Page 46 of The Wrong Boss

I nodded, following my friend and ex-boss out of the dining room. We went to a small living room decorated with dark colors and rich textures. Rome poured me a drink—he knew I was partial to port after a meal—and invited me to sit on a large, chocolate-colored leather sofa with rolled arms and a tufted back. I sank into the cushions and let out a long breath.

Rome came around the sofa and took a seat in the armchair to my right. He pulled something out of his breast pocket and handed it over.

My brows jumped at the grainy, black-and-white image. An ultrasound picture. I glanced up. “Another one?”

He grinned. “Number three.” He pointed to the picture I still clutched between my fingers. “And number four.”

I blew out a breath. “Twins.” Catching myself before my selfish, bitter feelings showed on my face, I glanced up. “Congrats, Rome.”

His smile was unlike anything I’d seen before. When weworked together, he was all business, all the time. He’d rarely smile, unless it was a triumphant grin when he closed a particularly juicy deal. “We’re not telling anyone yet—it’s early—but I can’t wait.”

He was a changed man—and I was happy for him.

But as I handed the ultrasound image back and watched as he let his gaze linger on the image, another wave of bitterness went through me.

It felt like we were drifting apart. He was a family man now, with two kids and a wife. He’d taken a step back in the business and wasn’t shy about telling me how happy he was as a result.

I couldn’t relate.

He was my best friend, and it felt like I was watching him turn into a stranger.

“Alba’s great,” he finally said to break the silence. The ultrasound picture disappeared into his pocket again, and he reached for his drink to take a sip.

I nodded. “She is.”

My best friend watched me, eyes narrowing slightly. “Sounds like there’s a ‘but’ in there.”

“There’s no ‘but,’” I said, maybe a bit too quickly. “She’s great. Our families are happy. Alba’s planning a great wedding. It’s good.”

Even to my own ears, my words sounded hollow. I thought about the look Rome and Nikki had exchanged at the dinner table, and I wondered if some people were just luckier than others. Maybe that kind of love wasn’t in the cards for me—the kind of connection that didn’t need words. Two people drawntogether like magnets, who could never be apart no matter what circumstances tried to come between them.

Gray eyes blinked in my mind, with pink lips curled into a coy smile. I banished the image.

She wasn’t for me. She never had been.

Rome cleared his throat. “Cole…”

My fingers clutched my glass of port as I leaned the base of it against my knee, and I forced myself to meet Rome’s gaze.

He let out a sigh. “You don’thaveto marry her.”

I jerked back. “What?”

“‘Our families are happy?’” he parroted back at me. “‘Alba’s planning a great wedding?’”

My gaze slid away from his. I didn’t know what to say.

“This isn’t a boardroom deal, Cole. It’s the rest of your life.”

“Is this what you wanted to talk to me about? What is this, some kind of intervention?”

Rome was quiet for a while. He let out a long breath, and when he spoke, his voice was quiet. “When you quit your job at my company, I was angry, Cole. Really angry. I took it personally.”

“I remember.”

“It wasn’t until Nikki and I…until I found out…” He trailed off. We both remembered what had happened between them. Rome let out a harsh breath and turned to face me again. “She changed my life, Cole. She changedme. She made me realize what it’s like to have a strong woman at my side. What it’s like to have apartner. And the fact that we have kids now, that our family’s growing… I can’t tell you how much joy it brings me.”

I thought about my own father, about those long, difficultconversations we’d had when I’d first reached out to him. He and my birth mother had had a one-night stand, and he had been all-in on his career. When she told him she was pregnant, he hadn’t had the space in his life for a child. She had no family support and few career prospects; they couldn’t do it on their own. It was better for me if they gave me up to a family that could care for me the way they couldn’t.

---