Page 43 of In This Together

She smiled at him in a way that told him she was on to him. ‘Was that all, because I really do have work to do.’

He exhaled heavily, the way a flame-breathing dragon might. Then he extracted a familiar velvet box from his inside pocket and set it down on the desk. Andrea glanced to the corridor outside her office, thankfully finding no one was watching them.

She nudged the box back to Hunter. ‘We’ve discussed this and I have nothing more to say on the matter.’

His lips curled up like a cunning fox. ‘You’re still taking a tantrum then?’

Her hands trembled with fury she couldn’t unleash. ‘I’m not a child, Hunter.’

‘Then stop behaving like one. Take the gift.’

‘Have your circumstances changed since the last time we spoke?’ Damn it, why was she even asking this?But she waited for the answer, holding her breath, her stomach tied up. What if he said yes?

His silence was the only response she needed, and she found herself relieved.

‘If there’s nothing else…’ She looked toward the exit.

‘I’ll come to your place tonight and we can discuss this like adults.’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘No. Even if I wanted to, which I don’t, I’m busy tonight.’

He snorted. A grotesque sound. ‘What, like, washing your hair?’

She scowled. Didn’t she have anything else in her life besides work and her illicit affair with her boss? Was she that predictable?‘Yes, I will be washing my hair, right before I go out. See, I have a date.’

‘A date? With who?’

‘It’s withwhom.’

‘Touché. Withwhomdo you have a date?’

Oh God, she was such a shitty liar, except, apparently, when it came to banging Hunter.‘A man.’

He laughed in a way that made her want to bring her trembling hand across his cheek. ‘Which man?’

‘You don’t know him.’

‘Okay, Andi. Well, if your date doesn’t transpire, I’ll be at your place around eight.’

She watched him leave.Fuck him. Fuck him so. Damned. Hard.

Urgh, she was so angry her eyes were stinging and her body was shaking. He was so… arrogant. What had she ever seen in him? Maybe Hannah had called it spot on. Andrea went with Hunter because he was off limits and now, she realised, not a man she could have ever fallen for seriously enough to get her heart broken.

She stomped to her window, hoping if she watched the Hudson for long enough she would calm down. And all she could think about was how, all her life, men had been telling her what to do. That it didn’t matter whether she was now a CEO of a label, because her ultimate boss andex-lover still held the power. That it hadn’t mattered when she was running her own indie recording label becauseshewas the one who was told to look after the business – by her father, even by her sister’s new husband. That it hadn’t mattered when she was just a girl who deserved to have her own independence; that she had been told to look after her kid sister and take hereverywhere.

‘So, you have a date tonight, huh?’

Hannah’s voice was tentative. She could read Andrea as easily as she could read a highway sign.

Andrea kept watching the Hudson and the ripples that followed a power boat. ‘You heard that?’

‘Yes. But I was intentionally eavesdropping and the other girls have their headphones in, so they didn’t hear anything.’

Andrea nodded once, sternly.

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