Page 43 of Based on You

Not consciously, and not in any visible, unprofessional way. I'd marched into the office each morning, brewed his black coffee, compiled his briefs, fielded his calls, sat across from him during board meetings, and taken notes in the margins of my leather notebook. I'd been flawlessly professional. I'd been present. By every metric the job required, I'd been fine.

I'd also refused to look him in the eyes ever since he'd stood over me in his kitchen, his lips a breath above mine, and asked me what I thought.

The problem was, I had no idea what I thought. He'd leaned in. That meant something. He'd made the first move. He'd closed the distance between us. He'd been the one to reach out, and that was not nothing.

But I didn't know what it was. Simon Beckett was a man who hadn't been in a serious relationship in a long time, who'd apologized to me on his living room couch right afterward, who'd kept his hands to himself in every professional context we'd ever shared… and who'd then caught my wrist in his kitchen and leaned in. I had no clean framework for what any of it meant.

It might just be attraction. The physical kind that builds between two people trapped in small rooms and needs an outlet. The sort that has nothing to do with long conversations, or inside jokes about goats, or being carried down a dark hallway while I slept. And if I was being honest with myself, a wealthy man in his position could find that outlet with far less complication than hooking up with the assistant sleeping in his guest room.

But it might be more than that.

That was the terrifying part I didn't know what to do with. The possibility that it was more than attraction. That he'd listened to me talk about the almost, about the tension of restraint, about the charged breath right before the inevitable thing happens, and that when he finally stepped toward me in the dim kitchen, he hadn't been moving toward a convenient body, but toward a conversation that had been building between us for a long time.

I didn't know which one it was. I hadn't told him how I felt. He hadn't brought the kitchen up again. And worst of all, I was keeping a secret from him that would detonate the moment it came out. Those were the four walls of the mental room I'd been trapped in, and I'd been in it long enough that I needed to say the ugly truth out loud to someone who wasn't him.

The small balcony off the guest room was the only place in the house where I was sure I was alone. Simon was locked in his study. Olivia was safe in her bedroom. I slid the heavy glass door shut behind me, perched on the edge of the patio chair, and called Sloane.

It rang twice.

"Hey," Sloane answered, her voice lower than usual, thick with something she wasn't saying yet.

"Hey." I pulled my knees up to my chest and wrapped one arm around them. "How is she doing?"

Sloane let out a long breath. "About the same. We've been stuck in the hospital a few days now. The lab results aren't back yet, so the doctors aren't saying much of anything. They just keep doing the whole 'we need to monitor her, we need to run more tests' routine." A pause, the muffled sound of her shifting in a vinyl chair. "I'm hoping she's fine. I just don't know anything for sure yet."

"I'm so sorry, Sloane. I really am."

"It is what it is." A beat of silence. "Have you eaten anything today, Vi? Have you actually been taking care of yourself over there?"

"Sloane. Have you eaten anything?" I countered.

"I choked down something from the sad hospital café. It tasted like pure regret, but it technically counted as food." I heard the squeak of her footsteps, a door opening, the hallway sound changing behind her.

"Have your parents gotten there yet?"

"No." Her voice went flat and dry. "Surprisingly, they're conveniently not in town. But they're coming eventually. They'll show up and make the whole crisis about themselves, but at least Grandma will be happy to see them, so…" She trailed off, exhaustion winning. "They'll be here soon enough."

"Okay. I'll be thinking about her."

"I know you will." Another long pause. "Okay. Talk to me. How's work going? How's Simon?"

I made a strangled, helpless sound. Not an actual word.

Sloane laughed weakly. "Oh, I saw that coming. What happened?"

I told her everything.

It came spilling out in pieces, each frantic thought interrupting the next, the relief of finally saying it aloud too big to stay organized. The awful landlord. The leather couch. Simon carrying me down the dark hallway. Moving into his house. Borrowing his pajamas, which I included because Sloane demanded the full, uncensored inventory whenever she asked for it. The charged kitchen conversation about restraint and the almost. His warm wrist catching mine. His lips, hovering close.

By the time I ran out of breath and finished, Sloane was quiet.

"Vi," she finally said.

"I know."

"You literally live with your boss now."

"Unfortunately, I do."