Page 24 of Just Not That Into Billionaires

“Yup,” he says.

“For ayear,” I clarify, trying not to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” he asks, like he’s so weary of me already.

His whole freaking attitude is giving me a complex, but I soldier on. “You,” I say. “You’re funny in the way that you’re not using your cognitive faculty of memory.”

“Meaning what?” he asks.

“Meaning you hate working for other people. You thought the Beau Cirque bosses were idiots.”

“Theywereidiots,” Benny says.

“You think that about everyone—you know you do, Benny! Everybody in Beau Cirque knew it, too. You were practically unemployable at the age of twenty-two. And now you’ve made a bazillion dollars and your big prize is…drumroll…working for other people, a thing you absolutely hate!”

Benny frowns at his phone. Is he even listening?

“He won’t hate working with the Protech team,” Aaron says.

“And you’ve witnessed him being an employee when?” I ask.

Aaron gives me a dark look. “And you got your business degree where?”

Benny is finally looking up from his phone. “That’s enough,” he says.

“I know what I know,” I inform Aaron, getting in the last word. I turn back to Benny and his whole U-Can’t-Touch-This forcefield. “And, dude, you were literally apoplectic every time they gave you an order, but I’m sure you’ve completely mellowed now. I’m sure you have a way better disposition. So much sunnier,” I say.

Benny’s focusing on me now. He has this ability to hyper focus with his full attention to the exclusion of the whole world. It was one of the things that made people think he was rude, but I got it. I knew what it was to focus like a demon—it’s how you get good at things. Needless to say, it was something about him that I secretly loved. I sometimes wondered what it would be like to have that intensity turned on me.

“You sell your company, and your big prize is that you get bosses, something you hate. What could go wrong?”

“You almost done?” he asks.

“Oh, right, I forgot. We’re not supposed to go by what was true ten years ago. My bad,” I say.

The way he’s watching me, it’s absolutely unnerving. I focus right back at him; I will not be cowed. We’re focusing weirdly on each other, now, like Clash of the Hyper-focusing Titans. It probably shouldn’t feel as hot as it does.

It’s hot to me, anyway. I doubt it’s hot for him.

“In the world of business,” Aaron begins from the other side of me, employing the most infantilizing tone possible, “a business owner staying on during a transitional period is part of how a sale like this gets done.”

Benny and I are still in our gaze-lock, but now I smile prettily. “It was unbelievably entertaining to watch you get bossed around,” I say. “It was physically excruciating to you, but entertaining to others.”

“A company isn’t like a car where you just hand over the keys,” Benny says, pulling out his newly minted measured cool-guy tone. “My presence in the company ensures that it retains its value through the transfer.”

“Good luck with that,” I say.

“I don’t need you to be on board with this sale,” he says. “I just need you to go eat dinner and be charming.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll be charming.”

“You’d better be,” Aaron chimes in annoyingly.

I’m just watching Benny. I forgot about his honey-colored eyes, how mesmerizingly saturated with light brown they are.

The limo stops yet again. The driver gets out.

“Are we there?”

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