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“Fuck right off,” Gareth responded with a droll look.
“But Asher here?” Ethan pointed at me. “Asher isn’t capable of taking a day off unless it’s for the game.”
Daisy leaned forward. “The poker game?”
“What poker game?” Mindy, the blonde, asked. I’d learned her name somewhere between the first and second course.
“Not important,” Ethan assured her. “Point is, if you were going to pick a billionaire to shadow, then you went with the most work-a-holic out of the bunch of us.”
Daisy glanced between all three of us. “I’m comfortable with my choice.”
“That’s because you haven’t spent seven days around me.” Ethan fucking winked.
“Funny, because I thought we all shared the same work ethic.” I cocked an eyebrow at him and sent him a look that told him to back off.
His eyebrows rose and then he smiled even bigger. “Oh, we do.” He looked at Daisy. “You see, Asher gets his drive from his mother. She’s a brilliant woman. Never accepted less than perfection out of Ash, here. She’s convinced he’s capable of saving the world and expects him to do it.”
He wasn’t wrong, but my jaw still ticked at him exposing my personal shit to Daisy.
“It’s the same pressure I got from my father,” Ethan continued with a shrug. “But Asher was taught that idle hands leave people to suffer that he should be helping, whereas my father taught me by example that idle hands are for…other things.” He stroked the shoulders of the women at his sides. “I know when to take my R and R.”
The door swung open, and Maria appeared with the little black folder.
“And on that note,” I said, reaching for the bill.
“Oh hell no,” Gareth muttered.
“Put them up. Just like always,” Ethan ordered. “One. Two. Three.”
I hit it with paper, just like Gareth. Ethan held his fingers in the scissor position.
“Looks like it’s my treat!” Ethan leaned forward for the bill.
“You guys play rock paper scissors for the bill?” Daisy looked at me with incredulity.
“Seems fair.” I shrugged. “Now, let’s get you out of here. We have an early morning.” It was an excuse, and I knew it. Ethan wouldn’t go after her, we were too good of friends for any of that shit, but he would absolutely keep flirting with her just to fuck with me.
I got Daisy out of there, and after another tip to Bobby, I was driving toward her place. The silence between us was charged, but comfortable, something I was getting used to at an alarming rate.
“This is you?” I asked, pulling up in front of a high-rise condo building.
“Yep.” She figured out the handle and stepped out of the door before I could even get the chance to get out of my side with traffic driving by. “Low maintenance, so it’s not like I can kill off my lawn or a garden while I’m on deadline.” She flashed me a smile.
“I had someone courier over your bag from the office, just in case you need your laptop tonight,” I said, gripping my steering wheel so I didn’t get out of the car and do something incredibly stupid like kiss her.
Her eyebrows rose with surprise and she smiled. “You’re used to doing that, aren’t you?”
“Having women’s bags couriered?”
“Taking care of the people around you,” she said softly.
Damn it, this woman was too observant, too wonderfully vivacious, and too beautiful for my peace of mind. “We have an early morning,” I said, my voice dropping.
Humor sparkled in her eyes. “What? I don’t get to shadow you while you sleep?” She grinned. “I mean, what if you get up in the middle of the night with some amazing idea and I’m not there to see it all take formation?” Her nose crinkled in the cutest way. “Though, I have to admit, I’d probably be sleeping. I love sleeping.”
I saw it all play out in my mind. She’d be tucked into my sheets, her curls spread out over the pillow, her breaths even and deep because I’d just worn her out with my hands, my tongue, my cock. I’d let her sleep for a few hours, maybe call and check on the foreign markets before waking her up again, just so I could make her come another three times before offering her that round two she thought was so elusive. Fuck, I was getting hard just thinking about it.
This was dangerous.
“Asher?” She tilted her head to the side.
“Trust me, Daisy, if you get in my bed, you’re sure as hell not sleeping. Neither am I.”
Her lips parted.
“I’ll see you in the morning.” I put the car in gear and got the hell out of there.
4
DAISY
Even after ten days of waking up every single day at four fucking thirty a.m., I still wasn’t adjusting. Asher kept assuring me I needed another week before it would start to feel like a habit, but I wasn’t sure I believed him. I loved sleeping until my body told me to wake up, which was usually around nine a.m., unless I’d spent the entire night prior lost in a good book.
