“You can call me anything you want.” His voice carries a hint of something that sends heat down my spine. “Though maybe not Meatball in front of clients.”
“Thatcher then.” The name feels formal on my tongue, nothing like the sounds I remember making in that bathroom. “For professional settings. Noted.”
“And for unprofessional settings?” The question slips out soft and quick, like he couldn’t quite hold it back.
Our eyes meet across the desk, and for a moment, his mask slips. Everything he’s thinking is written across his face. The wedding, the bathroom, hands and mouths, desperate sounds neither of us should remember.
“For professional settings,” I repeat firmly, though my voice sounds rough even to my own ears, “we’ll stick with Thatcher. And just to be clear, I will never call you Meatball.”
He nods, holding the sticky note between his fingers.
“I should get back to work,” he says, standing with unusual grace. He pauses as if he wants to say something, but then he smiles, and whatever he was going to say remains unsaid as he heads for the door.
As I stare at his parting figure, I give in to temptation, and my eyes land on his ass. Thatcher is shorter than me, but what he lacks in height, he certainly makes up for in other departments.
I turn back to my computer, demanding that my brain erase all inappropriate thoughts of the man on the other side of the wall.
The afternoon light slants through my office windows, painting long shadows across the floor when Thatcher returns with a stack of files. His sleeves are rolled up now, suit jacket abandoned on the back of his chair, and the sight of his forearms should not affect me the way it does.
“We should discuss it,” he says without preamble, setting the files on my desk. A yellow sticky note falls to the floor, and I pretend not to notice the tiny heart drawn in its corner. “The elephant in the room. Or should I say, the elephant in the bathroom?”
His attempt at humor falls flat between us, but I appreciate the effort. “I’m not sure that’s necessary.”
“It is.” He perches on the edge of my desk, closer than boundaries between boss and employee should allow. “Because I can’t stop thinking about it, and from the way you’ve been looking at me all day, neither can you.”
The directness catches me off guard. I’m used to corporate double-speak, carefully worded emails and implications hidden in meeting minutes, but his honesty is actually refreshing.
“What happened at the wedding,” I begin, my voice as steady as I can manage, “was…”
“Amazing?” He suggests. “Incredible? Life-changing?”
“Inappropriate,” I finish, though the word tastes false on my tongue. “And cannot happen again.”
Thatcher’s expression shifts, something flickering behind his eyes. “Inappropriate but amazing? Because I’m pretty sure those two things aren’t mutually exclusive. Besides, we didn’t know each other, so it wasn’t inappropriate then.”
“Thatcher.” My voice carries a warning note that sounds weak even to me.
“I know, I know.” He runs a hand through his hair, making those curls even more chaotic. “We need to be professional. I can do professional. I can be the most professional assistant you’ve ever had.”
“Can you?” The question comes out sharper than intended.
His smile, smaller now but no less genuine, makes my chest tight. “I can’t forget it happened. I won’t pretend I want to. But I can be appropriate about remembering it.”
“That makes no sense.”
“It makes perfect sense!” He stands, pacing the length of my office with that barely contained energy that seems to follow him everywhere. “Look, what happened in that bathroom was…it was something I needed. Something you needed too, I think. But that was then, and this is now, and now we can do different.”
I watch him move, unable to tear my eyes away. “Different?”
“A clean slate.” He stops pacing, turning to face me with unexpected seriousness. “Not forgetting, but not letting it control us either. We can work together and still acknowledge that we once…” He trails off, color rising in his cheeks.
“Once what?” The words come out rough, dangerous.
“Once made each other feel something worth remembering.” His honesty is a weapon I have no defense against. “But now we’re boss and assistant, and that’s its own kind of relationship. Different, but no less important.”
He extends his hand across my desk. “Shake on it? A proper business agreement between professionals who happen to have an extremely hot bathroom encounter in their past?”
I stare at his offered hand, remembering how those fingers felt against my skin, how they trembled slightly while fixing my tie afterward. Taking his hand now feels like signing a contract written in matches. One wrong move and everything burns.
