Page 20 of Knocked Up by my Best Friend's Brothers

“When was that?”

“Oh, a couple of years ago. My boss at Perry-Sage was desperate to hire him, but they couldn’t afford his price tag. I’m impressed you were able to—” I pause, my blood running cold as I realize what I just said. “Shit.”

“What’s wrong?” Cassius asks with a straight face. He heard me alright.

“You weren’t supposed to hear that.”

“Hear what?”

“You know what.” I raise an eyebrow at him.

He laughs. “Can’t I just pretend I didn’t hear it to keep you safe from an NDA breach?”

I can’t help but stare at him for a while, surprised and soft on the inside as I realize how tactful he’s being. I’m the one whose tongue slipped, yet he’s insisting on discretion and respecting my initial secrecy regarding Perry-Sage. I offer a timid nod and lean back in my chair.

“Thank you, Cassius.”

“Don’t mention it, Christa. You’re safe here.”

That sounds sweet. And wonderful. But I’m not safe anywhere, not while the Mancinis are still free, but I’ll cross that bridge if or when I come to it. Right now, I need to focus on my performance here, on finding a semblance of peace.

“I’ll put together a report on how I can improve each of the products and their developmental processes by the end of the week,” I say.

“Perfect. You can present it to us after your first staff briefing on Friday.”

“My first what?” I blink a few times, rather confused.

Cassius laughs again. “I won’t drag you out in front of people too many times; I promise. But we hold a quarterly staff meeting with all of our executive employees from all of our branches and departments. About a hundred people in total. It takes place in the White Conference Room on the ground floor.”

“White Conference Room?”

“Yeah, we’ve got three large conference rooms and ten smaller ones for client meetings. The White one is for staff events. The Black one is for corporate events, mostly for our steel mills. And the Green one is for press and city officials.”

“Wow, you boys have come a long way since you took over the corporation, haven’t you?” I ask, my eyes bright with awe.

He offers a slight shrug. “We make a good team, my brothers and I. And our father left us a good and fruitful legacy. All we’ve been doing is building upon what was already here.”

“I know he’d be proud of you.”

“Thank you.” Cassius takes a deep breath and gets up.

I expect him to head straight for the door, but he comes around my desk instead, prompting me to stiffen in my seat. My pulse goes on an instant rampage.

He leans closer, and his saffron-infused cologne inundates my senses. I’m paralyzed in my seat, secretly begging him to do something unprofessional because my core has already reached its highest temperature, but Cassius just peers into my eyes and smiles.

“And speaking of Friday,” he says, his voice low and inviting as he places his hands over mine on the armrests of my swivel chair, his touch sending a trillion hot shivers down my spine at once. “How about a dinner date? The four of us.”

“A dinner date?”

“Yes.”

“A dinner date.”

“Don’t they still do that in modern society?”

I nod once. “Yup. They still do dinner dates.”

“Of course, we’ll behave in public,” he replies with a sly grin and inches even closer.

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