Loverboy (The Company #2) - Sarina Bowen Page 0,45

kiss? What a blow to my ego.”

“Oh, I remember,” I admit. Like it was yesterday. His hands in my hair. His hard body pressing against mine. I don’t actually remember how it started. We’d been arguing viciously, and the next minute we were kissing. It was glorious.

He stops by the window and looks outside, where the streetlights are shining down on Mercer Street. It’s never really dark in New York. “Well, when I came in for work the next day, he called me into his office. He said that you’d complained to him about me. That I’d been very inappropriate with you.”

“What?” I gasp. “I would never have said that.”

“But I was,” he says darkly. “He wasn’t wrong.”

“Oh, please. It’s not inappropriate if I—” Oh my. I’m going to have to finish that sentence. “—If I enjoyed it.”

He shrugs, as if it doesn’t matter. “Sometimes people aren’t sure what they want. I thought you might have changed your mind later.”

“Not hardly,” I say emphatically. “And I’m not the kind to go tattling to Daddy. He doesn’t listen when I talk anyway. God forbid I had an actual problem that needed solving.”

He’s still staring out the window, like Mercer Street at midnight is the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen. “He made it your fault, too. What a turd.”

“I’m sorry, Gunn. I don’t know how that happened.” My memory of that night is a little sketchy. Not because I’ve forgotten that kiss, but because it had scrambled my brain. One minute we were shouting at each other over some little bartending dispute. And the next minute we were kissing. It was like a sudden clap of thunder.

We only stopped when my father called my name. But he wasn’t in the doorway. He’d been farther off.

“He must have seen us,” Gunnar says, as if he’s following my memory at the same speed. “Or maybe someone else ratted us out. But he made it very clear that I was a lowlife kid from the boroughs who should have known better than to touch his daughter.”

“What an asshole.” I thought I was done learning all the ways my father could be an asshole. But I guess there was no end to it. “He lied to me, too. He told me that he’d planned to give you the bar manager’s job, but since you quit, he had to give it to me instead.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Gunnar snarls. “He fired me, telling me it was your fault. And then he tells you that you’re his second choice? Who does that?”

“Him, obviously. And the funny thing? I could have sworn he liked you more than he liked me.” Showing love wasn’t my dad’s style.

“Not true. He handed me my last check and told me never to come back. And not to file for unemployment or he’d tell the cops I stole from him.”

“What?” I yelp. “That’s horrible!” My dad is an animal. He really is. “Although I’m not surprised. He’s done worse to his own family.”

“Like what?”

“Like cutting off Ginny when she got pregnant. And …” I guess I don’t really need to unload all our ugliest secrets tonight. “He’s not a nice man. And I spent a lot of time trying to please him. I keep telling myself that I won’t do it anymore. But do you know what I thought about tonight while I was watching the policemen poke around?”

“No idea.”

“I thought, I hope my father doesn’t hear about this. He’ll think I can’t handle my own business.”

“We all do that.” He sits down on his end of the couch again, his feet up on the coffee table. “The stuff our fathers do to us is hard to forget. Some people never get over it.”

“Therapists have to make their money somehow,” I say with a yawn.

He chuckles quietly. “I guess so.”

We sit in a comfortable silence for a few more minutes, until I realize something strange. “You still wanted the barista job.”

“Sorry?” he asks, yawning.

“You thought I got you fired from Paxton’s. And you still wanted to work for me. Why? That makes no sense.”

He’s quiet for a long moment. “A job is a job,” he says eventually. “And fifteen years is a long time to nurse a grudge.”

“Is it?” I ask. I’m pretty sure my grudge against my father has another decade to go. At least.

Eight hours later, I open my eyes to find sunlight streaming into my bedroom windows. I’m lying on top of my covers, and I’m covered by the blanket that