Page 38 of Promise Me Forever

“So, anyway, I only told you that so you’d know how inexperienced I am, Dra—um, sorry, Mr. James. I don’t really have much to judge things by or compare them to, and I don’t expect men to find me attractive. Especially not men like you.”

Men like me? I let that one go. “But that night, you had to have noticed that I wanted you. I don’t make a habit of fucking women who repulse me, Miss Ryder.”

“No, I’m sure you don’t, but… Oh gosh, I don’t know what I mean. I’m trying to tell you that I was different that night. I was Scarlet. And sometimes, I’m Scarlet around you even now. I behave in ways I wouldn’t normally behave. I guess I’m trying to say that I get it. If we’re both being honest, then I get it. I find it hard to be around you and not think about the things we did together. I find it hard not to… imagine them happening again.” She’s staring at her hands, her cheeks blazing, and my dick is now so hard it’s like having a metal bar between my legs. Jeez. This is exactly the problem.

“That’s the issue right there, Miss Ryder. Those things can never happen again. Not only because of the company’s image or the legal ramifications, but because I’m not a good man.”

Her attention snaps back to my face. “Yes you are! You might not be a saint. You work too hard, and you talk like you’ve got a stick up your ass sometimes. And you definitely smashed that coffee cup and lied about it, but youarea good man. You care about your job and your clients, you love the shit out of your family, and you’re… well, you’re a good listener. I get that you need to end this, whatever it is, but please don’t do it that way. You are a good man.”

I have no fucking clue how to respond to that. I’m doing what, dumping her? I’m not totally sure, but I’m not doing anything great to her. Yet she’s still defending me. She has no fucking clue who I really am. “We’ll have to agree to disagree on that, Miss Ryder,” I say, keeping my voice calm and locking my emotions away. “And what kind of man I am is irrelevant. For the time being, you will continue to be my secretary, but as soon as a suitable alternative position opens up, you’ll take it. I guarantee your salary and benefits will remain the same, and it will have no impact at all on your career prospects or your future with James and James. But you will be moving. Have I made myself clear?”

“Crystal clear, Mr. James,” she says, her voice matching my ice but her eyes flashing with fire. “Do you have any idea of a timeline on that?”

“Not as yet, but I believe Mr. Darwin’s assistant is due to go on maternity leave at some point in the next month or so.”

Fred Darwin is in his sixties and married to a man named Pierre, so I feel reasonably confident that she’ll be safe with him. I haven’t even discussed this with Nathan, never mind Linda, but I can make it happen. Technically, it might not be the same salary band, but I’ll damn well change the rules if I need to.

“Good,” she says, standing up and smoothing down her jacket. “Well, let’s hope for both our sakes that she doesn’t go over her due date, shall we, Mr. James? Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“No, that will be all, Miss Ryder.”

She nods and strides out of the room. Her ass looks phenomenal in those pants, and I bang my forehead on my desk as I feel my cock go hard yet again.

I hate that I’ve hurt her and that I have to freeze her out. But I have no other choice. It’s the only way I’ll be able to get her out of my head.

Chapter

Seventeen

AMELIA

I’m smiling as I show Stu Parker into Drake’s office. He’s a new client, and this is his first time visiting us.

I always make an effort with clients, but on their first visit, I show them the executive lounge and ply them with food and drink as part of the charm offensive. Not that the firm needs me to win or keep clients—the place is thriving—but I see it as part of my job. I am a representative of James and James, and as such, my behavior matters.

Clients like Mr. Parker make it especially easy. He’s a self-made millionaire in his sixties, a man who still wears jeans to work and has never forgotten his roots. He’s so easy to talk to, I’d quite like him to adopt me. In the hour he’s been in the building, he’s learned all about my mom, I oohed and aahed over several dozen pictures of his granddaughters, and we discovered that he used to live three streets away from my mom’s house in Brooklyn when he first started his plumbing business. He’s absolutely adorable, the complete opposite of a snot-bucket, and the smile on my face as I knock on my boss’s door is genuine.

It falters as soon as I hear his voice telling us to come in and almost disappears completely when I lead Mr. Parker through. Drake, as usual these days, completely ignores me apart froma curt nod. It’s been over a week since he told me I’d have to go work for someone else, and I don’t think we’ve exchanged more than a handful of words in all that time. He communicates more via email than by actually talking to me, and although I’m usually sitting right outside his office, I’ve barely seen him. I swear, he times his comings and goings to avoid having to interact with me. It sounds ridiculous, I know. He’s a billionaire master of the universe; he has far better things to do than keep tabs on me.

I tell myself I’m fine with our new reality, that all I care about is my job, but I’m a big fat liar and my pants are on fire. I do care, and I die a little inside every time he snubs me. He’s not rude, exactly. He’s simply perfectly professional and devastatingly distant.

“Mr. Parker, it was lovely to meet you,” I say, smiling up at him. “If you need anything, Mr. James will buzz through—make sure to say goodbye on your way out.”

“I sure will, Amelia—and maybe I’ll see you at Mario’s one day. Man, those exploding donut balls are something else.”

“I know, right?” I reply, ignoring the look of disgust on Drake’s face. He really needs to learn to live with the fact that Mario’s is the best.

“Thank you, Miss Ryder,” my boss says sternly, gesturing toward the door with his head. “Mr. Parker is here for legal advice, not a roundup of New York’s greatest food trucks. That will be all. Feel free to take your break.”

Right. Well. He certainly told me.

He doesn’t even meet my eyes when he dismisses me anymore, and I feel a little whoosh of pain as I obediently trot out of the room, my cheeks blazing with humiliation. When he first told me I’d be moving to work for someone else, I was hurt and upset. Now, after a week of getting the cold shoulder, I’m starting to look forward to it. Work shouldn’t bethis hard, especially when home isn’t much better. My mom is still struggling despite her new medications, and I’ve ended up staying with her a few nights because I was so worried. None of which I’ve mentioned to Drake, of course, because he doesn’t have the right to know anything about me other than what goes on within these walls during working hours.

I decide that I’ll take him at face value and take my break. Before I head off, I quickly check my emails and see one from him marked “annual leave.” It looks like he sent it a few minutes ago, before I saw him. In it, he informs me that I have already accumulated several days’ worth of paid vacation time, and that I should consider booking it “at your earliest convenience.” Wow. He really doesn’t like having me around, does he?

Screw him. The man is an arrogant asshole. I just wish that he’d be consistent and always be an arrogant asshole. It’s the flashes of humor and humanity that devastate me, the way that we sometimes seem to connect. Other times, he seems to wish he never met me. Given the opportunity to go back in time, I’d tell him to get lost the moment he sat down next to me at the wedding.

Except I wouldn’t, I think as I grab myself a coffee in the break room. No matter how things have worked out long-term, I’d do it all again in a heartbeat. Even the memory of his mouth on my skin makes me squirm. The contrast between that and the way he behaves now is what’s breaking me.

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