Dear Grumpy Boss: A Brother’s Best Friend Office Romance (The Harder They Fall)
Dear Grumpy Boss: Chapter 13

“YOU NEED TO RELAX.” Luca pushed my drink toward me. “Drink up. You have another long week staring you in the face.”

I picked up my glass. “I’m relaxed as I get.”

Elliot chuckled and leaned back in his seat. “Which isn’t relaxed at all.”

Luca shot him a look. “Pot, meet kettle.”

Elliot slung an arm over the back of his chair. “I’m relaxed. Just because I’m not out riding motorcycles and going to house parties like a fucking frat boy doesn’t mean I’m incapable of relaxing.”

It was Sunday. Elliot had just arrived home from his Dubai trip two days prior. He’d spent the afternoon with his sister. Tonight, the three of us had gone to dinner, and now we were having a few drinks at a bar we often frequented.

Luca held up his beer. “There’s no need for you to be jealous of my active social life. Just because I have more than two friends doesn’t mean I don’t love you guys the most.”

Elliot’s eyes rolled. “As if I’m insecure about my place in your heart. I’m firmly wedged in there.”

Luca winked at him and patted his chest. “For lifers, bro.”

“Please don’t say bro. Or lifers. It offends me.” I tipped back my bourbon and soda, finishing it off.

“Speaking of.” Luca nodded to someone near the bar. “There’s Celeste. Looks like she’s got some friends with her.”

“Oh, Celeste,” I said drolly. “I have no idea who that is.”

Luca backhanded my arm. “I took her to the Saviano benefit. You met her. Auburn hair, hot body, sucks dick like she’s being paid for it.”

Elliot’s brow winged. “Was she?”

Luca raised his glass in cheers. “Fuck off, old man. I’ve never paid for a lay in my life. That’s a strictly volunteer position.” He hopped up from his seat. “I’m going to bring them over.”

I groaned. The women who flocked around Luca were always the most insufferable. Gorgeous, obviously, but I needed more than a pretty face to keep me interested, and that was all most of Luca’s women offered.

Elliot angled himself toward me. “You never said, did you catch up with Elise on her hike yesterday?”

I happened to be talking to Elliot when Elise had texted where she was spending her day yesterday. Something had come over me—panic was probably the word—and I’d followed her. She’d been easy to replace and hadn’t noticed me behind her until I’d made myself known.

I didn’t let even an ounce of guilt flicker across my face. “No. We must have missed each other.”

If she hadn’t told her brother about what had happened yesterday, I wouldn’t be the one to do it. Not the mountain lion. Definitely not what had happened after.

He shook his head. “I can’t believe she went out on her own again. Next time I see her, I’m going to throttle her. I’d intended to this morning, but she’d been so thrilled by the presents I’d brought back for her, I didn’t have the heart to yell at her.

“What did you get her?”

“A little gold camel, a pink Pashmina, and some sand art. Nothing big, but you know Elise. Those kinds of things make her squeal. It’s fun giving her presents. She always has these cute, over-the-top reactions.”

It had been years since I’d openly given Elise anything, but I hadn’t forgotten. Her face always turned bright pink and the dimple in her cheek popped when she beamed. There were hugs. So many hugs, and usually kisses on the cheeks.

I understood why Elliot hadn’t wanted to ruin the moment.

Luca approached the table with an entourage surrounding him. Three women, the one with the auburn hair hanging off his shoulder.

He introduced us. “Elliot and Weston, this is Celeste, Mara, and Sarah. I begged them to join us for a drink. I basically had to promise my firstborn to get them to agree.”

Mara, the brunette, took a seat beside me. Sarah, a blonde, sat beside Elliot, who admittedly took a vague interest. He didn’t seem annoyed by the intruders.

Everyone paired off, so I was forced to make small talk with Mara, a twenty-three-year-old who worked in marketing. She had a lot to say on that topic. So much, she didn’t notice I’d completely tuned her out, going over my weekly schedule in my mind.

“What do you do?” she asked breathlessly, as though she just ran a mile in her heels.

“I’m a garbage man,” I deadpanned.

She blinked, her long, thick lashes casting weird shadows on her face. “Oh, really? Luca said—”

Tuning her out, I scanned the bar and landed on a big, redheaded lumberjack-looking fellow. Standing close to him was Elise Levy. He bent toward her, listening to her speak.

She had on snug jeans and a top that dipped low, revealing the upper swells of her creamy tits. There was not a chance this asshole wasn’t trying to see what was beneath her top.

I smirked to myself. I knew exactly what was under there, and it was fucking glorious.

My smirk fell away when he brushed her hair back from her face and she leaned into him.

“Is that my sister?” Elliot ground out.

I turned back to the group. Everyone had stopped talking. Elliot was watching Elise and her lumberjack through narrowed, pissed-off eyes.

“Oooh.” Luca covered his laugh with his hand. “Little Elise is on a da-ate.”

Elliot whipped around toward him. “Why don’t you sound surprised?”

Luca grinned wider. “Because your sister is a beautiful, grown woman and this isn’t her first date with that gentleman.”

Elliot’s irritation at being out of the loop landed on me. “Did you know about this? Who is he?”

I turned my hands over, forcing myself not to clench them. “That’s Thomas. They met a week ago. You should go check on them.”

He shot to his feet before I even finished my sentence and strolled over to his sister with a false air of casualness. He was going to make a mess of things. He always did with guys she dated. Elliot had never liked any of them. And it wasn’t some weird, incestuous thing. He wanted the best for her and had never once thought her boyfriends had qualified as that.

There was no part of me that wanted to watch this. Elliot and Elise were going to end up pissed at each other and he’d most likely push her further into the lumberjack’s arms. It’s what had happened when he’d disapproved of her last boyfriend.

We’d lost her for three years and were only now getting her back.

The girl beside me—god, I’d already forgotten her name—pressed her hand to my inner thigh. “You were kidding about being a garbage man, weren’t you?”

I picked up her hand, holding it for a beat. “Why would I joke about that kind of thing?”

She curled her fingers around mine and let out a laugh that didn’t come close to sounding real. “You’re funny. Luca said you’re funny, and you are.”

I slipped my hand from hers and excused myself to the restroom. As soon as Elliot was finished with his intimidation tactics, I would be saying my goodbyes and heading out. I was getting too old and impatient to hang out with random, vapid women on a Sunday evening when I had no intention of taking them to bed.

Leaning against the wall in the bathroom hall, I replied to an email from Renata about my and Elise’s trip to California at the end of the week. I had just hit send when someone rounded the corner.

My head shot up, and I locked eyes with a red-cheeked Elise. Her steps stuttered, and she slowed, wariness pulling at her soft features.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

I straightened, taking a step in her direction. “I could ask you the same. You’re on a date?”

“Yes.” She folded her arms under her tits, which did nothing to clear my head. I blamed that as I closed in on her until her back hit the wall, knocking a gasp from her chest.

“Why?”

She raised her defiant little chin. “Because he asked and I like him.”

I tipped my head down, bringing my mouth beside her ear. Back and forth, I rubbed my lips against her velvet lobe. A shiver went through her, and her chest rose, pressing into mine.

“Elise…” My teeth nibbled along her lobe, then my tongue licked a path around the shell of her ear. Her arms fell to the bottom of my shirt, grasping it with both hands.

I drew my tongue along the soft line of her jaw. “Does your date have any idea you were writhing under me only yesterday?”

She sucked in a sharp breath. “Stop it, Weston. Don’t talk about that.”

Bracing my hand beside her head, I pulled back so we were eye to eye. The position reminded me of when she was trapped against her car.

When I’d trapped her.

“What did Elliot think of your boyfriend?”

Her nostrils flared. “You know he’s not my boyfriend. You also know Elliot disliked him immediately.”

“Maybe you have bad, bad taste in men, Elise.” I picked up a piece of her hair. She’d made it wavy, but it was still as silky as always. “Why is that?”

She raised her chin a little more, bringing her mouth almost level with mine. I could have kissed her, and she wouldn’t have stopped me.

That wasn’t off the table.

“Maybe I’ve only known bad, bad men since my father died. Men who would stalk their best friend’s sister, make out with her in the back seat of her SUV, then trap her in a dark hallway and lick her neck.”

My free hand shot up to cup her jaw. “That’s the thing, Elise. You could have moved away from me at any moment. You’re choosing to stay.”

I pressed my erection against her softness, pulling a raspy breath from her lips. Her eyes darted to the side then back to me.

“Why are you doing this?” she whispered.

“Why are you on a date tonight?” I shot back.

Her tongue darted out, licking her bottom lip, leaving it shiny. “I don’t know how to handle you when you’re like this.”

“Like what?”

Her breath shuddered. She tried to turn her head to the side, but I tightened my grip on her, keeping her in place.

“Weston…”

“Like what, Elise?”

Her dark eyes flicked to mine. “Like you’re jealous.” She looked away. “As if you weren’t just touching a beautiful woman. As if you weren’t holding her hand a few minutes ago.”

“What?” It took me a moment to understand what she was talking about.

Luca’s girl.

It was on the tip of my tongue to deny it, but why? I was pissed she’d shown up here with that man. Why was she dragging it out? It was clear there was no chemistry there. If there was, she wouldn’t have kissed me back yesterday.

But I had no room to be pissed. Elise wasn’t mine, nor would she ever be.

“You’re right. I was doing that, which means I shouldn’t be here with you.” A sense of honor finally came over me and I let her go. “You might think I’m a bad man, and maybe I am, but I would never be bad to you.”

As I backed away from her, she pulled herself off the wall and smoothed her palms down her hips. “Weston…”

I jerked my chin toward the mouth of the hall, dismissing her. “Go back to your boyfriend. I don’t have time for this.”

She flinched at my caustic tone but didn’t hesitate more than two heartbeats before scrambling away from me back into the bar, leaving a subtle cloud of her sweet, floral fragrance.

I finally got my head on straight.

I was being stupid, making thoughtless choices that would only end in disaster. That wasn’t me, and it wouldn’t continue.

Tomorrow, I’d set us both straight.