Page 17 of In Love and War

Seriously, he smelled so good. It was actually becoming harder to concentrate.

“I’m a generous person, Ms. Bloom.” A dimple.

Ignore. And whatever you do, don’t look at his mouth.

“You always have been.” Sarcasm drenched my words.

Donotlook at his mouth.

“Glad you think so. It’s always nice when you like your boss,” he teased.

Do. Not. Look. At. His. Mouth.

“Mmhm.” I nodded. I didn’t know why we were talking so quietly now. “It’s so crucial. I’m very lucky.”

Don’t do it.

“The luckiest,” he agreed as our staring contest continued. He was standing so close now…

Milly, I’ll kill you if you break and look a—

A knock on the door startled both of us, making my heart rocket into another orbit. Zac took a step away from me before it opened.

“I’m sorry to interrupt.” Margaret walked in. “Here’s the file you’d asked for. All of the current contacts have been updated.” She handed a blue folder to Zac.

“Great, thank you.”

“Oh, and Milly, could you do me a favor and get me a rundown of all of your current open accounts and any leads you’re working on? The more detailed the better.”

“Yes, absolutely.” I felt a little dizzy.

“Thanks. Next week is fine. Have a good evening,” she said and left with a wave, her heels clicking all the way down the hall.

“You can go too. It’s late,” Zac said as he casually walked back to his desk, his attention now on reviewing the file that was handed to him. “We’ll review the details of the account on Monday.”

Dismissive.

“Uh, yes, okay. See you then.” The words sounded a little rushed out of my mouth as I turned around to leave.

“And Amelia—” He was still looking down. “—we’re expected in New York in two weeks to meet some of the Yuval and Emerson people and discuss strategy. You’ll need to be all caught up on the account details by then. We’ll be there for a week, and I’ll have Andrew book your flight and hotel. Just make sure you get together with him and confirm the details.”

“Sure, will do. Thanks.”

I grabbed my things, left the building, got into a cab, made it into my apartment, flopped onto the couch, and my stupid heart wasstillacting like I’d just finished a spin class.

Who had really been fucking with who? You are such an idiot.

I didn’t have a ton of time to beat myself up over it, now knowing that I needed to prepare for New York. I grabbed my laptop and spent the better portion of the weekend doing research on our new client. It was the perfect distraction.

Plus, I could always just win the next round.

8

Igot to the office at a quarter to six on Monday morning, getting a head start on the summary of accounts I had promised Margaret. Zac had put a four-hour meeting in my calendar starting at 9:00 a.m. so that he could start to catch me up on the Emerson account details. By the time I’d finished putting together the document, my five-minute meeting reminder popped up.

Perfect timing.

I quickly typed out the email to Margaret and sent everything over, then looked up and through the glass wall into Zac’s office to see if he was ready.