Page 287 of Small Town Firsts
She gazed down at me through her darkly lashed eyes. “If you wanted to touch, you just had to ask.”
I didn’t let go. If anything, I gripped that soft handful of flesh harder. Possibly leaving marks she’d remember later. Maybe even burns.
Surely I couldn’t be the only one who felt that incredible warmth every time we touched? I didn’t dare ask, but from the way she trembled faintly in my hold, she had to be feelingsomething.
Her throat moved and she slicked her tongue over her lips. “Don’t like the STD question? I could pretend to be an ex of his and slap her and call her nasty names. That’d probably work too.”
“Sit. Please.”
“You going to unhand me first?”
I did, reluctantly. I took my seat again as she sat in hers, and then let out a long breath. “I appreciate the gesture. Truly. But he’s your boss too.”
“Temporarily. And if he’s a sea cretin, maybe I don’t want to work for him. That ever occur to you?”
“No, because I didn’t know you had an aversion to sea cretins.”
“I do. They give me hives.” She shuddered. “Easy enough to tell someone you’re not feeling it anymore and you need to go.”
I picked up the napkin that had fallen off my lap and spread it over my trousers. “Yes, when there isn’t a million-dollar fortune at risk. That makes it harder.”
She didn’t even blink. “Are you excusing what he’s doing? You didn’t look like you were cool with it when you sat down. Or is that the bro code kicking in?”
“Bro code?He’s my father. The woman he’s hurting is my mother.”
“Then?” She snapped out her napkin over her lap.
“He’s a divorce lawyer. I’m not going to say we become immune to endings, but we definitely see how transientrelationships can be.” I jerked a shoulder. “People aren’t forever, but money lasts a good long while.”
“Nothing is forever. Especially not money. You can’t take it with you. Unless someone forgot to tell you that.”
“No, but you can’t take supposed love with you either.”
“Supposed, huh?” She shook her head, but not as if she disapproved of what I was saying. More like she was disappointed in me.
Hot on the heels of my father’s deception, that stung.
“Let’s just say I’m not a believer in Valentine’s Day. This is not helping my outlook.”
“You sound jaded as hell.”
I had been privy to far too many broken relationships, many of which ended due to tawdry extramarital affairs, frequently with staff. No wonder I took work boundaries so seriously.
I smoothed my hand over my napkin. “Yeah, well, do my job for as long as I have and see how you feel.”
“So don’t do it anymore. If it doesn’t feed your soul, let it go.”
The laugh that cracked out of my chest was loud enough to make the couple beside us look our way. For all I knew, my father had heard me too.
I didn’t care. I wasn’t the one who should be hiding, even if I’d traveled to the other side of Crescent Cove in case anyone saw me lunching with my brand new assistant and assumed things they shouldn’t.
Guess the joke was on me.
“If you’re able to construct your life that way, you’re lucky. I’m not. A role was waiting for me when I was born, and I stepped into it.”
The compassion that softened her expression made my shoulder blades itch. “Your brother must have too. But he enjoys his work.”
“Oh, you know that much about him already, hmm?”
