Page 35 of Bobby

He shakes his head. “No. You’re just easy to read. Come on.” He stands tall and drops one hand, but not the other, as he walks us out of his office. “I need some caffeine after that call, and I bet you could use a cup of coffee too.”

“You don’t happen to have a Diet Coke, do you?”

“No, but I can get one.”

“No.” He arches an eyebrow as we descend the stairs. Shouting wasn’t necessary, probably, and I feel myself blushing at my reaction. “Coffee is fine. No need to do more than you already are.”

His lip twitches, but he says nothing else as he drops my hand and rounds the kitchen counter, going to an obscenely large and impressive coffee maker. The type baristas spend their entire college careers learning to use to make a single perfect cup of coffee. And he just happens to have one in his home.

I watch him work, fascinated by the way he moves about the process as if he’s done it a thousand times before.

“Surprised?” He doesn’t even look at me as he does some kind of tamping motion with a round cookie cutter.

“Very.”

He huffs out a laugh as he glances at me for a second before focusing once more on making us coffees. “I seem more like the pompous type who has things done for him, huh?”

“Well, you do always have a driver.”

“Fair point.” He turns with a cup in each hand, rounding the counter to sit on the barstool next to me. “My youngest brother, Tommy, is the worst without coffee in the morning. Then again, so are the rest of my brothers. I learned at a young age that it was better to just have a cup made to their liking ready for when they woke up before saying any words.”

“You always woke up before them?” I ask as I sip the drink. “Damn, that’s good.”

“Thanks. And yeah. I’ve always been an early riser, even as a kid. Sleeping in means anything past six.”

“Ugh, don’t tell me you’re one of those types who can function properly on like three hours of sleep and never need to recover from it.”

He takes a sip of his coffee before setting it down. “Okay, I won’t.” He winks, and I roll my eyes, then catch sight of yet another laptop.

“What’s with all the laptops? Do you really need so many?”

“Probably not, but I find it useful to have one in most rooms so I don’t have to run around the house to do business when someone calls or I get an idea I need to look into.”

I nod. Makes sense, in a weird, Type A personality way. I do the same thing with notepads; I always have one close by in case a thought pops into my head that I want to write down.

“I’m also a bit of a tech nerd and seem to collect different styles of computers as a sort of hobby. Or that’s what Tommy calls it.”

I raise an eyebrow. “A hobby? Really?”

“Yeah. He said I needed a hobby outside of work. I disagreed. Then he found out about my little collection of laptops, and that seemed to appease him enough to think I have a hobby. Again, his words, not mine. I just use them for work.”

I sip my drink again because I have nothing to add. Especially since I have no hobbies myself, unless work is the hobby outside of being a mom. Mom duty is all day, every day, even if you aren’t with the kids, in my opinion.

He turns to look at me fully. “So tell me, what’s the issue? The deliveries in general, or that I didn’t talk with you about them before they arrived?”

“Yes.”

Chapter 14—Bobby

Her quick response isn’t what I expected. Okay—with her, it is. I’m just not used to someone telling me they’re bothered by what I do.

Sure, I get occasional disagreements, but usually all it takes is a look from me or Marco and they fall in line.

Willow isn’t like that. And I appreciate it more than she’ll ever know.

“Care to be more specific?” I sip my coffee as I stare her down. Not to intimidate—I just enjoy looking at her. In my home. Seeing her around my space has me smiling internally as I let the warmth settle in my chest.

“It’s all too much.”