Page 40 of A Baby Surprise For My Billionaire Boss

“To get you breakfast. When you tell this story to Tess later, I want to make sure I come off looking really good.”

“Oh, you don’t need to worry about that,” Maddie said. Then she blushed. Imagining what she must be thinking, Eli couldn’t help but laugh — he sort of wanted to ask her exactly what details she would share with Tess, but he decided to leave that between the two of them.

“Just tell me one thing,” he said.

“All right?”

“I just want to know whether you have any regrets. Whether you’re wishing that we hadn’t done it.”

She swallowed. “No,” she said softly. “No regrets at all, Eli. I don’t know where we go from here, and I don’t know if we were wise in what we did, but I do know that I can’t possibly take it back now. It was exactly what I’ve been wanting this whole time, and I’m happy that it happened.”

“Good,” he murmured. “That’s good.”

“Do you feel the same way?”

“We can get into how I feel when I get back with your breakfast.” He flashed her a grin. “Why don’t you just relax? Enjoy the sunrise.”

She nodded and settled back into the pillows.

Eli grabbed his phone from the charger and headed into the kitchen. He started the coffee and then pulled up his email, thinking that he would fire off a quick message to his assistant to let everyone know that he wouldn’t be coming in today.

He froze.

There were dozens of unread messages in his inbox.

It didn’t make sense. He had cleared it out last night before leaving work. It wasn’t yet seven in the morning. What could all these messages possibly be about — unless something had gone seriously wrong overnight?

With a sinking feeling in his stomach, he clicked one of them open.

It was from his contact at Harrison Duncan, a law firm that was one of his biggest clients. Eli skimmed the email with mounting horror. Harrison Duncan was canceling all their contracts with his company. The tone of the email was one of deep dissatisfaction bordering on outrage, and Eli had no idea what to think. Everything had been fine yesterday…

He looked at the clock. Was it too early for a phone call?

He knew the answer to that, really, but something had to be done to mitigate this situation. He couldn’t just lose such an important client. This was terrible for the business. They would survive the hit, but it was a huge setback.

No, he had to call. He had to at least leave a message, to show that he was taking this seriously.

Jack Harrison answered the phone on the first ring. “It’s about damn time,” he snapped. “I’ve been trying to get in touch with you all night, Sinclair.”

“I’m glad I didn’t wake you,” Eli managed, though in truth this was worse. Apparently whatever had happened was so serious that Jack Harrison hadn’t been to sleep yet, and that was worrisome in the extreme. “I just received all your emails.”

“How can you havejustreceived them? Is your company’s technology so terrible that it takes eight hours for an email to go through?”

“What I mean is that I just checked my messages,” Eli said, striving for patience.

“That’s not what was promised when I signed my contract with you. Round-the-clock customer care, that’s what I was told I would receive.”

“I’m sure there have been members of my staff available,” Eli said. “I always have staff on hand to deal with anything that might come up, at all hours. Didn’t anyone respond to you?”

“Of course they did, but I didn’t want to speak to whatever random associate you left manning the desk. When something of this severity happens, I needyou, Sinclair. Where were you?”

Eli wasn’t about to be interrogated as to his whereabouts post work hours. “What happened?” he asked. “Whatever it is, I’m sure we’ll be able to set it right.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t count on that. The firm suffered a serious data breach yesterday,” Jack Harrison said. “We’re facing lawsuits from a number of our clients because their data was leaked, and we’re probably going to have to settle with all of them, because they’re completely in the right. I thought your software was supposed to protect against this sort of thing! What went wrong?”

“I have no idea, but I’m more than happy to dispatch a tech support team,” Eli said. “We can manage this.”

“It’s too late for that. I’ve been dealing with your tech support staff all night. At leasttheyanswer their phones.” Harrison paused. “Do you know why I contracted with your company? You’re not the only security software out there. I had options. I chose your company because of how dedicated you seemed. You told me that you would always be available if I had any issues. Not some minimum-wage desk jockey.You.”

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