and I don’t appreciate her.”

“So pull the offer. Especially if you don’t think you can stand to have her on your arm four or five times a week. Maybe more with the holidays coming up. You need to at least pretend you get along, or else this whole thing falls apart.”

I bared my teeth at him, then whirled around and stalked to my bar. I poured myself a tall drink, letting the alcohol burn my throat.

“I can’t pull the offer,” I finally said when my glass was empty. “You were right about Monk. He won’t hire me unless he knows I can take criticism, and in his geriatric, wife-obsessed mind, the only way to show that is to have a softening influence in my life. I need a companion.”

“I wonder how he deals with same-sex couples.”

Setting my glass down, I shook my head. “He’s fine with it. It’s the partnership he wants. He thinks a committed relationship changes someone and makes them worthy of trust.”

“So you need her.”

“I don’t needher,” I shot back petulantly, glaring at him. “I needsomeone. She just happens to be the convenient option.”

Cole tilted his head, considering me. “I see,” he said, and it sounded like he saw a lot more than I wanted him to. Like he might be able to see just how easily Nikita Jordan had gotten under my skin. And how badly I wanted to march back in there and demand she stop playing around and sign the damned contract already.

“I can’t afford a lawsuit right now. Especially not a public one,” I told him, even though that wasn’t the only reason I wanted her to work for me.

It galled me that she was winning. It boiled my blood to know she’d gotten one over on me. It wasn’t right.

I wanted to teach her a lesson.

But most frustrating of all was that I couldn’t think of a single person I’d met who would be better suited for the job. She had personality, a vibrancy, that was rare. People warmed to her—I’d seen it in the way her coworkers had worried when she was injured. There had even been a few muffled protests when Ophelia announced she’d fire her for the perfume stunt.

The woman was likable, damn her. And I needed that more desperately than I was willing to admit.

Cole hummed, and we both turned when the door opened. Tabitha, the junior lawyer who’d amended the contract, poked her head in. “They’re ready for us,” she said, then held the door open for Cole, Arthur, and me to step through. The hallway leading to the conference room narrowed and stretched before me. Every step felt like it jarred my body, and it was all I could do to keep my breathing steady and my movements smooth.

She sat on the other side of the conference table like a queen. Back straight, chin lifted, eyes steady. Her lips drew my gaze, red and lush. I wondered what they’d look like mussed, with that red lipstick smeared by my thumb. Wrapped around my?—

Blinking, I sat in front of her and braided my fingers together. “Well?”

Phil Phillips cleared his throat. “We’ll need the rest of the week to review the contract,” he said.

“No chance.” I leaned back, holding Nikki’s gaze. “You walk out of here today without signing that contract, and your decision is made.”

Her eyes narrowed, and I could tell she was biting that sharp tongue of hers. I wanted to goad her into speaking.

Her lawyer inserted himself smoothly by saying, “This is highly unusual.”

I slid my gaze across to meet his. “I’ll give you as long as you’d like to review the contract in this room. Once you leave this floor, though, there won’t be going back. So decide now if you want to sign those pages or not, because I won’t be jerked around by you any longer.”

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