Arrogant Boss

“My father.” I lined up another shot. The striped one I’d been aiming for rolled into the pocket perfectly. “He loved this game. I had a queue in my hand from the age of six.”

Julian leaned against the pool table next to ours, putting him right next to where I was planning my next move. He crossed his arms over his chest and I looked away from the way his arms bulged.

“Are you as good as him?”

“No.” I never had the time to reach his level, because he died when I was eighteen. “Where did you learn?”

“College.”

I shot and missed, sighing. “Right. Your Ivy League college experience.”Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.

“Have you been reading up on me, Ace?”

“It’s part of my job.”

“Is it?” His voice was deep and speculative. “I wonder if you know all the truly important things.”

“Such as?”

“What’s my favorite color?”

“Um, white? Black?”

He grinned. “Just because I’m wearing those two colors? Your mind works in very obvious ways. No, it’s yellow.”

“Yellow? That’s an awful color.”

He looked momentarily affronted. “It’s the color of the sun.”

“Is it? I was taught never to look directly at it.”

Julian shook his head at me. “You’re impossible. And clearly, you need to get to know me better for your job, if nothing else. I should win this game just to give you the ability to pick my brain. I’d be doing you a professional courtesy.”

I pursed my lips. “How do you manage to walk with all that weight?”

“I don’t follow.”

“With an ego that big?”

There was a gleam of interest in his eyes. “Ace, trust me, it’s not my ego that’s the biggest-”

“No. Don’t finish that sentence.” I held up a hand to stop him. “You’re really making me question whether I even want to drive your stupid Porsche.”

He laughed, delighted, before he sank another ball. The tables were quickly turning and we now had the same amount of solids and stripes left.

It was time to really show off. I pocketed the remainders of mine in quick succession, and before long, there was only the eight ball left for me.

“Damn. I hadn’t expected this.”

I hid my smile against my shoulder. “Clearly.”

But as I leaned over and lined up my final shot, I thought about the demand. I wanted to win. It would be fun to drive a car like that.

Dinners with him were a bad idea. It wouldn’t lead anywhere and might jeopardize my job.

But maybe, just maybe, I’d had enough of being sensible.

I missed the shot.

Julian tsked. “Rookie mistake.”

He proceeded to pocket his final balls in rapid succession. I leaned against the wall and watched him move. A dinner a week. He’d likely be bored after the first two, but I couldn’t find it within myself to dread that prospect. Any time spent with Julian Hunt felt like time spent gloriously alive.

He glanced up at me before he lined up the eight-ball. “Have you cleared your calendar, Ace?”

I gave a long-suffering sigh. “I think I can pencil you in, if I must.”

He leaned forward in concentration, and I could see him biting the inside of his cheek to focus. High cheekbones and a perfect jawline, just faintly illuminated under the low lights. How was he real?

He made the perfect shot. The eight-ball rolled in a perfectly straight line, hitting the pocket with a satisfying thud.

Julian grinned up at me in triumph. “Once a week you’re mine, Giordano.”

“As long as it’s only once a week, Hunt.”

He murmured something barely audible under his breath and turned away to put his queue back in the stand. I watched the ripple of back muscle through the white of his shirt.

I couldn’t have heard that right? It sounded like he’d mumbled “yeah, to begin with.”

I was so far in over my head.

Denise, who had stuck with me through thick and thin, turned out to be surprisingly unsupportive.

“You agreed to do what with him?”

“Only dinner, though. And only once a week.”

She grinned at me. “Damn. I hate to give it to him, but the man is good. Getting you to date him on a dare.”

“It’s not dating, not really.”

“But you want it to be. Don’t you?”

I frowned. “He’s my boss.”

“But he’s hot.”

“God, yes. But what am I supposed to do? This situation has me so far out of my depth.”