Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Sofia
I’d be lying to myself if I said I wasn’t sitting at the bar at Noble Rot, hoping Andrew—or rather, James—was going to walk through that door, sit down next to me and tell me again how attractive he thought I was.
How attractive exactly? Very. Never before had four letters sent so many tingles down my spine.
Getting to read Joanna’s Andrew Manual this afternoon had been enlightening and intriguing.
It confirmed that he didn’t like to be disturbed before noon, but didn’t say why.
It noted that he didn’t take cars in London but preferred to walk or take public transport.
It detailed lots of things I already knew and plenty of things I didn’t, like airline preferences, or when he liked things in hard copy versus when he liked email.
It would have been a revelation when I first started, and it was still going to be useful.
But it didn’t tell me any of the stuff I really wanted to know.
It didn’t tell me why the barman called him James.
It didn’t say why he lost it when he got a piece of personal mail at the office.
It didn’t reveal why the man at the bar seemed so different to the man in the office.
He wouldn’t come here again. Last night, after he’d given me the best compliment I’d ever had in my life, he’d rushed off like he’d made a huge mistake.
Sure, I’d had guys say more gushing things.
A few had even dropped the L-bomb. But there was something about Andrew telling me I was “very attractive.” He didn’t say what he didn’t mean, or waste words on things that weren’t necessary.
Last night, it had felt like he had to tell me what he thought. And he thought I was very attractive.
I couldn’t be too happy about James’s compliment. Today in the office, it was like it had never happened. Like James and Andrew were really truly two different people, and I was living in that Reese Witherspoon rom-com that hadn’t been made but definitely should have been.
“A glass of Barolo,” I said to Tony as I slid onto my now-usual stool.
“Coming right up,” he said.
As he slid my glass across the bar, the bell on the door chimed. I didn’t have to look around to know he was here. I could just tell.
Andrew.
James.
Whoever it was who made me shiver and blush at the same time. The man who could turn my knees to water with a half-second-too-long glance. The man I’d been waiting for.
He slid onto the stool next to mine without a word.
I wasn’t about to strike up a conversation.
If he’d wanted to avoid me, he wouldn’t have come here.
He must have known there was a chance I’d be here.
If it was just a coincidence, he could have taken a seat at a table, or left an empty stool between us.
He wanted to see me.
And if he wanted to talk to me, he was going to have to go first.
Without asking, Tony appeared with Andrew’s drink. No ice. No mixer—just straight whatever-it-was. Just like him. Andrew didn’t come watered down or altered in any way. He wore his edges like he didn’t give a fuck if most people would prefer him a little weaker or easier to swallow.
“How was your day, Sofia?” he asked, not even turning his head to meet my gaze.
I took a beat, letting my heart rate settle before I replied.
“Good.” It had been. For a change. Listening to Andrew explain something of his philosophy the other night made my day a lot easier.
I’d always known the way he treated me wasn’t personal, but it felt better now I’d heard from him why he was so .
. . lacking the usual niceties of working relationships.
And then, when I’d gone to him this evening and urged him to share what he was trying to achieve with Goode—he’d done so.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say Andrew valued my opinion, but he respected me enough not to simply dismiss me. That was progress.
Had my conversation with James changed his perspective about me the same way it had changed mine about him?
“Good seems like an improvement,” he said. I took a sip of my wine to drown my smile.
“Yes,” I replied. “What about you? How was your day?”
Andrew sighed. “Not good. Being here is . . . better.”
I tried to ignore the swirl of heat in my stomach.
Maybe he was talking about the fact he could get shitfaced, but I was going to take his statement as a compliment.
His day was better because he was with me.
Although technically, we’d sat about twenty feet from each other all day.
But that wasn’t the point. In the office, he was Andrew.
The man next to me was James. He clearly didn’t want to be Andrew right now.
Maybe it was because he wanted to escape the pressures and stresses of the office.
Or maybe he didn’t want to flirt with someone whose paychecks he signed, but he still wanted to flirt with me.
“I’m glad to hear that,” I said.
Whatever the reason Andrew had become James, I was happy to play his game.
I didn’t have to hate this man next to me for how miserable he made my friend and for how obnoxious he was in the office.
Because he was James and not my boss, I could enjoy his compliments and the sight of his rock-hard ass.
“Whisky and the company of a beautiful woman are guaranteed to make even a good day better.”
Andrew barely noticed me in the office. James, on the other hand, was full of compliments. James was more relaxed, lighter. He seemed to shoulder less responsibility than his counterpart.
“It’s good to blow off steam at the end of a hard day in the office,” I said. “It’s healthy to shrug off the stress and remove the game face.”
“Game face?”
Was that phrase just an Americanism? “You know, the armor we all wear at work. The people we are in the office compared to the people we are . . .” I glanced around the bar. “After dark.”
He stayed silent and I wondered if I’d blown it. He didn’t want to be called out. He wanted to continue our game, no questions asked. And I hadn’t meant to push—I just wanted him to know that I understood why he wanted the separation between Andrew and James. At least, I thought I did.
I shifted to face him. My heart was beating a little faster and my cheeks flushed like a virgin in an MLB locker room. “For the record, I think you’re very attractive.”
Our eyes locked. “There’s a record?”
I couldn’t help but mirror his slow smile. “Well . . . in case there is, that should be on there.”
His gaze dipped to my drink, then across to my shirt and down, down, down. And then he licked his lips before turning back to the bar and taking another sip of his drink.
“I’m a Catholic,” I said. “A bad Catholic but still, I suppose I just needed to confess.”
“What else . . . needs to be confessed?”
Lust growled at the base of my spine. What was he really asking?
“I hoped you’d be here tonight,” I said.
He didn’t reply. I’d gone too far. Said too much. Silence stretched between us. I shifted back to face the bar and gulped down a mouthful of wine. Andrew might like his edges. Mine could do with some smoothing.
I took a deep breath in and as I exhaled, Andrew leaned closer and whispered into my ear, “I want to take you home and make you come.”
My pulse pounded in my ears and my heart thumped across my chest. If I’d been standing, I would have fallen, as I’d lost all feeling in my legs.
My asshole boss wanted to get me naked. And the feeling was entirely mutual.
I slipped off the barstool and pulled on my coat.
“You leaving?” he asked.
“I am,” I replied. “And you, James, are taking me back to my place to do every last dirty thing you have got going on in your imagination.”