Page 22 of Snowbound in Her Boss's Bed

CHAPTER FOUR

MIRISANKINTO the sofa, swallowed by its cushioned designer warmth. In front of her blazed the largest in-home fireplace she had ever encountered.

Plush, heated and inviting, the sitting area was a far cry from the hard-lined modern-style particleboard couch she’d purchased secondhand for her own living room, as well as the cracks in the plaster, mostly covered by thrifted artwork, in her 1920s single-story apartment walls.

Mr. Silver joined her with two chilled glasses of delicately pink wine and the box of doughnuts she’d brought.

He had asked her earlier if she normally made it through a box of doughnuts in a meeting.

She had never finished anywhere near to a full box of doughnuts before in her life, but it looked like that might be changing over the next few hours.

Given that this was her first time in a blizzard, snowed in with a supervisor, she couldn’t even find it in herself to feel like she shouldn’t.

In fact, given the day that she had had, she couldn’t even say doing so would ultimately register as one of the big firsts.

It certainly fell below drinking wine with an astronomically wealthy colleague in front of a fire in his private residence, as well as below being flown out to Aspen in a private jet.

In the face of all of that, what was eating half a box of doughnuts?

She took the glass from him with a “thank you,” unsure if she was grateful or not.

While a nice gesture, rosé and delicious doughnuts were still no substitution for her annual night with her friends.

He sat down beside her, placing the doughnuts on the marble-topped table in front of them as he did.

Beneath their feet, a thick sheepskin rug glowed like a bright pearl in the flashing light of the fire, just begging her to curl her toes into its silky softness.

But one had to be barefoot to curl one’s toes into a luxurious rug, and Miri still wore her pumps.

Despite the rosé and the doughnuts and the fire and generally opulent coziness surrounding them, there were cracks in the image of winter holiday bliss they presented.

Mainly the lack of bliss or basic familiarity with each other.

Abruptly, her life didn’t seem to make any sense anymore.

She sat on a plush sofa alone with a man she barely knew, drinking wine, their bodies angled toward each other.

Finding herself in this position with a man she had only just met was unheard-of for her.

Miri went slow with things, taking her time with love and friendship and anything else that the crush of modern life would let her get away with.

Rushing and being hasty and trusting too soon were things that she had learned the hard way to avoid from the man she had thought she was going to marry.

Her former fiancé had taught her that even three years was not enough time to truly know if someone was trustworthy and steadfast enough to give your heart to.

She had thought it was, but it wasn’t.

And she had known Mr. Silver for mere hours.

And yet the alternative to sitting here with him would have been waiting out the storm alone in one of his many guest rooms.

Sometimes circumstances forced unusual behavior.

“Cheers,” he said, breaking into her thoughts and jolting her back to the present moment that she had been reflexively denying.

The present was surreally romantic and ideal, a cozy and rom-com-esque situation in which to find herself in the wake of all of the unexpected events that this man had set off in her life over the last twenty-four hours.

“To the gala, and the first night of Hanukkah,” he continued his toast, “and the end of this snowstorm, of course.”

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