The Boss on the Brain (New York Office Billionaires #1)

Chapter 1

AVA

Ishould never have agreed to this, I thought as I stared at the big block letters that announced the name Il Corvo on the blue door to the restaurant.

I watched a few couples walk in, hand in hand, while I wistfully stood out on the pavement alone. It had been a long time since someone held my hand.

In an attempt to break a dry dating spell that had lasted almost a year, my friends had set me up on a date. With Harvey Barlow, a guy with an extra-wide smile who we’d found on a dating app.

But right at this moment, as my fingers curled into a fist and my palms sweat, all I could think was that I couldn’t place the music that was drifting out from the restaurant.

Whose music is that? I wondered. I had no idea. Perhaps I ought to know more about opera. What if that’s all my date wants to talk about?

My stomach rumbled, reminding me of more pressing issues than music, and I checked my watch.

I’d gotten here ten minutes to seven. Ten minutes early, like I always did.

A habit ingrained in me from a mom who was always responsible—for herself, for me, and most recently, for a restaurant she owned. It was now five past seven.

I checked my phone and saw one message. My heart leaped, and I opened it, hoping it offered some explanation for why Harvey was late.

It wasn’t Harvey.

It was a text from my friend Gabriela.

Gabriela: I’m here for you if you need me to bail you out. But I hope you don’t. It’s been ages since you did something for yourself.

She knew I was nervous. I didn’t go on dates.

In fact, for a long while recently, I hadn’t done dates.

For the past year, I’d been grieving the loss of Mom.

It had been just me and Mom for as long as I could remember.

And while things were getting better, I still felt like I was missing something.

A sense of belonging and family. Something to drive me forward when I felt anchorless.

Perhaps there was something to what Gabriela had said. I loved doing things for others; it filled me with a sense of purpose. It also kept me from having to think about what I needed to do for myself.

After one meaningful relationship back in high school had ended abruptly, I’d found it easier to get swept up with the world around me, never introspecting, never being alone for extended periods of time.

This only got worse after Mom’s death. I didn’t want to think about what her loss meant to me—what being alone in this world, with no one to call my family, meant to me.

It was also something I couldn’t talk to my friends about because I could see the worry on their faces when I tried.

Looking around, I resisted yet another urge to go in by myself. Stillness frustrated me, which was why I loved the bustle of working at Mom’s restaurant. I waited outside a little longer and took a deep breath as I looked at the name of the restaurant—Il Corvo.

It was a restaurant I’d been meaning to try for ages.

A brand-new Italian restaurant on the same street in the Bronx where I managed Mom’s restaurant.

One that I’d owned for the past year, ever since she’d passed away.

Il Corvo seemed to do way more business than we ever did, which was a cause of concern to me.

So, when Harvey had suggested we meet here, I’d said yes. I was curious to scout the competition. What I hadn’t prepared for was for today being the day my restaurant investor, Ray Murphy, dropped the bombshell news that he was pulling out of the business.

I closed my eyes, rubbing my fingers over my temple to keep my impending headache at bay.

Ray had informed me that he knew of a new investor who would be interested.

If I went with the new investor, which I was very likely to do, then some jerk in a suit would show up and convert our Southern-inspired restaurant into a standardized one, where the menu offered no creative choices, the seating would be uninspiring, the colors drab.

My stomach tightened into a knot at the idea. I didn’t want to consider what the worst outcome might be even though the answer was right there, tucked away in my brain. The new guy might demolish our restaurant and build something else. I shuddered.

Standing out in the chilly breeze for the past fifteen minutes was making me a nervous mess.

I heard a pair of feet step onto the pavement first before a car door shut loudly next to me. Startled, I spun around and, in the twilight, ran into a wall of hard muscle. Hard but warm.

I lifted my head, and I was looking at the chest of a really tall man.

A man was standing in front of me, one of those businessmen in expensive suits. He caught hold of me, stabilizing me, while I tried to step back. Unfortunately, I ended up stepping on his shoe and tripped and fell even further into his arms.

For a moment, I was mortified. And then I inhaled the lemony, musky scent of this man. He smelled like heaven. And the way he was holding me seemed to suggest that I would fit just right.

His hands slipped from my arms and went around my back, holding me to him. I smelled more of the expensive cologne just as my cheeks grazed the silk of his shirt.

“Are you okay?” he asked in a smooth, deep voice.

It was, unfortunately, an eerily familiar voice.

My head snapped back in an instant, and I looked at the man so utterly familiar that it made me forget to breathe.

Light-brown eyes met mine. His hair was black and trimmed.

The face was angular, the jawline hard, but his goatee was missing.

So much about this man was painfully etched in my mind, and yet so much was still new.

“Desmond?” I blurted out while his eyes widened.

I stepped back, and he didn’t let go right away until I seemed stable. When I found my footing, his hands dropped to his sides.

I moved away, but not before my senses went on high alert.

He was so close. Desmond! His tall, muscular body and that adorable, dark brown hair, which was now cropped close to his head.

He must have been lifting weights and training more because this was no more the mellow nerd that I remembered.

He was—I gulped—very attractive in a strong, bulging-biceps way.

Our gazes locked, I could feel his eyes on me, and the surrounding aura changed perceptibly. Desmond’s eyes darted to me, his gaze taking me in, and his mouth fell just a little open.

Even though Desmond McKinley and I both lived in New York, running into him was a shock.

He would eat out at Masa and Le Bernardin.

I normally ate my meals at the restaurant when I wasn’t at home.

He spent his free time at the museums and traveling in his private jet to exotic locations, like the C?te d’Azur and Bora-Bora.

So, hearing his name in the news or local gossip occasionally or knowing he was still, unfortunately, alive, was not unusual.

But locking eyes outside a restaurant where I was meeting a date was.

Especially since we hadn’t seen each other ever since our breakup ten years ago.

Desmond turned slightly and nodded at the driver. It was a Rolls-Royce Phantom. It reeked of wealth, just like the new Desmond. The car pulled away from the curb and glided out of sight before I turned back to him.

“Ava?” he said, his voice now low and husky.

The smile I’d initially seen on his face was gone. He looked stern, as if my presence almost irritated him.

“What’re you doing here?” we blurted out at the same time.

In the silence that followed, we hesitated. Ten years ago, we would have laughed at the coincidence. Laughed at ourselves for speaking at the same time. Not today.

“I’m … I’m here for a personal event,” I said finally when he didn’t relent, when his eyes bored into mine.

My heart was racing. The Desmond McKinley I had known was an enthusiastic seventeen-year-old in high school.

He’d dressed in sweatshirts and shorts and had perpetually floppy hair that I used to love to flick above his forehead.

This man was dressed in a suit that probably cost more than I paid for rent.

In New York rent, no less. His hair was so neatly trimmed that I couldn’t even push any of it back even if I wanted to.

My hands smoothed over my pencil skirt. The Ava I had been in high school would only dress in shorts or summer dresses. I’d worn nothing formal until graduation night. But Desmond hadn’t been there that night to see me. He never saw this Ava.

Seeing him like this, here, without an ounce of regret, made me hate all the times I’d spent mourning my high school romance with Desmond. I had often caught myself wondering if he was the one who had gotten away.

“A personal event?” Desmond’s voice was wry, and he tilted his head just a little to look at me.

The light from the windows caught the cuff links on his sleeves, and they gleamed.

“That must mean you’re on a date.” Desmond checked his watch just as I gulped. He knew me too well. “It’s five minutes past seven, so I’m guessing you’ve been waiting here for fifteen minutes.”

My cheeks felt warm at the reminder of how well he knew me. Ten years later, I was still utterly predictable.

“You should go in,” Desmond said, looking at the blue door. “It’s too cold out here.”

I shook my head. “If my date doesn’t show up, I’d hate to tell the waiter that I got stood up and do the walk of shame out the door.”

Desmond’s voice was hard. “If he doesn’t show up, Ava, you call me, and I’ll be your date.”

I looked up at him in surprise at the offer. I was just about to speak when, from somewhere behind me, I heard a voice. It sounded breathless and hoarse.

“Ava?”

Desmond’s eyes darted over my shoulders to look at the person walking up behind us before he looked at me. His lips curled, and he stood taller. “I see that your personal event has arrived.”