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“What the hell is going on right now, AJ?” he asked.
“What are you talking about?”
“You’re not acting like yourself.”
I forced a laugh. “Is that surprising? I mean I did have a bit of a life-altering day yesterday.”
“Well, should we talk about that?”
“Why would we?”
“Because you’re being rash for once,” he said heatedly. “You’re making decisions you wouldn’t normally make. And I don’t know if I’m supposed to be worried.”
He stood close to me now, his stare on me intense, relentless. Threatening to break me. But I refused to let it, so tipping my chin up, I met his eyes with confidence. “How did I do at the presentation today?” I asked.
“Good. Why are we talking about this?” he answered straightaway.
I stood up as straight as I could. “Because if I did fine there, Adam, that’s all you need to worry about. As long as I’m showing up to work on time and doing my job well, you shouldn’t have anything to say. Right?”
I’d verbally trapped him. We were technically just boss and assistant and as tight as we were, we’d never actually referred to each other as friends. According to the unspoken rules of our very-close-but-only-because-of-work relationship, that would be weird.
That was at least how I felt about it.
And I suspected Adam felt the same, because with a single clench of his jaw, he stepped back.
“Guess so,” he finally said.
And though he sounded mostly like he meant it, his eyes said something else entirely. They were hard, steely. They took several moments to move away from me and hours later, the intensity of that stare still burned in my mind, making my breath feel suddenly short, and my dress suddenly too tight.
Annoying, but I told myself it was good motivation, because that was the whole point of tonight—shifting my focus to someone else.
And getting Adam Maxwell the hell out of my head.
9
ADAM
“Bro… did I do this? Maxwell. I swear to God, I made this happen.”
For fuck’s sake.
My jaw tightened as I ignored Josh MacMillan while standing in the middle of the crowded ball room, taking a bigger than usual drink of my whiskey because, well, Josh was unfortunately pretty hard to ignore.
Especially when he wouldn’t stop running his mouth about AJ.
“I mean come on. I was just noticing how hot she looked and then I asked you about her stupid fiancé. Didn’t I? And then boom. They’re over. After five fucking years.” Josh gave a hearty laugh to the skies, like the gods of dirty rebound sex had just smiled upon him. “Bro. How does that even happen?”
Dragging my palm across my jaw, I looked at him then at Keith, the head of the music division whom I’d been talking to before Josh came loping over like an idiot. I took another drink before peering over at Keith.
“Sorry,” I muttered, to which he laughed.
“Hey, I was like that once. I’ll let you young guys talk,” he said before excusing himself and leaving me alone with Josh and his cartoonishly blatant ogling of AJ from well across the room. He palmed his hand over his head as he stared at her.
“Goddamn, I just hope that isn’t a padded bra.”
My jaw clenched. It’s not, I thought as I reluctantly brought my eyes to her.
She was standing by the arched doors that led to the courtyard, looking like a fucking bombshell as she smiled wide, talking to Liza and some others from the office that I didn’t know. Christ, AJ. Don’t do that, I willed her as she leaned over to murmur in Liza’s ear, drawing both Josh and my eyes to the dip of her lower back—the way it curved into a round ass I couldn’t believe I hadn’t spent the past five years staring at. What the hell had I been doing with my time?
