Boss I Love to Hate An Office Romance - Mia Kayla Page 0,81

to my brother, sitting by him on a barstool by the long kitchen island that split the room.

“Not yet. I snuck past the herd to get a piece of dessert before dinner.”

“And we’re not dating,” I huffed, irritated and already tired of repeating the words.

There was no doubt I’d have to repeat it a dozen more times before the night was through, though it wouldn’t matter. When he no longer came around, my family would get the hint.

“In the beginning, Jeff used to be attached to your hip. And then he stopped going to our monthly dinners altogether. He smartened up.” Marco pushed his fork through the tiramisu and slid it in his mouth.

“He always had to work.” The muscles in my neck tightened. I felt the need to stick up for him, though I wasn’t sure why. Jeff didn’t deserve my loyalty. That was for sure.

Marco lifted two fingers in air quotes. “‘Work.’ Yeah, sure. During almost every monthly dinner. How coincidental.”

I thought about the new information I’d learned Saturday night. Jeff had been working all right. Little had I known, he’d been working on my replacement.

“I never liked that guy.” And Marco never had. He wasn’t overly talkative, but when he said something, it meant something.

“Why?” I settled my wineglass on the marble island and grabbed Marco’s fork.

“There was something about him.”

I sliced the tiramisu with my fork and stuffed it into my mouth. As soon as the cake touched my tongue, I sighed. Heaven on a plate. “You know I hate when you say that. What does that even mean?” I’d never asked Marco to elaborate, but seeing that I was obsessed with my ex-boyfriend, I needed to know. Did others know he was cheating all along? Could I have predicted our end? What signs did I miss? How could I guarantee it never, ever happens again?

Marco peered over at me, his face thoughtful. “You were way too in love with him.”

I laughed. “Well, duh. We were in love.”

He shook his head and then retrieved his fork from me. “No, I mean, you were way more in love with him than he was with you.”

There was Marco in all his honesty, saying how he had seen it.

“No, I wasn’t.” It hurt to hear it, and I didn’t want to believe it, but it had to be true because I’d loved him so much that I couldn’t fathom leaving him. “Jeff was in love with me, too.” I stared blankly at the dessert and then picked up the wineglass, tightly gripping it within my fingertips. If I squeezed tighter, I would break the neck. It wasn’t exactly the neck I wanted to break, but it might help ease some of the pain, the pain of finding out that my ex-boyfriend had cheated on me. “He did things for me, too. Wrote love letters, bought me nice dinners, surprised me with gifts …”

Jeff used to talk about forever, how our children would look, how they would be legally blind because we both were.

I swallowed hard because Marco was only speaking his mind, and deep down, I knew it was the truth because, if Jeff had loved me as much as I had loved him, he wouldn’t have left me.

Marco bumped his shoulder against mine. “Hey.” He dipped his head closer to mine, getting eye to eye. “Stop overthinking things. It’s over.”

I wished it were that easy.

A low breath escaped me, and I smiled a little for his benefit. “How did you know? That he didn’t love me the same way?” So, I’d know not to do it again. To fall in love with a guy who wasn’t that into me.

“It’s how you looked at him. Like he was your whole world, and you would do anything to keep him in it.”

I sighed and bit my thumbnail, thinking deeply. “Isn’t it always that way though? When people are in love, there is one person who always loves the other person a little more? I mean, look at Dad and how he looks at Mom. You can’t tell me their love is even.” I wanted an excuse, someone to tell me it was okay that I had fallen in love with Jeff and at one time was fully and deeply committed to him. That I wasn’t stupid and that it was okay if I fell in love again sometime in the future. Because I wanted to believe in a forever love after heartbreak, in a love that led to marriage and