“We are going to get rid of these immediately,” I tell her aloud, before my brain can be inundated byI Heart Salingerstickers. I should have learned my lesson before about lusting after my boss. It brings only bad things into my life.
Outside, the storm has broken. A lush green lawn stretches out in front of the wood-framed floor-to-ceiling sliding-glass doors that open up onto small terrace. My toes dig into the plush rug as I stand in front of the window, looking out at the view. Across the lawn—which, please don’t tell my dad, is the nicest lawn I’ve ever seen—is a line of old-growth conifers, the sun drying the last of the rain from them.
The room has a small breakfast bar with tea and coffee.
“Wow, Pepper!” I thumb through the various imported tea options. “The one percent truly does not live like the rest of us. I don’t think we’ve ever been in a hotel this nice, let alone someone’s house. Wait…Pepper? Pepper! Dammit.”
The dog isn’t in the bathroom that I can see in the daylight is huge and luxurious. I can’t appreciate it because I need to find my corgi. She’s not still snoozing under the covers or hiding in the closet.
“Pepper!”
Am I afraid for her safety?
No.
Am I afraid that she’s currently ruining the very expensive floors and rugs in Salinger’s house, which I will never in a million years make enough money to replace?
Yup.
“Pepper. Pepper, come!”
The huge house is completely empty. Why does one man need such a large house all to himself?
I race down the stairs two at a time, calling for the corgi. Finally, I see her through the window, wandering around by the flowerbeds.
She could fall down the cliff and hurt herself. I don’t think they medevac corgis.
“Pepper, no. Pepper, come,” I yell through the window.
The dog doesn’t hear me.
There’s some fancy-pants lock on the doors that I can’t get open, so I finally give up and go through one of the open windows, landing in some tall grasses artfully planted next to the house.
“Pepper, get away from that right—oof!” I slip in the wet grass, my arms windmill, then I face-plant in the grass.
Pepper immediately freaks out that I’m lying sprawled on the lawn.
Then I hear, “Mandy?”
Crap.
I scramble upright. It’s not graceful, but at least I’m not lying like a beached whale on the grass when Salinger walks like a Norse god up the steep path from the ocean below.
I cross my arms. I do not need him to see the effect he’s having on me.
My sister was wrong. Isodo not have a crush on him. One, he’s my boss. Two, I’m too old tohave crushes.
Salinger’s barefoot, wearing those skintight black wet suit pants that make a man look like a superhero and his ass look better than fried chicken. His sandy-blond hair is damp from the ocean. Unlike in the office, where it’s perfectly styled, now it hangs in messy locks over his forehead, shading eyes the same color as the Pacific Ocean behind him.
As an American female who spent her teen years religiously watchingThe OC, this is very much playing into all of my delusional dream-boy surfer fantasies.
His top half?
Completely naked.
No, don’t use that word.I will not think about my boss naked while I’m wearing his clothes.
Clothesless. The top half of him is clothesless and stupidly muscular.
