Page 82 of The Guy Who Became My Grumpy Boss

“You could take me.” She still refused to let go.

“I don’t have a car, and I doubt you can take the train.”

“I could do the train.” Hope like a kid who was trying to get their parents to buy them something shone in her eyes.

What was going on? My brain couldn’t keep up, and I was almost out of patience. I had things to be doing, and Marissa was in the way of me doing them.

“Absolutely not,” I said in response to her taking the train.

The adoration in her gaze returned, and another sinking feeling filled me.

Marissa had been like this when we’d briefly dated after college. It had taken a full-blown fight to get her to stop.

I didn’t have the time or the emotional bandwidth for this right now. So I pulled my grumpy boss persona around me and frowned down at her. “Marissa, I’m going to call you a wheelchair van to take you home. You’re going to get in the van without complaint.” I pointed toward the lobby. “In the meantime, I need to do damage control.”

Tears continued to glisten in Marissa’s eyes. “You never talk to Jessica like this.”

Because Jessica doesn’t push me like this.

I kept the words to myself and my expression in place. “This isn’t about Jessica.”

“You’re right, it’s about us.” Marissa’s voice grew in volume. “It’s about you and me.” Her grip somehow tightened even more,and I had to resist violently pulling away from her. “You keep denying what’s between us.”

The room seemed to tilt sideways. I’d always worried that she still had feelings for me. I’d done my best to ignore or halt any of her advances since we’d officially broken up.

Things had been fine between us for years. Why now? What had happened?

Did she know about Jessica and me? If so, how?

Marissa tried to pull me toward her. I refused to move. Her lower lip thrust out in a pout. “I know you don’t have feelings like other people, and maybe that’s why you keep running away from us.”

I shook my head and spoke slowly. “There is no us, Marissa.”

“Yes, there is,” she hissed. “There always has been.”

“No.” This conversation could only end one way, and I had to get to that conclusion as quickly as possible.

“Peter.” My name was a plea on her lips. “We’ve always been close.”

“We haven’t,” I fired back. How long before I ripped my hand from hers?

“Yes, we have.” She smiled, but instead of being filled with light like it should be, it completed a sinister expression that I’d never seen before from Marissa. “I’m all you have.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, other than calling her delusional, so I kept my teeth clamped shut.

“We’re meant to be together.” She reached out her other hand to grab my arm on the side she was already holding. “Peter, I’ve loved you since we were kids. Since the first time I saw you.”

A throb started at the base of my skull, and the walls seemed to be pressing in on me. I had imagined this conversation before, and it had never turned out well.

Marissa’s smile widened, and tears were now streaming down her cheeks. “Underneath the grumpy exterior, you’refragile, like a child.”

I’d never expected that to come from Marissa, and my brain got stuck on the fact that she thought I was childlike.

Marissa went on. “But I help you. All the time.”

She had assisted me with things over the years, but it was always work items. It had never been romantic.

“I complete you.”

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