Page 17 of The Bachelor

Me

8 p.m. Tonight. My place.

Oaklyn

Ohhh. That must mean it’s time for lesson 1.

Me

Did you think I was inviting you over for dinner?

Oaklyn

Ha! Dick …

Should I bring anything?

Me

Your body.

Oaklyn

Obviously. Anything else?

“Someone’s talking to a woman.”

I glanced up and saw my sister leaning into the doorway of my office.

“Why the hell would you think that?” I opened my top drawer and placed my phone inside, hiding the screen from Hannah’s watchful, wandering eyes.

“You’re smiling.” She came in and took a seat in front of my desk.

“Hannah, women don’t make me smile. They make me scream. Huge fucking difference.”

“Gag.”

I lifted my orange juice off the desk and pounded a few sips. “What’s going on?”

She shrugged. “I just had a few minutes before my next meeting, so I wanted to pop in and see how Boston went.”

“Declan didn’t tell you?”

“He gave me the highlights.”

I rested my arms on the desk. “Now that I’ve pored through some of the info, I don’t think I can even comprehend the magnitude of this case. The two companies going to war against each other, the evidence that’s been presented, the lies, the data we’re going to have to sift through—it’s going to get interesting.”

“Declan mentioned that. He even said he needs to add more people to the team—he doesn’t think he has enough to cover what he needs.”

I nodded, linking my fingers together. “He’s meeting with Dominick right now to discuss that.”

“You lucky little shit.” She grinned.

“Hey, I didn’t tell you to go bang your boss and start a relationship with him so you’d have to get assigned to a different team. That decision was all on you.”

She laughed. “So out of character, I know. Let’s just say, I pulled a you.”

“If you had pulled a me, you would have ended things with him before they began; you wouldn’t be living with the dude, talking about how many babies you’re going to have.”