: Chapter 9

Nathan is shrugging on his jacket by the time I walk into his office. There was a time when he would have worked until at least seven, but now that he has Mel and Luke to rush home to, he’s eager to leave after a mere ten-hour day. I can’t blame him for that, even though I’m likely to be working until midnight. I want him to have that freedom. It’s one of the reasons I agreed to come back from Chicago.

Glad I caught him, I hold up the bottle of Scotch. “You have time for a quick drink?”

His eyes scan the label, and he smirks. “You brought the good stuff, huh? You either had a great day or a really shitty one.”

With a sigh, I take a seat on the sofa in the corner of his office while he grabs a couple of glasses. He hangs his jacket back up, and I appreciate the gesture. It means he has time for me, and that will never not matter.

“So which is it?” he asks, sitting opposite me and placing a pair of empty crystal tumblers on the table. I pour us each a generous measure while Nathan eyes me suspiciously. He doesn’t push me any further, although I’ve obviously got something on my mind. Something that merits the good stuff. He knows me well enough to understand that I’ll get there when I’m good and ready. He holds up his glass. “To new beginnings. May the best day of your past be the worst day of your future.”

“Is that Irish?” I down the entire contents of my glass in one. “It sounds Irish. You been spending too much time with the Ryans?”

The Ryans are clients of James and James’s New York office, and they keep us busy. Never a dull moment, in fact, between their business activities and their not-so-legitimate activities.

“Perhaps. So. What the hell is going on with you? Is it really so bad being back here?”

I realize too late that he must be worried about me wanting to leave. I’ve been in Chicago for a long time, and the decision to move home wasn’t made lightly.

“No. It’s going to take some time to adjust, and that coffee machine is a total bitch, but no—I don’t have regrets, I promise you. I’m glad to be here with you guys again.”

“Good. That’s a fucking relief, in fact, because I’m glad to have you back. I’ve missed you. So, other than the coffee machine, what’s the issue?”

I look him in the eye. Time to rip off the Band-Aid. “I fucked Amelia.”

He blinks at me in surprise. “Already? Jesus fucking Christ, Drake. She’s only been here a matter of hours.”

“Not today, numbnuts.”

He blows out a breath. “At least that’s something. So when?”

“Saturday. And technically Sunday. She was the maid of honor from that wedding.”

He shakes his head in confusion. “The one you spent the night with? You said her name was Scarlet. What am I missing here?”

I drop my head back and rest it on the cushion. “It’s a long story.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” he mutters.

“You already said that.”

He snorts. “Yeah, well, it’s a classic for a reason. What were you thinking?”

“I wasn’t thinking anything. I didn’t plan this. I had no way of knowing that she’d waltz in here a couple days later and be all, ‘surprise, I’m your new assistant!’ It’s a coincidence. A really shitty one. There are, what, eight million people in this fucking city, half of them female? And I end up screwing her. I swear, I couldn’t make this shit up. It’d be funny if it was happening to somebody else. What the fuck am I gonna do?”

He pours more Scotch and frowns as he thinks it through. “It’s not ideal, but we’ll have to think of some way to fix this. I can’t see how she can stay as your secretary after this. I thought she seemed a bit off earlier. Of course, it would be much fucking cleaner and simpler if we could just let her go.”

“Let her go? Why? She did nothing wrong.” In fact, the memory of how she did everything so damn right is eating away at my insides. When she walked into my office today, I almost had a seizure. Only my years of experience in the courtroom allowed me to keep a straight face while my brain imploded. And if it wasn’t bad enough that it was her, she had to be wearing one of those wrap dresses. The kind that falls open with the correct pull on the correct string. The kind of dress that seems like it was made specifically to get my blood pumping. One little tug, and she would have been unwrapped. Knowing exactly what lies underneath it didn’t help. Even her hair was in on the act, all neatly pinned up and begging to be liberated. I can’t shake the image of how all those dark tresses looked spread over my pillow …

“You can’t fuck your secretary, Drake. It’s a damn PR nightmare. Plus, it’s just fucking wrong.”

I grunt in frustration—at him, at myself, at the whole screwed-up situation. “I know that, jerkwad. I know it’s wrong. I know it’s exploitative, but is firing her any better?”

“Maybe not if we guarantee her another job. We can pull some strings and I’ll write her a glowing reference.”

I slam my fist down on the table, and he raises his eyebrows at me. I’m mad, and I don’t get mad. Her mom is sick, and she was excited and nervous about starting her new job. She needs the pay and the benefits. I know way too much about her to be calm. The image of how disappointed she looked when I basically fucked her and kicked her out of my room is still seared into my mind, and I couldn’t live with myself if I screwed her over like this. Just because she had the poor judgment to go for an asshole like me doesn’t mean she should suffer for it.

“No. It’s not right, Nathan. She needs this job, and besides, I’m not fucking her now. I fucked her. Emphasis on the past tense. She wasn’t even an employee then. It’s a mess, but I’m not gonna be the kind of asshole who fires her because we …” I swallow the knot in my throat. Because we fucked like animals, yet it was the most intense connection I’ve felt with a woman in as long as I can remember?

“Okay. Playing devil’s advocate here, bro, but what if she talks? Tells the whole goddamn firm about the two of you?”

I throw my hands into the air. “About what? We didn’t do anything wrong. We were two very consenting adults who had a great time together, and now she just happens to be my secretary.” I drop my head into my hands as reality hits home. “Shit, I’m so fucked.”

Nathan hums softly before he speaks. “Yeah. That’s a good way of putting it. And from a legal standpoint, firing her opens us up to a lot more scrutiny. Accusations of wrongful termination.”

I look up, incredulous. “That’s because it would be wrongful termination.”

His eyes narrow the way they do when he’s trying to solve a problem. “We could swap her out with someone else. One of the junior partners. Tim Sullivan needs someone.”

Fuck no. For some reason, the thought of her working for anyone else pisses me off, especially Tim fucking Sullivan. The man’s a horndog. I’m not going to admit that to Nathan, though, because I don’t really understand it myself. “That won’t work,” I say. “The position she applied for was secretary to a senior partner. It has a higher salary band. Moving her potentially causes the same issues as firing her, which we are absolutely not going to do.”

I wait for his response, keenly aware of the fact that I’m back in our New York office to make his life easier, yet it’s only day one and I’m already causing him headaches. Way to go, Drake.

“You two are done though, yeah?”

I nod, unable to bring myself to say it aloud. The reality of the situation is that we have to be done. I’m not the kind of guy who nails his secretary. I don’t even like to associate with the other partners outside of business hours. I don’t exploit people, and that’s the end of it.

Nathan downs his Scotch and licks his lips. Then he brushes a nonexistent crease from his suit pants and stands. “Have you spoken to her about it?”

“Yeah,” I reply, looking up at the ceiling. “I was a bit of a jackass, but she basically agrees that it’s over, all in the past. One hundred percent finito.”

“You sure about that, buddy? Because the way you talked about her … It seemed like it was more than a one-night stand, honestly.”

“No. It wasn’t. You know me, Nathan. I don’t do relationships. They’re too damn messy. Look what happened after one night. This won’t be going any further, and I promise we’ll work through it. I just needed you to know.”

I also needed to talk to someone about it, and Nathan is my go-to guy. He doesn’t know everything about me—we all have our secrets—but our relationship has always been solid. This little incident obviously hasn’t helped the way I often feel like I’m in his shadow, no matter how hard I work. Here I am, back in New York and busting my ass for our firm, and I still somehow manage to feel like a fuck-up.

“All right,” he says, grabbing his jacket. “If you two think you can handle it, then do whatever you think is best.”

I stare up at him, suspicious. “Well, that’s a complete one-eighty. What happened to moving her?”

He glances at his watch. “You’re right. It’s the wrong way to go, both morally and legally. Look, you don’t need me to tell you what to do, Drake. You don’t need me to hold your hand. This is your firm as much as it is mine, and I know you wouldn’t do anything to put it at risk.”

That’s true, but it’s good to hear that he trusts me. Seeing Amelia again today dredged up a whole load of confusing emotions, but he’s right. I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize what Nathan and I have built together. Work is everything to me; this firm is everything to me. I’ve had a much longer relationship with my work than I have with any woman, and that’s always been fine by me. I don’t see anything or anyone changing that, not even the woman who has occupied my thoughts since I first met her. That stops now. Amelia Ryder is my secretary and nothing more.