Page 42 of Boss of the Year

For the first part of my life, I hadn’t ever wanted to fall in love. It seemed like a recipe for disaster. Then I met Daniel. But now, looking at my sister and the wreckage her husband’s death had left her, I was back to feeling unsure about the whole idea.

How would I deal with it if I loved someone like that and lost them?

“You never finished telling me what happened at the party,” Joni started after Nathan had finished a story about his latest surgery.

Lea perked up. “You went to your boss’s party after all?”

I sighed. “He’s not my boss. Well, he is sort of, but really, it’s his mother. And, well, I guess, his older brother pays the bills, but?—”

“She went!” Joni interrupted cheerfully. “And let me tell you, he could not keep his eyes off our girl. Her look was fire!”

“He did seem enamored,” Nathan agreed.

“And what did yourbossdo when he found his employee attractive?” Lea asked in that overbearing way that put my teeth on edge.

At least she sounded more like herself.

Heat flooded my cheeks. “We danced a little. And he asked me to meet him later.”

Joni squealed and smacked the table. “I knew it! I knew he wouldn’t be able to keep his hands off you! Then what?”

“Yeah.” Lea looked a bit more suspicious. “Then what?”

I shrugged. “I told you, Jo. He had to go. He had a family matter, I think.”

Both my sisters looked incredibly let down.

Something held me back from telling the full story. What happened between Lucas and me was embarrassing, yes, and probably unethical on a number of levels.

But the moment also sort of felt like ours. Just ours.

I wasn’t ready to share it yet. Maybe I never would be.

“That’s it?” Lea pressed, leaning forward to put her elbows on the table. “You danced with the boy you’ve been obsessing about for a decade, he asks you to meet up, and all you have to say is ‘he had to go’?”

Nathan cleared his throat. “If I may, you seemed taken with him when we arrived, Marie. But when we found you later, you appeared fairly upset. Your eyes were red, and your face was swollen. It looked like you’d been crying.”

Trust Nathan to notice what others missed.

“I was just tired,” I lied. “It was a long day.”

Lea sat back in her chair, studying me with the penetrating gaze that made her the bane of our existence growing up and meant that Nonna could trust her when she wasn’t around. “You know what I think?”

Here we go. A lecture was on its way. One about not getting involved with my employer, not getting my hopes up, and not doing anything interesting ever for the rest of my life.

“I think you’re scared.”

Joni nodded emphatically. “Yep. Yep, yep,yep. She’s been in love with this guy for a decade, and now that he’s finally noticed her, she’s freaking out. It’s Marky Marino all over again.”

“I never had a crush on Marky Marino,” I said. “He snapped my bra in the sixth grade.”

“And tried to talk to you after school at the bus stop. You told Nonna you were sick for three days. Freaking. Out.”

“I did not freak out!”

“When Mike and I first got together, I was terrified.” Lea changed the subject like we were still seven-year-olds fighting over the best Barbie. “Here was this ex-con, totally forbidden by Nonno, if you remember, totallywrongfor me. And yet, he made me feel like I was the only woman in the world. All I could think about was what would happen when he figured out that I wasn’t worth all that appreciation.”

Why?Whywas it Lucas Lyons’s face and not Daniel’s that flashed through my mind when she spoke of her history with Mike?