Who's the Boss? - Erin McCarthy Page 0,28

I looked up at the ceiling and wondered who I could call to meet up with and have sex because I was losing my mind around Isla. I needed a release and fast. Yet, even as I mentally went through my phone for a viable candidate, I wasn’t sure that was the answer. That was just avoiding the real problem, which was that Isla drove me fucking crazy. In every single possible way, she drove me insane.

To the point that everything I did was a challenge. My focus was shit, my blood pressure high, my dick hard.

But I wasn’t about to let her either inadvertently or on purpose destroy this opportunity for me. Hence the painful politeness.

“You both sound like you’re being paid to be nice to each other,” Juan said.

“We are,” I told him dryly.

Isla laughed. She picked up a carving knife. The sight both terrified and turned me on. “That’s very dramatic. Juan, I just think it’s important to start a new working relationship with someone the way you want to continue.” She deftly sliced the sharp knife through the meat.

“So you want it to be weird forever?” he asked, rubbing his hands on a towel tucked into his apron. “Because you’re being totally different.”

The kid was probably twenty at the most, a hard worker, but not a quick thinker. Though obviously observant. “How is Isla being different?” I asked, curious. Aside from not snapping at me constantly, which was what she’d done the first two times she’d met me. But I didn’t know how she had been in the kitchen before I had entered the picture.

“I don’t know,” he said, defaulting to self-preservation.

She shot him a look. “Go ahead. Say what you’re thinking. I won’t be upset.”

That sounded like a trap. But Juan walked right into it.

“You’re usually more, like, efficient. You just do stuff and you’re not like always saying please and whatever like you are now.”

“Maybe I’m trying to ensure positive karma.”

Maybe that was the biggest crock of shit I’d ever heard. Maybe I didn’t know Isla well, but that did not seem like her style.

“Besides,” she said, looking up and giving me a smile. “I like Chef.”

“Okay,” Juan said, sounding very confused.

I eyed her with suspicion.

“You really need to wear nonslip shoes in the kitchen,” I said, feeling like I needed to make a statement about the safety of the staff in general, her in particular. “That’s an order.”

Her smile never wavered.

“Yes, Boss.” Isla had a bowl filled with mango for a chutney. She picked up a piece and bit into it, closing her eyes in ecstasy. “Hmm, this is so good. You should try it.”

Juan left the kitchen. The poor kid looked terrified.

Common sense told me not to go over to where she was standing with the bowl of fruit. I had never been known for taking the safe route. I went over and reached to snag some mango. She pulled the bowl away.

She was playing a game and I didn’t know the rules. But then I decided I wasn’t a rule-follower anyway. I liked to make it up as I went.

“Here, let me get it for you, Chef.” She fished out a piece and held it up to my lips with a mischievous sparkle in her eye.

If she was flirting to fuck with me, which I was almost one hundred percent certain she was doing, it wouldn’t be a hardship for me to do the same.

“Thanks.” I opened my mouth and let her place the mango between my lips. But I captured her wrist with mine to hold her hand there. Her eyes widened as I took both the mango and her finger into my open mouth.

A little gasp escaped her.

The juice of the mango when I bit it ran down over her fingers and I sucked each one, getting all the sweet flavor. It was highly unprofessional and something I had never even been tempted to do at work before. But staring into her eyes, I had been taken back to that moment in the hallway, when our lips had met, and there had been an explosion between us.

Her eyes darkened with desire. I leaned closer to her.

Then she suddenly seemed to remember where she was because she jerked back so fast she collided with the work station, rattling bowls and knives. “What the hell?” she demanded, but her voice sounded more aroused than aggravated.

“Delicious mango,” I said, and my voice was rough and raw to my own ears.

Sure, I should