Page 160 of By A Thread

It had been a long fucking night, but I was energized. For the first time since I’d stepped into my father’s role atLabel, I felt confident in what I needed to do.

While Ally got Brownie his breakfast. I warmed up the kettle and fired off a text to my mother.

Me: Need to talk. It’s important. My house?

Mom: You really know how to strike fear in a mother’s heart before 7 in the morning. Is Brownie okay? Are you okay?

Me: Sorry. Brownie and I are both fine. Everything is fine. Just need to talk.

Mom: I can be there by 8. But I want breakfast if you’re determined to deliver bad news.

I winced.

Ally yawned and bent down to peer under the kitchen sink.

“What are you doing?” I asked, admiring the view of her ass in my sweats. It felt like a claim staked.

“Looking for some kind of cleaner. Aha!” Triumphantly, she produced a bottle.

I watched as she grabbed the paper towels and liberally sprayed the spot where only hours ago, we’d fucked like horny teenagers.

For some reason, it struck me as funny, and I laughed.

Ally raised an eyebrow in my direction. Brownie lifted his head out of his bowl and stared at me, head cocked.Had I never laughed in front of my dog before? Was I really that soulless?

“What?” Ally asked, wiping down the countertop. “Sooner or later, someone is going to make a sandwich here.”

I took the bottle and the towels from her. “Go upstairs and shower.”

“Bossy,” she complained, yawning again. “Can’t we just go to bed?”

“Not yet. My mom is coming over.”

“Oh!” Her eyes widened as it sunk in. “Wait, you’re telling Dalessandra that we had sex?”

I laughed again at the horror on her face. It had been a hell of a lot more than sex, and we both knew it.

“My father kept a lot of things from her.”

“But it was just—”

I put my hand over her mouth. “If you try to say that last night was ‘just sex,’ I am going to work very hard to prove you very wrong.”

She pulled my hand away and poked me in the chest. “Excuse me. Don’t you think this is a conversationweshould have before we include your mother, ourboss?”

The woman seemed really hung up on the hierarchy. She also had a practically infinitesimal point. “Fine. Ally, last night changed everything for us, and I’m not willing to return to a strictly professional relationship.”

“There are miles between a strictly professional relationship and dating, Dom.”

“Not in this case, there isn’t. Are we together?”

“What about the policy?”

“Forget everything else right now. Forget the policy. My mother. Your father. Forget that hovel in New Jersey.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Forget everything else except you and me. Right here. Right now.” Pulling her into me felt so fucking right after all those weeks I’d wasted pushing her away. “Are we together?”