Page 21 of Falling for My Boss

That night as I lay in bed staring up at the ceiling, I felt like I had gotten lost somewhere along the way and ended up in an alternate timeline. There was no way this was actually happening. Looking back on how my life had unfolded since leaving home, it just didn’t seem possible I was tucked into the spare bed in my boss’s home office, riding out the challenging situation I’d landed in.

And speaking of my boss, that was a whole thing of its own. Despite his caution when he was making sure I wasn’t part of some organized crime ring that was going to set up shop in his house or at his vineyard, the truth was, Derek was starting to show cracks of his true colors. And those cracks revealed sweetness and compassion.

And possibly a touch of naivete.

I didn’t want to think of him that way, but it was hard not to. Lying there in the dark, not able to close my eyes, I couldn’t help but focus on the reality that he hadn’t done a lot of thinking when it came to extending his offer of help to me. Maybe not any thinking at all.

Without knowing why I was upset, what I was running from, or where I might have planned on going, he opened his home to me. Then he kept it open to me on nothing more than my word. All he needed to hear was that I was being honest with him and not getting him involved in anything nefarious, and he was willing to accept it. Not only accept it but give me a place to stay without an end date and offer whatever other help I might need.

I could hardly believe there were actually people like that in the world. Truly selfless, caring people who wanted to offer their help and support to others in any way they could for no other reason than they needed it.

It wasn’t that I didn’t know any good people. There were people in my past who I cared a lot about and even missed when I let myself think about them. But I’d never encountered a situation where any of them gave of themselves the way Derek was.

It was nothing short of crazy, and as I lay there, I realized that whole thing was why I was unable to sleep. At first, I wanted to keep everything to myself and offer up as few details as possible because I didn’t want to open up. I didn’t want to give him a glimpse into what my life really was. Or, maybe, who I really was. Him just accepting that and moving forward seemed like a great thing.

But now it was eating at me. His sweet, trusting approach made me feel like he deserved more than just my word. He deserved the full truth.

I got out of bed and walked over to the door that separated our rooms. It had been closed since the first time I saw it, but I was very aware of Derek being right on the other side of it. The late hour made me worry he might have already gone to sleep, and I would be disturbing him, but seeing light trickling under the door told me sleep hadn’t found him yet either.

I hesitated for just a moment on my side of the door. I wondered if he could see the shadows caused by my feet and knew I was standing there. If he did, he didn’t say anything.

Knowing I needed to just bite the bullet and do it or I might lose my conviction, I knocked on the door. It only took a second for Derek to respond.

“Come in,” he said.

I swallowed and opened the door enough to stick my head into the room.

“Are you awake?”

It was one of those questions that was utterly stupid to ask. Clearly, he was awake. Not only had he told me to come in when I knocked, but there he was, sitting up in his bed with a book in his hands in front of him. Yet, it was the only thing that came out of my mouth when I tried to create some sort of bridge between opening the door and getting into the conversation itself.

Derek’s eyes slid back and forth like he was looking around the room, then came back to me and he nodded.

“Yeah. Come on in.”

I stepped the rest of the way into the room and walked toward the bed. I was trying hard not to notice that he had no shirt on and the cute way his tousled hair was falling across his forehead, still damp from his shower.

Gandalf lay on the biggest dog bed I had ever seen up against the wall and didn’t even lift his head when I walked into the room. Either I had already won over the giant dog and he didn’t think I was any sort of threat, or he really was the worst guard dog ever.

Derek closed his book as I got closer. I couldn’t see what the title was, but there was something about him sitting there reading an actual book, with pages and creases and a bookmark tucked in the back, that I really liked.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Can’t sleep.”

He gestured at the foot of his bed. “Have a seat.”

I plopped down at the foot of his bed and let out a long breath. He didn’t say anything else, but the look on his face was inviting. He was giving me space to talk if I wanted to, and the open expression had the words bubbling up in my throat.

“I told you I’m trying to get away from my family,” I started. “Well, that’s what I’ve been doing for a while now. I didn’t grow up anywhere around here. In fact, I’m really far from home. If I can even really think of it as home anymore. I was born in Rhode Island to a really wealthy family and grew up with pretty much anything and everything.

“I have a twin, a brother named Jack. He has always fit in a lot better with the family and the rest of high society than I have. Not that I was the major black sheep or anything. I just didn’t quite subscribe to it the same way. A big part of that is how my parents like to throw their power around. They know their wealth gives them a certain amount of sway, and they are always looking for ways to get more.

“To them, having as much control, money, and influence as possible is the most important thing in life. They will do anything to get it. Including a lot of things I didn’t want any part of. To them, anything is fair game if it gives them the ability to climb a little higher on the social ladder.

“I’ll admit, I just kind of let it happen around me for a long time. Some of what they did made me uncomfortable, but it was never illegal or totally morally repulsive. So, I turned a blind eye and just kept going about my life. In my mind, it wasn’t like there was anything I could really do about it. It wasn’t like I could stop them. Even when I did say something to them, it wasn’t like they listened or cared what I had to say.”

“But I’m guessing something changed,” Derek said.

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