Page 45 of My Boss's Sons

I looked up at Ethan and nodded. “Yeah. Everything’s fine.”

“Do you know what this meeting is about? You met with Dad this morning, didn’t you?”

I nodded. “We had breakfast at the house. He didn’t mention any meetings. He did ask about how things were going. I told him that it was good and that I thought this was a good department for us to start in.”

“Any mention of that weirdness between him and Sophia last week?” The elevator doors opened and we stepped inside, still just the two of us. He hit the button for the top floor and leaned against the wall opposite me. “I got the feeling they don’t especially like each other.”

That bad feeling in my gut grew heavier. I wasn’t going to mention the wink Dad had thrown my way when he’d made a comment about us watching Sophia closely to see how she ran things. It’d given me a gross feeling, knowing that we were involved with Sophia the way we were. Dad didn’t know, though. He was just being Dad. He’d never cheated as far as I knew but he did like to look.

“Noah?”

I shook myself out of my funk. “No, he didn’t mention anything that made me think he doesn’t like her.”

“But you got the feeling that she doesn’t like him, right?”

I frowned. “I don’t know, Ethan. Does it matter?”

The elevator doors opened on the top floor and Dad’s assistant was waiting for us with a smile and two fresh cups of coffee. “Hi! Good morning. Sophia is in with Mr. Anderson and Alex is waiting in the conference room.”

Ethan was staring at me, unmoving. “Of course, it matters. I mean, if-”

I glared at him. “Not now.”

He took his coffee and nodded at the woman before stalking away.

“I hope everything’s okay, Noah. Is there anything I can do for you?” The woman placed her hand on my arm and leaned closer. “If you need some space, you can sit at my desk.”

I just shook my head and walked away. I didn’t need space. I just needed to focus on what mattered. Work. Even as I thought that, a clear image of Sophia crept into my mind.

37

***Sophia***

It should’ve made me feel better that the guys were just on the other side of Gerald’s conference room door. Unfortunately, it didn’t. Gerald still spoke to my chest, despite my top covering everything up to my neck. He made me feel like I needed to leave and take a shower. He also made me feel utterly disrespected. He’d sent for me and once I was in his office, he made a call and didn’t seem like he was in a hurry to end it. It left me sitting across from him, doing my best to not notice the way he looked at me while talking about a golf game he’d recently played with someone.

The list of things I could be doing grew in my head the longer I sat there. Gerald couldn’t have made it clearer that he didn’t consider me or my time important. I had hundreds of companies to research, dozens of calls to make, appointments to keep, and a team of researchers to direct. None of that mattered, though. Not to Gerald.

At the back of my mind, I felt a real sense of dread that somehow he knew that I was sleeping with his sons. The tattoo on my thigh, done by his son, was a vivid reminder of the wild sex we had just the day before. I’d accepted the idea that I was going to keep sleeping with the guys but facing off with their father made me feel dirty for it. It was strange to suddenly be doing something that I had to keep hidden and I wasn’t sure I liked it. My conscience didn’t feel clean and I didn’t like knowing that it wasn’t when dealing with Gerald.

The sound of Gerald ending his phone call drew my attention back to him just in time for me to see him smirking at my breasts. I crossed my arms over them and met his gaze with a stern expression. Not jumping in to fill the awkward silence made my skin crawl but I managed to keep my lips sealed.

Gerald chuckled and stood up. “I like you, Sophia. You’ve got spirit.”

I took a deep breath and nodded. Still, I kept my mouth shut. I realized I was walking a fine line of being too openly unhappy with the CEO of the company so I wanted to play as nice as possible.

Walking around his desk, coming closer to me, he sat in the chair next to me after pulling it closer. “Tell me how the training is going.”

“It’s fine. Your sons are all qualified and intelligent, which makes it easy to show them around. They understand everything and catch on quickly so I haven’t lost as much time as I thought I would. I’m not sure how much more time they need in my department, though.” I kept my back straight and face blank, hiding every emotion I felt towards the guys.

“Only two of them went to school for business.” He leaned forward and raised his eyebrows. “Can you tell which one didn’t?”

Anger lapped at the edges of my conscience. If I hadn’t just learned about Alex’s childhood, I still would’ve found his question awful, but knowing what I knew made me want to scratch his eyes out. “Not at all. They’re all three very smart.”

“Of course.” He smiled and steepled his fingers together. “Do you realize a mistake you made cost the company dearly last week?”

The quick change in topic threw me off, most likely the way he wanted it to. I frowned and shook my head. “I’m sorry?”

He smiled and reached out to pat my knee. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to fire you, Sophia. You fill a very important role here at Anderson Inc..”

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