Page 48 of Matteo

“Thanks,” Elizabeth says. I detect a sharpness in her tone as I return to my chair.

“For what?”

“She’s your consultant, you hired her, why don’t you tell her what you want done?” she echoes my words.

“I'm sorry,” I say, feeling bad about it. “That was out of line. That man brings out the worst in me.”

He always gets under my skin, he always manages to rattle me, even though I try to keep it in. This is one of the few occasions I haven’t been able to. I don’t understand why he felt the need to come here. Why he’s micromanaging me. Why he hired her behind my back. And the more I think about it, the more the answer stares me in my face: Paul Knight doesn’t trust me.

His son.

He’s suspicious, and paranoid. The worst combination.

I lean back in my chair, surveying her. Elizabeth doesn’t feel like an employee to me, and judging by the way she’s so direct with me, she doesn’t quite see me as her boss either.

Even Alex, who’s been here longer than I have, wouldn't dare talk to me like that, and he's older than me.

I'm her boss, for one thing. I’m also three years older than her. It was one of the first things I checked when I looked through her resume. Twenty-eight to her twenty-five.

“It doesn’t mean you can take it out on me.”

She puts me right. “You’re right. It doesn’t. I’m sorry. My father annoys the hell outta me.”

“I can see that. He seems to have that effect on you every time he gets within an inch of you.”

She heard us arguing that day, when I discovered he was interviewing, for the third fucking time, behind my back, and it was her. That shocked the hell out of me.

“He and I have a complicated relationship.”

She sits quietly, her expression softer now. “At least you have a relationship.”

“I wouldn’t call it—” I stop, remembering that she’s been in foster care. “You’re right, at least I do.”

She watches me quietly, and I would give anything, anything, to know what she’s thinking.

“I’m sorry.” The urge to apologize surprises me. “I shouldn’t have spoken about you the way I did.”

“You already apologized.”

I fumble for words. I’m so used to being cool and holding my composure, and it confuses me how I am anything but that around her. “I'm heading out to meet one of my brothers for dinner. I bailed on him yesterday, so ...”

“Don't let me get in the way.” She stands up.

Damn Enzo. He wants to grab a steak at a new place in Manhattan, but I'm tempted to bail on him again and just stay here instead.

“You're not in the way.”

She looks at me. That wasn't very professional, but it's the end of the day and my willpower is almost gone.

“Do you like steak?” I suddenly ask.

“Steak?”

“The meat that comes from a cow.”

She giggles. “I know what it is.”

“Okay. Good.” What is wrong with me? I feel strangely flustered, like a teenager about to ask a girl out for the first time. My pulse kicks up a gear, and I’m suddenly hyper aware of her standing across from me, watching me.