Page 95 of Forbidden Boss (Manhattan Billionaires)

Cole found me in my office, where I’d gone to hide from the revelry. He dropped onto one of my sofas and gave me a long look. “You think she’ll be vindictive?”

I poured myself a drink and didn’t meet his gaze. “Who?”

A soft scoff was the only immediate response, until Cole said, “You know who.”

He was right, of course. Nikki. Who else? “No,” I answered. “What would she have to be vindictive about?”

“The fact that you threw her out of here.”

I glared over my shoulder at him. “She marched in here and basically quit. What was I supposed to do?”

Cole put his hands up, and I took a deep breath. He’d marched in here and quit too, and it wouldn’t be long until these chats were a thing of the past. Who would talk sense into me when Cole was gone? I set a drink down on a coaster in front of him and took a seat on the opposite couch with my own. The alcohol burned on the way down, and I relished the pain of it as I swirled the liquid in my glass.

“Is she going to be working for Roseanne?”

Sighing, I looked at my second-in-command, soon to be former second-in-command. “Probably. Roseanne would be smart to hire her.”

“They could get close. The truth could come out.”

I grimaced. The truth could come out regardless, unless I figured out how my mother had found out about the companion contract.

It was a problem.

We’d lied to Wilbur. We’d pretended to be a couple, closed the deal on false pretenses. It was a gaping hole of exposure, and it scared me a hell of a lot less than the pain in my chest that splintered through me every time I thought about Nikki.

“It’s in her best interests not to tell Roseanne the truth.” I couldn’t even say Nikki’s name out loud. It was pathetic.

“Right,” Cole said. “Makes sense.”

“You think I should reiterate that fact to her so she understands.”

Cole shrugged. “I could do it for you if you don’t want to speak to her.”

I sighed. It was tempting to have Cole do my dirty work for me. He could find Nikki, tell her to keep her mouth shut, and we could live our separate lives like nothing at all had changed in the past few months.

But that would be cowardly, and I’d learned long ago that if I wanted something done right, I had to do it myself. I should have kept that in mind before hiring Nikki as a companion in the first place.

“I’ll do it,” I told him, resigned.

That’s how I found myself at her building the next day, pressing the buzzer between the two sets of glass doors to see if she’d let me up.

“Hello?”

Even the sound of her voice through the terrible intercom speaker sent a spear through my chest.

“It’s me,” I said, then cleared my throat. “Rome.”

There was a long pause. Or at least, it felt long. The seconds dragged by, one after the other, and I wondered if she’d leave me here without even a word.

Then a buzz sounded, and the click of the inner doors told me she’d unlocked it for me. I stepped through, throat tight, the thumping of my heartbeat echoing in my ears.

I stared at my own reflection on the way up in the elevator, fixing a few stray strands of hair like a vain asshole, because apparently I still wanted to look good for her when she opened the door.

Still, when it swung open and Nikki stood before me in all her dark-haired, dark-eyed glory, I didn’t feel like fixing a few flyaway pieces of hair had helped me prepare for the sight of her before me.

She was barefoot, wearing soft, loose pants and a shirt that hung off one shoulder. Her hair was up in a clip and she wore no makeup, but her cheeks were flushed. She looked amazing. I hated it.

“Um, come in,” she said, stepping aside. “Can I get you a drink?”

---