“You’re tripping balls,” he murmured. “Not gonna happen.”
“What’s her name again?” Sam asked.
Riley gazed out the window as he exhaled loudly, his head shaking. “Ma’am. She lets me call her ma’am.”
Matt pressed his fist to his mouth to conceal a laugh. “Twenty-First Amendment, around six. I want Lauren to meet Andy.”
“She didn’t tell you?” Shannon asked. She closed her laptop and folded her arms on the table. “We had lunch with Andy on Saturday. Bumped into her at the farmers’ market. Andy picked out Lauren’s wedding dress.”
“Really?” Matt murmured, his arm crossed over his chest and his free hand propped under his chin while an affectionate smile danced across his face.
“Don’t ask. I’m not telling you anything other than it is gorgeous and ideal,” Shannon said. “And don’t even think about asking Andy. You won’t get anything out of her.”
Didn’t I know it.
I tried to picture Andy shopping for wedding dresses with Lauren, her dark, fitted clothes a sharp contrast to the sea of white. An uninvited image of Andy’s slim body encased in a delicate white lace wedding dress floated into my mind, and I choked on my coffee.
I sputtered and coughed while Shannon smacked my back, though I couldn’t escape the vision of Andy’s hair spilling over her shoulders, and the gentle rise of her breasts against the lace.
Yep. Losing my fucking mind.
They continued talking but my attention slipped back to Andy. She was turning me into a delusional maniac, and now I had a wedding dress fetish.
*
Andy didn’t mentionmy drunken text messages on Monday. I waited for her to inquire about my weekend, or offer anecdotes from hers, and found myself irrationally annoyed when we talked through design changes over lunch without a moment of small talk.
At one point in the late afternoon, I started babbling to myself about finding a case to protect my new phone because it cost more than most kidneys on the black market. She gazed at me from the conference table while I rambled, glanced at the phone in my hand, and turned her attention back to her laptop.
Fucking infuriating.
Tuesday passed without comment, and I repeatedly scrolled through my messages to reread her responses and confirm the exchange did in fact occur. Given the degradation of my sanity as a product of Andy’s aloofness and pouty lips and ever-present “hm,” it seemed entirely possible I hallucinated.
Her hair wasn’t helping my mental state either. The gusting wind that came in with Wednesday’s blast of arctic air sent her tendrils flying in spite of her earmuff headband.
I had the good fortune of getting a face full of her hair that morning. I felt hundreds of brain cells explode when I inhaled the lavender scent that was uniquely Andy. It happened three more times, and those moments when my fingers connected with her raven strands launched a new batch of fantasies.
Seated for a late lunch at a farm-to-table sandwich joint in Arlington, the curly mass was secured in a messy knot. I itched to loosen it, and feel her strands on my fingers again. The image of her hair wrapped around my fist as I took her from behind fueled my arousal, and if I didn’t get this situation under control, my dick was going to be hard enough to hammer nails all night.
Andy sent me a concerned look when I groaned and missed the window for a decent cover-up. “The pork belly is…really good,” I stammered.
“Hm.” She continued dotting her roasted vegetable wrap with spicy mustard.
She met my every maneuver with chilly indifference, and it left me more rankled than before. It wasn’t about the texts now. I wanted her attention, and I knew that was beyond fucked up considering I was her boss. I still wanted it, and I was long past worrying about professional boundaries.
“Any plans for the weekend?” Andy looked up, her eyes wide, and I plowed ahead to fill the silence. “I was thinking about getting out of the city. Maybe heading up to the North Shore, or New Hampshire. It’s not far. Only forty-five minutes or so.” I shrugged. “I think I’ve hit my limit of gray Boston days, and there are a few dives in New Hampshire with incredible seafood. Legit dives. And the best part is they’re totally empty this time of year.”
Andy nodded while she chewed, and I held my breath, worried than another “hm” was headed my way. “Have you been to that area?”
“Yes and no.” Shaking her head, Andy sipped her tea. I wanted her to give me an opening. No matter how small, I’d run with it. “That is, I’m familiar with the region but probably haven’t been to the dives in question. Seafood is…not for me.”
I was going to make an opening out of seafood if it killed me. “That’s blasphemous. You’re in New England. We take seafood seriously in these parts.”
“Trust me, I know. I grew up surrounded by seafood worship.”
Some Neanderthal part of my brain failed to register until then that Andy’s life didn’t start at Cornell, and there was more to her than the finer points of her résumé. “Where are you from?”
“Maine. Wiscasset.”
