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His eyes snap open. “I take that back. You fucked your goddamn secretary. Do you have any idea of the Pandora’s box you just opened? Of how many HR policies you’re in breach of? You could get the whole firm sued or canceled.”
Anger simmers beneath my skin. “Don’t treat me like your fucking junior associate, Nathan. I?—”
“A junior associate fucking your secretary wouldn’t be half as bad as you doing it, numbnuts,” he barks.
I know he’s right, but still, I’m pissed and I’m not here for a lecture. I’m here to talk to my brother, my ally in life, and instead, I feel like I’m talking to my boss.
“I know that, dipshit. And I don’t need to be reminded of our HR policies. I fucking wrote them.”
He grinds his jaw like he wants to argue, but for whatever reason, he doesn’t. We’ve had our fair share of fights, and we both know how easily it can escalate. “And don’t call it fucking,” I add. “It was more than that.”
He sighs, leaning back in his chair. The anger seems to drain out of him, and he just looks tired. “What the fuck, Drake?”
“I know. I tried to stay away from her. I tried so fucking hard. But I couldn’t. I can’t stop thinking about her for more than a damn second.” I screw my eyes closed and wait for a rebuke that never comes.
“So what the hell are you going to do now?” he asks instead, his tone a little softer.
I recall the way I left her, lying naked on her bed, her big hazel eyes looking up at me with such trust. She’s taking a huge chance on me, and I won’t let her down. “I like her, Nathan. And she really likes her job.”
His frown turns to a scowl. “So?”
I suck in a deep breath. “So we’re going to keep seeing each other in secret and see where this goes. For the time being, she’s going to keep working for me. I was thinking of getting her moved over to work with Fred Darwin when Marla goes on maternity, but?—”
“Fred announced his retirement. Yeah.”
I was actually kind of glad when I got word. Having Amelia around was torture, at least before this weekend, but it was a torture I was addicted to. Now I’m addicted to everything about her, and I don’t want anybody else as my secretary.
Nathan blinks at me. I loosen my tie again, and we stare at each other in silence like we’re in some kind of standoff. What the fuck did I come in here for? Approval? No, I came for advice. Maybe even for congratulations, because this is a big fucking deal for me. Deep down, I was excited to tell him and thought he’d be happy for me. Instead, he seems more concerned with HR policies and our image.
Even if he thinks I’m a nutjob who’s putting our entire firm at risk, he’s still my big brother, and I want him to be that right now more than anything else. “I’ve never felt like this before, Nathan.Not about Tiff, and definitely not about anybody since then. My last relationship ended when I was twenty-three. I don’t know what I’m doing, and I badly want this to work. How do I not fuck it up?”
“You haven’t exactly given yourselves a fighting chance, Drake. The secrecy…” He shakes his head and lets out a weary sigh. “It might be exciting for a while, but it’ll get old real fucking quick. What about Dad and the others? Will you tell them? Will she tell her family, her friends? Will Emily Gregor gossip about it to Amber at some society lunch?”
“Amber already knows some of it, and she isn’t likely to do anything to damage our firm, Nathan.”
He looks surprised and a little upset. Maybe he thinks I should have confided more in him, but here we are, shooting daggers at each other. Is it any wonder I didn’t?
“I don’t find the secrecy exciting, by the way. I fucking hate it. But for now, there’s no other way to do this. I can’t force her out of her job. It wouldn’t be fair. And I have no intentions of going back to Chicago.”
He jerks back as though I’ve taken a swing at him. “Who even mentioned you going back to Chicago?”
“That would be the only way for me to not be her boss. I could transfer her, I guess, but I know she’d see it as a punishment, and…” I drop my head into my hands. “Of all the fucking people I could fall for.”
“She’ll have to sign an NDA,” he says, his legal brain kicking in and looking for solutions.
My head snaps up. “Fuck no,” I say, my legal brain completely backfiring.
He rolls his eyes. “It’s no big deal. We’ve had employees sign them before.”
Is he fucking serious? I get to my feet, outraged. “Not about stuff like this. Not a please-don’t-tell-anyone-your-boss-screws-you-on-his-desk-every-afternoonNDA.”
Nathan’s eyes flicker to his desk, and I swear that deviant fucker smirks. I fold my arms and lean away. “You’ve fucked Mel on this desk, haven’t you?”
“A gentleman never tells,” he says smoothly, but the twinkle in his eyes says I’m right. Of course I’m right. What’s the point of having your own office and a huge sturdy desk if not to fuck the woman you’re obsessed with on it every chance you get?
I force images of Amelia naked and spread out on my desk from my head and sit back down. “I’m not having her sign an NDA. I trust her.”
“You barely know her,” he counters.