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Cole’s lips thin as he looks over at me. “The kiss. It shouldn’t have happened. I’m sorry if it made you think I was somehow coming on to you. I wasn’t. It was just, you know, a fluke. It won’t happen again.”
“Oh!” I blink and try to absorb this.
Cole kissed me, and now he’s telling me that it won’t happen again? My heart sinks an inch.
I paste the sunniest smile on my face. “Seriously? It was no problem. It was like you said. Just a fluke. I mean, pssh, whatever.”
“I’m your boss. You’re my assistant. We shouldn’t be mixing business with pleasure.” He winces. “Not that I really got a lot of pleasure from the kiss. Really, it was just a non-event.”
“You’re not what I’m looking for. Sorry, but you’re not.” Words come tumbling out of my mouth. “My dream man is like… the opposite of you. He’s a surfer. He has long blond hair, perfect abs, and he serenades me all the time on the guitar. We go for long, barefoot walks on the beach together. He smiles all the time. He never talks about things that would upset me.”
Cole snorts. “He sounds about as deep as a rain puddle.”
“Maybe that’s what I’m looking for,” I fire back.
“Maybe that’s who you think you want. I can’t ever see that working out, though.”
I glare at him. “It doesn’t matter what you think.”
He cocks a brow, challenging me. “I’m not interested in you either. And even if I were, I’m still in the last six months of sexile. And I’m way, way too old for you. Not that you need a bunch of reasons why we can’t… explore each other.”
I spread my hands. “And you’re moving to London soon.”
“Right!” He swallows. “Yep, can’t forget about that.”
“Totally.”
He pulls off the main road and onto a dirt road, frowning. “So, we’re on the same page?”
“Same paragraph, same line, same word. We are in lockstep.”
He peers at me, the relief flooding his features giving me a flash of guilt for feeling a little crestfallen. I don’t know if I believe Cole, frankly. But what else am I supposed to do but agree?
“Okay. That’s good to know.”
I stare at my phone screen forlornly, trying to process the whole mess that Cole just dumped into my lap. We bump down an unpaved country road. The silence stretches between us, filling up the car, seeming stifling. I don’t know how to break it, though.
We’re both stuck in a bubble of our own thoughts, it seems. Cole clears his throat and attempts to make conversation first.
“Listen. I brought you here to smooth the way for me in getting this guy to sign another contract. When I found out Holly was a cheater after our would-be wedding, she dragged me on social media. There was a lot of fallout; I lost several important clients in the aftermath. So it is really important that I keep every single client I still have. Even ones like this jackass that we are about to go see.”
I’m dying to ask him a million questions about Holly and their public blowout. But that’s the moment the car slows down.
We pull up in front of a busted-up, brown double-wide. There are five cars parked in the yard, but only one of them – a fancy low-slung coupe – seems to be in working condition. Toys are scattered across the scraggly lawn and a three-year-old sits under the trailer’s ripped awning next to a pile of multi-colored toy blocks. He doesn’t appear to be wearing anything but a swim diaper even though it’s raining buckets and as cold out here as a polar bear’s toenails.
When Cole cuts the engine, the front door of the trailer swings open and a scantily clad young woman comes out to snatch the kid up. She glares at us and vanishes inside. I open my car door just in time to hear her shout.
“Boyd! That lawyer is back for you! Boyyyyd!”
Cole looks at me, shrugs, then climbs out of his car. He doesn’t fuss with an umbrella-like I do, so he strides right up the three crooked front steps to the door. I follow behind, throwing my umbrella up.
The storm has only grown in intensity since Cole picked me up.
A guy, who I can only assume is Boyd, steps out of the trailer. Approximately the size and shape of a Mac truck, Boyd sports jaw-length dirty blond hair, a white muscle tee, and a baggy pair of black athletic shorts. He looks suspiciously between Cole and me.
“What are y’all doing here?”
“Just came out to get your signature on your contract.” Cole steps under the awning and offers his hand to Boyd. Boyd manages to make the normally intimidatingly large Cole look dainty as he shakes the proffered hand.
