Page 21 of Grumpy Boss's Secret

I'd read it a great deal since the corners were peeling back, and there was a slight tear at the edge of the cover. I should have been embarrassed that a romance novel was sitting on my work desk, but I was suddenly bursting with an idea. The question that rose to my mind rolled off my tongue before I could suppress it.

"Have you ever read Kirk Green?" I asked as Ian continued to look down at the book.

“You obviously have,” he said, turning towards me. His eyes were twinkling again.

“But have you?” I countered, watching his face. His eyes emitted a warm glow that I hadn’t seen before.

The blank mask passed over his face as if he'd drawn a curtain over the light in his eyes.

“I’ve never heard of him,” he said.

“Oh,” I said. “Okay. Well, see you at the meeting.”

"Yes," Ian uttered and walked out of the room, shutting the door behind him again.

I watched him go, my mind doing somersaults. That was odd. It was obviously a lie. Was he just too embarrassed to admit it? He didn't want to confess that he'd read a romance novel like that. The cover could have been more smutty-looking. I might have been embarrassed if it had been – but it was just a photograph of a castle at night with light shining out of one of the windows.

“I know you’ve read Kirk Green, Ian,” I muttered.

And he’d been interested in my book. He’d paid particular attention to it.

“Enigma,” I said.

Also, Kirk Green was famous. Very famous. Most people had heard of him.

“Huh,” I said.

That itching feeling at the back of my mind was back. I ignored it and glanced at the clock. Half an hour until the staff meeting. There was still some work I could get done before then.

“Are you coming out with us later, Jozi?”

I lifted my eyebrows, surprised, as I lifted my binder off the meeting table. Larry smiled up at me complacently.

“Coming out where?” I asked.

“To the staff mixer!” he said. “We’re all meeting at Rouge tonight at seven-thirty. Ian was supposed to tell you.”

I glanced at Ian, who was looking at us blankly.

“Sorry,” he said. “It slipped my mind.”

It had slipped his mind, or he’d been too preoccupied with denying that he’d ever read Kirk Green even though he’d just posted one of Kirk Green’s quotes on Instagram?

“Bring your boyfriend,” Larry said to me.

“Oh,” I said, laughing casually, “I don’t have one.”

“Oh no?” Larry said. “Then you can be Ian’s date. He needs one.”

I glanced at Ian, embarrassed and confused.

"That's inappropriate, Larry," Ian said breezily, looking down at the meeting table and collecting his paperwork.

Oh, sure. We've already gone way beyond appropriate, Ian. I didn't really mind that he'd said it, though. It was the correct response, indeed, and my heart was hammering because he hadn't just said, "You're wrong, Larry; I'm already bringing a date."

I told myself I shouldn't care much, but I found myself asking another question out of curiosity.

“Don’t you have a date, Ian?” I said, my tone casual. “I thought you had a girlfriend.”

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