Page 46 of My Boss's Sons

My blood ran cold at his touch. I shifted back in my seat to try to get out of his reach. “Can you explain what mistake I made?”

Standing, Gerald walked behind me. “Did you recommend that we make an offer on Boulder Gear?”

I sat perfectly still. “Yes.”

“Did you tell Bill how important it was?”

I glanced at the conference room door and wished the guys were in the office with us. “When I send my research to my manager I always assign a level of importance. When I emailed Bill, I made sure to signify that it needed to be rushed.”

“I spoke to Bill and he never received the information to rush anything. Because of your slip, we missed out on Boulder. Charles Marcum called me this morning to let me know that he just closed the deal. We lost that deal because of your negligence in making sure Bill knew to move quickly.” He rested his hands on my shoulders and began to rub them. “You’re lucky that I like you, Sophia.”

I squeezed my eyes shut and forced myself to keep breathing. “I can forward you the email I sent Bill.”

“That won’t be necessary, Sophia. You just need to be a team player. I know it’s upsetting that Bill beat you for the job, butI expect you to continue to put the company first. These sort of slips won’t be allowed. If your job is too much for you, you could always work under me, like I previously mentioned.” He squeezed my shoulders harder and then strode across the room to open the conference room door. “Boys? Join us.”

I barely had time to correct my face and fight back tears of fury before the guys walked in. What happened next had me questioning my sanity. The moment they walked in, I felt a sense of calm wash over me. All the fury I’d been feeling eased and my shoulders sank down to where they should’ve been, instead of up by my ears. It occurred to me that I suddenly felt safe and that before they came in, I hadn’t. That thought had my stomach sinking.

Noah’s face was set in a hard expression as his eyes moved over me and then to the chair next to me. If he noticed that it was closer to me than it should’ve been, his face didn’t show it. Instead, he casually folded his tall body into the chair and presented a perfect picture of ease as he looked up at his dad. “Did Sophia tell you we’re awful and that she’d like to be set free from us?”

Gerald sat in his chair and smiled. “She was actually informing me that I have highly intelligent sons. I believe you boys have impressed Ms. Sophia here.”

Ethan pulled up another chair and smiled. “I’m flattered.”

I glanced back at where Alex stood behind me and saw the tension around his eyes. I wanted to hug him so badly to ease the anger and pain he felt because of his dad. It made me hate Gerald even more than I already did.

“So, tell me how this is going. Noah?” Gerald folded his hands in front of him on his desk and managed to keep his eyes off my chest while his sons were in the room.

“It’s been informative. Sophia runs a tight ship and it’s been good to learn from her.” Noah looked over at me and I felt theweight of his stare. “You picked a good department for us to start in.”

“Father knows best.” Gerald laughed. “Sorry. I know you boys hate when I say that. It’s true, though. How do you feel about working under Sophia’s care for the next week or two? Unless you feel like you’ve learned all you can from her?”

Ethan gripped the back of my chair and I felt his knuckles gently press into my back. “I’m good with staying in Acquisitions.”

“Noah?”

“I feel the same way.” Noah turned his head to look at Alex but Gerald made it clear he didn’t care what Alex thought.

“Great, then. You’ll stay with Sophia. I’d like to set up daily meetings with you, Sophia, to stay on track of their training. We’ll start tomorrow during lunch.”

I ground my teeth together and gave a curt nod. “Yes, sir.”

I could feel their eyes on me and I was torn between telling them to stop looking at me in case their dad noticed something and telling them to never look away to keep their dad away from me.

38

***Sophia***

Iwent straight home to spend the evening with Lily that night. Then, on Tuesday, I spent the morning going over the Boulder Gear case with Randal. I wanted to be prepared with answers for my lunch meeting with Gerald, but when I reported to his office for our new daily meeting, he just had me sit in front of his desk while he took a call from one of the board members. I clasped the file I’d put together in my hand and found myself thinking about where the line would be with Gerald. How far would he push me before something snapped?

I was dismissed from his office without ever having talked to him about the guys and I spent the rest of the afternoon on edge and angry. Gerald called the guys away a few hours before the end of the day to do more media stuff so I didn’t get to see them before I left work. I was grumpy and it was all I could do to make it home without screaming.

Mrs. Johnson walked out in front of my car to stop me as soon as I pulled into the neighborhood and when she started in,I imagined myself telling her to fuck off while I listened to her complain with a forced smile on my face.

“That man isn’t right! His hair is bright pink now! And he was cutting up logs all day! I couldn’t hear myself think. Now you’ve got those other hooligans coming over and I’mthisclose to calling the mayor on you. You’re ruining this neighborhood.”

“Honestly, Mrs. Johnson, if the worst thing Milo does is dye his hair fun colors and work on his art during daytime hours, you could do worse.” I started driving away. “I’m driving away now so I don’t have to hear anymore complaints today!”

I was so over the day that I didn’t even notice that there were two more vehicles than normal in my driveway until I was out of my car and walking up to the front door. Spinning around, I recognized one of the trucks as Alex’s. A spark of energy shot through me and I hurried inside.

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