Page 37 of The Boss I Can't Stand

FINN

“You don’t have to drive me to work,” Sierra said.

“I really do,” I said, waiting for the street to clear before pulling out of my building’s parking lot. “Firstly, because you’re my fiancée?—”

“Fake fiancée.”

I huffed. “Don’t say that too loudly. And secondly, I’m pretty sure your car is one pothole away from imploding.”

“Just because it’s not some ridiculous muscle car monstrosity,” she complained, squirming in her seat.

She’d already complained about being driven to work in something so flashy. I chose to keep it to myself that my Ferrari Portofino wasn’t even the most expensive car I owned. No need to give her more to complain about. “Your car is actual junk on wheels. It’s a road hazard.”

“It’s reliable,” she said. “Good old-fashioned machinery. Not this high-tech stuff that’s probably one good thunderstorm away frombreaking,” she said, prodding at my dashboard. “This thing has so many buttons it could fly to Mars.”

“Stop touching things, Cinderella,” I growled, swatting her hand away. I had my music programmed the way I liked and my Bluetooth connected, and I didn’t need her messing with it.

“What do all these buttons even do?”

“Stop it.”

“Wait, does your car have Wi-Fi?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my God!” she said. “This is ridiculous.” She touched a button, and the radio popped on. Her eyes lit up, a surprised smile stretching across her face. “Country? Well, then?—”

“Knock it off.”

“Am I about to find out you have cowboy boots in your closet and go line dancing on the weekends?”

“As if I have time.” I fixed the radio as a flash of heat prickled at my neck. I didn’t like her messing with my things, but I liked it a little too much when she smiled at me like that.

She pushed another button, and her phone connected to the Bluetooth. A signal beeped.

“New text message from…Ro,” an automated voice announced.

“Okay,” Sierra said, sounding a little panicked. “Now how do we turn it off?”

“I told you not to touch things,” I grumbled, glancing from the road to the touch screen she was fiddling with.

“Well, excuse me, I didn’t know it would take an electrical engineering degree to operate your car.”

“Giirrrlll,” the automated voice said, doing a horrible impression of Ro’s text.

“Wait!” Sierra said, frantically pushing more buttons. “How do we stop it?”

“You know what they say about having sex dreams,” the automated voice continued, reading out the rest of the message.

Christ! I thought, trying to bat Sierra’s hands out of the way. This was not the kind of thing I needed to overhear while trapped in a car with her. Sierra’s entire face turned the color of a tomato.

The signal beeped again.

“New text message from…Ro,” the automated voice said again.

“Disconnect it!” Sierra practically screamed at me.

“Move your hand!” Her fingers brushed against the back of my hand, and my eyes narrowed. She wasn’t wearing the engagement ring yet. Maybe it hadn’t fit? If it needed to be adjusted, we’d have to get that done soon, before the tabloids started trying to zoom in on her hand.