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Where she kissed me back.

This bracelet is a loose end. But only if she asks for it, which she hasn’t. I haven’t heard from her. Maybe she doesn’t know that she dropped it at my place.

I don’t know if she’ll reach out, looking for it.

I don’t even know if she left it on purpose. How do I know what devious lengths a woman might go to if she wanted to see me again?

Wishful thinking.

I don’t know her at all.

Her feelings for me, and how she’ll deal with me or my siblings when she runs into any of us again—if it ever happens—are uncertainties, and I don’t like uncertainties. Uncertainties are shades of gray, and they send my mind into endless spirals ofwhat if.

I can’t live with what ifs.

I need answers.

Clear data.

Facts and figures.

Not embellished desserts with no function but to overindulge the senses.

Even lies are better than uncertainties, as long as they’re fully received. Believed.

Black lies.

White lies.

It doesn’t matter. Black or white is always better than gray.

I decide I need to disrupt my spiraling with another meeting—before I break down and start scrolling Quinn Monroe’s TikTok like a Gen Z with a crush—and have Brant call Savannah’s assistant to find out where she is.

Then I stalk out of my office, heading straight for the executive elevator. My head of security, Manus, gets up from his desk and strides after me, diving into the elevator just before it closes. Maybe it’s the look on my face that has him running.

He straightens his tie. “Are we in a hurry?”

“That special assignment I gave you?” I growl. “You gave me bad data.”

“I don’t see how that’s possible,” he says carefully. “The search was exhaustive, and thorough.”

That may be so.

But the datawasbad.

I don’t care how well Quinn Monroe checkedmostofthe boxes on my list. Do I have leverage over her as my employee?Check. Does she need to retain her job for financial security? Check. Is she willing and able to pretend to be someone she’s not, to bend or break rules, and to keep a secret? Check, check, and check.

The problem is, there was that one last box that she also seemed to check, but fucking didn’t.

Is she emotionally unavailable?

Big nope.

I was very specific that she was not supposed to get attached to me in any way, or want anything from me other than her continued employment and the paycheck it provides. She was not supposed to develop any feelings for me whatsoever.

This was not supposed to get personal.

But that kiss…