Page 27 of The Thing About My Secret Billionaire

“What if I take sugar?” He looks at me side-eyed and smirks.

“Then you’re shit out of luck.”

His shoulders shake with a quiet laugh as he takes his first sip.

“Also I figured you’d never be a sugar guy.”

“Because I’m sweet enough?” he says with irony.

I want to say that sweet is by no means enough to describe what I’m looking at, but instead settle on, “Please don’t make grandpa jokes.”

“Ha,” he says, sniffing the drink before taking a sip. “Are you and your grandpa close?”

“Yeah, I spent most of my middle and high school vacations here. This place made me want to be a vet.”

“Hmm, this coffee’s hitting the spot just right. Particularly since the raccoons sounded like they were having a dance party at three o’clock this morning.” He puts the mug down and looks at the container of toast. “Do you have any hand sanitizer on you? Not sure I should go from shoveling shit to touching food.”

“You weren’thandlingthe shit, though, right?”

“Guess not.” He takes two squares of the paper towel I’ve brought for napkins and uses them to pick up a slice of toast. “So what happened to being a vet?”

“I suck at science.”

He coughs on his toast. “Oh, yeah. That would be a problem.”

“I was always better at words, so I tried to figure out what was the most consistently good money you could make with words. Settled on marketing.”

“You’re all about the money then, huh?”

“More like I’m all about a good, regularsalary. Being here is probably not helping with my next step on the ladder, though.”

“You think they might forget about you while you’re gone?”

“Taking two months off under normal circumstances would be okay. But I’ve just applied for a promotion. So it might not look great that I’m away while my main rival is there sucking up to our bosses on a minute-by-minute basis.”

“I really can’t imagine anyone forgetting about you.”

A tingle of surprise warms my belly, and my eyes dart to his face to see if he’s kidding. But he loses his grip on the toast and concentrates on not dropping it.

“I meant, forgetting about how good you are at your job,” he adds, as if realizing how that must have sounded and feeling the need to set the record straight.

“Well, if they give the VP position to that guy, I’ll be looking for another job anyway. No way am I working under him. He’s like Michael Scott fromThe Office. But mean.”

Miller was mid-bite into his toast when I said that and almost chokes on a chuckle as he rips off the mouthful.

There’s a certain thrill of satisfaction in making him laugh.

He grabs another napkin and wipes his face as he chews.

“Crumbs went up my nose,” he says after he’s swallowed.

He pauses for a second to clear his throat and take a sip of coffee. “I guess one of my joys of being self-employed is never having to work with anyone I don’t want to.”

“Lucky you. Anyway, even if I’m all about the moneyin my real life in Chicago, when it comes to this place, all that matters is that it keeps going.”

“What’s the deal with that little gray one over there?” He tips his mug toward Harley.

I have to suck in my lips for a second to stop myself from laughing. “Ah, yeah. I forgot to tell you. Harley doesn’t like the shovel.”