Page 21 of My Boss's Sons

I huffed. “You think I snuck out? After that situation with your mom? No, Iwantedto sneak out. What I ended up doing was meeting your mother and discussing shame and its complicated relationship to sex for women. That wasn’t sneaking out. Oh, my god. I’m just now putting together that Mary Anderson, the wife of my boss, caught me failing to sneak out of her sons’ apartment.”

“Well.” Ethan’s grin was shit-eating. “Want to come over and try again?”

18

***Sophia***

“Let’s go over ground rules, for real.” I took a deep breath and tried to remember that I was a grown woman who could face anything. “This is a professional office setting and you three need to act like it. Keep your hands to yourself and respect the people who work here.”

“Alternative rule. We keep our hands to ourselves when people are around. If we’re alone with you, we do what we want.” Alex laughed at the incredulous look on my face. “We’ll definitely respect the employees, though. Right, Noah?”

“I’ll play nice with Randy.” Noah stood up and walked around to my side of the desk. “You were talking about pain medicine. What hurts?”

I tried to slide away from him in my chair but he caught me. “The next rule should be that y’all stay on the other side of the desk.”

“Answer me, Sophia. What hurts?” Noah cupped my face and frowned as he rubbed his thumb over my forehead. “You’re squinting a lot. Headache?”

My shoulders sank and I nodded. “It’s been a long day already.”

“Let’s focus on the rules later then. For now, we’ll agree to not manhandle you in front of others.” With one more frown, he stood up. “I’ll be right back.”

I rested my elbows on my desk and my chin in my hands. Staring across at Ethan and Alex, I raised my eyebrows. “What’s he doing?”

Ethan shrugged. “Who knows?”

“Noah’s focused. Once he sets his mind to something, it happens.” Alex took the chair next to his brother. “I’m betting he’s in search of a way to make you feel better right now. For his next trick, he’s got his mind set on you, though.”

I shot him a dirty look. “Stop it.”

“You’ll get it eventually.” He nodded at Ethan. “This one isn’t much better. He’s just charming about getting what he wants so people don’t see it coming.”

Noah strode back into my office and toed the door closed behind him, sealing us away from the rest of the office. He unloaded a pile of things on my desk and gestured at it. “Pain meds, caffeine, a sandwich, and a book about chicken soup for women’s souls.”

A surprised laugh came out with a snort. “Where did you get this stuff?”

He pushed the items closer to me. “Don’t worry about it. Just take the medicine.”

I thumbed through the chicken soup book and then shook my head while pouring a few ibuprofen into my hand. I couldn’t imagine who was holding onto that book. It was over twodecades old. If they were, though, it clearly meant something to them and Noah had to take it back.

Before I could open the can of coke, Noah did it for me. I looked up at him while I took the medicine and searched his face for any kind of sign that would tell me he was joking. There was no way he was actually trying to take care of me. He was Gerald Anderson’s son. He would’ve been raised with a silver spoon in his mouth. Kids like that didn’t grow up to be the caretaker type usually.

“What?” He leaned against my desk and began unwrapping the sandwich. “You’re staring.”

I went to answer him just to have him push the end of the sandwich into my mouth. I glared at him while chewing and as soon as I swallowed the first bite, he shoved another one in my mouth.

“Your hands have been shaking the entire time we’ve been in here. While I’d love to assume that we’re breathtaking enough to leave you shaking, I know better. Your blood sugar could be low.” He held out my hand and grunted when he saw it was still shaking. “Eat more.”

I couldn’t admit that they did affect me enough that my hands shook so I ate the sandwich and drank the coke. By the time I was finished, I did feel a little better. “That’s enough. Thank you, but I don’t need you to take care of me. This a great place to start setting boundaries. If you wouldn’t treat another coworker the same way, don’t treat me that way.”

Alex sucked in a breath through his teeth in a dramatic way. “Oof. That’s going to be an issue. If Noah is going to treat you the way he treats everyone else, you’re going to hate him immediately.”

“Fuck off, Alex.” Noah leaned in closer to me. “You may be our boss for now but you don’t get to control the way I treat you.”

“I’m not your boss. Don’t even joke about that. It makes me feel even worse about this weekend.” I grabbed my hair clip and tried to pin my hair up. “I wish to god I’d known who fathered you three before I went home with you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Noah frowned and gripped the arm of my chair so he could pull me closer. “While we’re getting things clear, you need to let go of whatever freak out you’re having over who our father is. It’s irrelevant to any conversation about us. No matter how much our mom made us sound like little boys, we’re grown men, Sophia. I think you know that, though.”

I laughed. “Gerald Anderson being your father is definitely relevant. There are layers upon layers of wrongness to what happened this weekend because of that fact. We could go through this a hundred times and I’m not going to change my mind about that.”

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