Think Outside the Boss - Olivia Hayle Page 0,72

yet and wished everyone here a Merry Christmas.

My heart speeds up as I tell Quentin and Toby I forgot something at my desk. I ride the elevator to the thirty-fourth floor instead. There’s so much churning emotion inside of me that I barely register the familiar fear.

Milan is my decision, and yet Tristan hadn’t wanted me to make the one my heart is telling me to. You’re ambitious and brave, and that’s what I like about you. Would he think less of me if I turned Italy down?

And worse, would I think less of myself?

I walk down the empty hall on the top floor, passing offices I’ve never entered. Heading to the large one at the end of the hall with the emblazoned letters on the door.

Tristan Conway.

I knock and he responds a few seconds later. His voice is familiar, and yet not. Because this professional tone isn’t one I’ve heard him use toward me since… well. Ever.

Even in the Gilded Room, he had his walls lowered more than he does here, in the company he owns and operates.

He closes his laptop when he sees me. “Freddie?”

“Hi.” I push the door shut. “Are you hiding from the party?”

“I couldn’t be down there. Besides, they don’t want me there.”

“They don’t?”

He pushes back the chair and rises. “No. They want to gossip and blow off steam. They want to talk about me, not with me.”

I frown. “That sounds sad.”

He waves a dismissive hand, coming around to lean against his desk. Not crossing the distance to me. Not wrapping his arms around me or pressing a kiss to my temple. Just calm, collected, restrained. A man who’s made up his mind.

“We haven’t spoken this weekend,” I say.

“I’ve been busy. So, I take it, have you?” The voice isn’t unkind, but it is determined. “I heard you accepted the job.”

“No, I haven’t. Eleanor gave me an extension. I have until the end of the week,” I say, taking a step closer, and hating the unusual formality between us.

Tristan meets me halfway. I lean against his chest and he wraps his arms around me, pressing a kiss to my forehead. The bristles of his rough-shaven jaw tickle my skin. “You’re hesitating?” he asks.

“I am, yes.”

“I hope you’re not hesitating because of me,” he says. The hand on my back is soft, but the steel in his voice is not.

Something in my chest cracks. “And why not?”

He sighs, both arms coming around me. “Because we’re in different times of our lives,” he murmurs. “Because I can’t be the one who holds you back. Because this is a dream of yours, Freddie, and it would kill me if you regretted saying no.”

My next words aren’t well-thought out. They’re a fear given words, and like a genie, they can’t be put back into a bottle. “What happens if I go? Does that mean we’d be over?”

The single nod against my head is heart-breaking. “How can it be differently?” he asks.

There are a million things in my mind. I can stay here instead. Or you can quit being the CEO. We can do long-distance. Or, worst of all, Why don’t you come with me to Italy?

But it wouldn’t be fair to ask him that, not when I know what he’d have to sacrifice in return. The value he places on being a good father and a good boss are his very best qualities, and I wouldn’t want him to break them even if he was inclined to.

My eyes burn and I clench them tight, but it only speeds the tears on their journey down my cheeks.

“Frederica?” Tristan murmurs, a hand smoothing over the back of my head. “Are you okay?”

I shake my head against his chest, and he sighs, pressing me closer. He might not say a word, but I can feel it in the strength of his arms. I know, he’s saying. I know exactly.

“When do they want you there?” he murmurs.

My words come out muffled. “First of February. I understand if you don’t want us to continue seeing each other, you know. If I’m moving.”

He leans back, eyes widening as he takes in my face. They grow soft as he cups my cheek, a thumb smoothing over my tear-tracked cheek. “We can,” he says. “But it will make things harder for us both when you go.”

“Yes, it might.”

“So you’ll go to Philadelphia to celebrate with your family.”

“And you’ll go to Tahiti to see the whales,” I whisper, my hands locked in his shirt.

He nods. “And when we