Boss I Love to Hate An Office Romance - Mia Kayla Page 0,51

were nothing.

He blinked back up at me. “Brad Brisken?”

I smirked, wondering where he’d seen me. Crains Business Magazine perhaps. “The one and only.”

He let out an all-knowing laugh that grated on my nerves and then turned to Sonia. “When did this happen? I thought you hated this guy.”

All my muscles tensed. “Excuse me?” I stepped into him, but Sonia grabbed my arm, yanking me toward her.

“It’s fine.” An anxious, high-pitched laugh escaped her. “We’re fine. Everything is fine.” She was already making her way toward the door with me in tow when she yelled back, “Brad is doing me a favor. I’ll explain everything later, Kyle.”

I turned toward her and narrowed my eyes. “You really hate me that much?” Am I that much of an asshole to her at work?

“I’ll explain.”

I opened the door to my Porsche 918 Spyder, closed the door behind her, then hopped into the car.

“This feels like a toy car.” Her hand brushed against my dashboard, and she adjusted her seat to give her more leg room. “I like that it has that new-car smell.”

Talk about queen of diversion.

I turned to her. “Explain.”

She averted her gaze, looking down at her hands that wrung in her lap. “I … I complain about you sometimes.”

“Why?”

That forced her head up. “Why? Because you’re a jerk.”

She pulled back as though that wasn’t what was supposed to come out of her mouth, but I’d take it. I didn’t want our normal glossed-over relationship. I wanted honesty from her.

“I’m not,” I argued. “I treat you with the utmost respect.”

“Yes, when you’re in a good mood.” The sass was back in her tone, and I welcomed it. “But the problem is, you’re not in a good mood all the time, and you take it out on everyone around you. Plus, you make me do things that are not a secretary’s job.”

“That’s our relationship. I push at you. You give it right back.”

She thought I was an asshole. I’d never been a purposeful asshole. That was just our relationship. Fun and games, but work still got done.

My muscles turned rigid. “I want examples.”

She reeled back. “What?”

“Yes.” I tapped my fist against the steering wheel. “Real-life examples.”

“Oh, let me count the ways.” She lifted one hand and began to tick off instances. “How about when you were already home, and I had to come to the office to throw away the bra of your recent rendezvous because you didn’t want to get in trouble with Charles?”

Shit. I’d made it up to her, right? Okay, that was a douche move. But I’d bought her favorite doughnuts and coffee the next day.

“Or how about when you made me get your dry cleaning, and it wasn’t clean enough, so you made me go to another dry cleaner to get it done the same day?”

“They’d done a shitty job.”

“Well, you know that’s not a secretary’s job, right?” She glared at me with burning eyes. “I was doing you a favor.” She continued. “Or how about when you made Chris, the new grad accountant, cry, and I was the one who had to console him? You didn’t know about that one, did you?”

I shrank back into my seat.

She ticked off a fourth finger. “Or how about when the coffee spilled at that important meeting with that big honcho guy and I was helping to clean it up, and you embarrassed me and told me to get out of the office?”

Fifth finger. “How about the many times I’ve gotten your coffee, your lunch, fixed your schedule, including your three-week haircuts, and I hardly hear a thank you? Do I need to go on? Because this could be an all-day event, and we have a wedding to get to.”

Shit.

I hung my head because she was right. About everything. I stared at the couple walking past my car, checking out the vehicle, checking out Sonia and me. A woman in a skirt suit passed, carrying a Starbucks cup in each of her hands, and I was brought to months ago, to the boardroom where I had been leading a meeting.

I cleared my throat, coming clean about that day and spilling the coffee. “I didn’t like how he was looking at you.”

“Who?” She frowned.

I kept my gaze out the windshield, sighing loudly. “Bill Townsend. He’d spilled the coffee on purpose, and I know you wanted to help, but I didn’t like how he was looking at you. He wanted to see you bend and clean up the mess, and the shirt you were wearing