Taboo Boss - Natasha L. Black Page 0,28

you doing right now?” he asked.

“I’m working.”

“Would you want to meet my mom?”

My heart fluttered in my chest a little. “Sure. I’d like that.”

“Good. Go ahead and get ready.”

“Get ready?”

“Yeah. I’m going to come pick you up, and we are going to have dinner with her,” he said.

Meeting his mother shouldn’t seem like that big of a deal. It probably would have been stranger if he didn’t ask me to go with him to see her or bother to introduce me to her at any point while we were in Astoria.

And yet, there I was. A bundle of nerves.

My mind drifted back to the night before and the tripping incident. The memory of stumbling into his arms and the way Tom had looked at me gave me a little shiver and brought a whole new wave of butterflies. I needed to call Emily.

I dialed her number and put the phone on speaker as I looked at all my clothes.

“I was wondering if you were ever going to call me,” she said rather than greeting me. “What’s going on? Tell me everything.”

“Actually, I just have a question for you,” I said. “What should I wear to meet Tom’s mother?”

Emily gasped so loud it sounded like she might inhale her phone. “He asked you to meet his mother?”

“Not like that.”

“What do you mean not like that?” she asked. “Did he or did he not ask you to meet his mother?”

“He did,” I admitted. “We’re going to have dinner with her, but I’ve already met everybody else in his family. His brothers and his sister-in-law. Doesn’t it make sense that since we’re in town, I would meet his mother?”

“You know what I think,” she said. “I’ve said it before, and I’m going to say it again. The two of you need to stop hiding your feelings for one another. Yes, it makes sense for him to introduce you to his mother since you’re in town. Does that mean having dinner with her? That’s up for debate.”

“Debate with who?” I asked.

“I’ll find somebody if I need to,” she said, making me laugh.

“As compelling as your arguments are,” I said, “you’re wrong. There are no feelings for us to hide because there are no feelings. Tom is my boss. I am his secretary. That’s it. No feelings.”

“Liar,” she said without hesitation.

“How about you?” I asked, giving up on getting any recommendations from her in favor of changing the subject and choosing an outfit. “How about your love life? I haven’t heard any updates from you recently.”

And just like that, any need for her to talk about me and what feelings may or may not exist between me and my boss were gone.

“I just met this incredible guy. His name is Xavier. He’s an artist,” she said.

“Where did you meet him?” I asked, shucking off my clothes so I could change into the outfit I chose.

“On Tinder,” she said.

I laughed to myself and rolled my eyes. I had to give it to Emily. She was the only person in existence as far as I knew who’d managed to make meeting somebody on Tinder sound romantic.

“Have you met him in person yet?” I asked.

“Yes. We just went on the most amazing date. You wouldn’t believe how romantic he was. Just right from the beginning. As soon as he showed up…”

Right as she was saying that, the door to the hotel room opened and Tom walked in.

“Emily, I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to go. I’ll call you back in the morning and you can tell me everything else, okay?”

“Sure,” she said, stumbling a little. “Oh, is he there?”

She had dropped her voice so he wouldn’t be able to hear her over the line, not realizing I still had her on speaker, and he could hear her even if she was whispering. I grabbed the phone and turned speaker off.

“Yep,” I said casually. “So, I’ve got to go. But I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

I hung up and offered up a somewhat awkward smile to Tom.

“You ready to go?” he asked.

“Just give me a couple more minutes,” I said.

He nodded and I rushed into the bathroom to throw on some makeup and brush my hair. I tried to tell myself I didn’t need to go to too extensive an effort. This wasn’t a date, and he wasn’t bringing me home to his mother. We were just going for dinner. That was it.

Even still, I couldn’t shake the nervousness that stayed firmly lodged in my stomach and my chest