Sleeping With My Boss: A Standalone Novel (An Alpha Billionaire Romance Love Story) (A Dirty Office Romance) (23 page)

CHAPTER 30

Lilah

My cheeks were glowing red and burning as if they'd
just been doused in gasoline and set alight. I could hardly believe Brendan had
the audacity to walk into this building, head straight to my office, and hand me
a bouquet of flowers knowing full well the kind of stir his presence was going
to cause. Knowing the likelihood that Asher would see him.

Of course, the more I thought about it, the more I
realized
that making such a show was likely his
motive all along. Brendan had made it clear he was still romantically
interested in me–he hadn't stopped messaging me, despite me responding either
with single word
replies
or not at all.
My aloofness hadn't seemed to
discourage
him in the slightest. Now flowers?

I wasn't sure what I could actually do to get him off
my back. The longer he pursued me, the more
I
questioned if he was even interested in me at all, and the more convinced I
became that he had something to do with the tweet being leaked.

First,
there had been the break-in at the offices, then Brendan suddenly taking a
strong interest in me, and now this leaked tweet. Something was fishy—like,
left in the cooler in the summer heat for a week, fishy. Still, I didn't have
any way of proving anything, not yet, at least. But I had every intention of
finding a way.

For the moment, however, what I needed was damage
control. Asher had arrived at precisely the worst moment–seconds after Brendan
had surprised me and shoved a bouquet of flowers into my arms. It was almost as
if the man had been given a cue.

And, what had I done? I froze. What was I supposed to
have done? Or said? How should I have reacted? Clearly, I didn’t know. So, I
did what any confused woman with her arms filled with flowers would do, I crept
into my office and shut the door.

With all that was happening, I had to rethink my
situation.

As much as I’d been trying to, I couldn't deny that my
feelings for Asher had grown stronger. In fact, they seemed to be growing
stronger by the day, no matter how much I tried to tamp them down and ignore
them.

But I still felt strongly about putting my career
first. That hadn’t changed. My career, my passion for my job is what had driven
me for the past few years. It was the one thing that had gotten me through the
tough times, through the depression and heartbreak after Jacob. And focusing on
that made me stronger than I had ever thought possible.

In fact, look where that had landed me. In my dream
job, where I'd just been given a raise,
a
promotion,
and a new luxury car to drive around in. And yet, despite all
of those things, something hollow remained in my core. There was still an
emptiness when I wasn’t buried in work.

Only, when I was with Asher, that emptiness went away.
I found myself time and time again thinking about how we laughed together all
those late nights when we were supposed to be working, how easy it
was just being
around him, how much we had in
common…and how rigidly I kept pushing him away.

What I felt for him seemed to be at odds with
everything I was putting at the forefront of my life. It was a conflict I felt,
on some level, couldn’t possibly be reconciled. It would have to be one or the
other; I simply couldn't have both. Life didn’t work that way.

How could I play both sides of that fence and make it
work?

A sly smile crept over my lips as the idea spread like
wildfire through my mind. Playing both sides of the fence was precisely what I
needed to do.

***

Asher stepped over to the projector, where he pulled
up a chart and turned to face the team around the conference table.

“The VIV French perfume campaign has been a runaway
success,” he said with a smile, “again, largely due to the brilliant insight
and innovation provided by our campaign leader, Miss Maxwell, here. I really
don't think we could have asked for better results, especially since its
success opens up a whole new potential client base for us on the European
market. In fact, in light of how promising some of the market research appears,
we are considering the option of opening an office in Europe.”

I was as taken by surprise as the rest of the team
seemed to be. Opening a European branch? Mostly because of my influence on a
campaign? It sounded too good to be true, and I immediately wondered what that
meant for my future with The Sinclair Agency. I could totally see myself living
in Paris.

Just as Asher was flipping to a new chart to review,
he was interrupted by a frantic knocking on the door. Confusion ran across his
features. “Come in,” he instructed.

One of the interns burst in, carrying a laptop that
still had half of the power cord dangling from it as she rushed into the room.

“
Mr.
Sinclair,
Mr.
Sinclair, there's something you really need
to see. I’m so sorry for interrupting. It’s just…it’s just,” she stuttered.

“What? What's wrong?”

“The tweet, sir, the tweet—and that blog post. They've
just gone viral, sir.”

CHAPTER 31

Asher

I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

“Viral? It's gone…viral?” I managed to stammer.

“Yes, sir,” she said, nodding.

“How viral?”

“Nuclear, sir. That blogger must have contacted
someone at
Salon Magazine
, and one of
their writers did a piece on it. Now it's all over
Facebook
, people are tweeting about it left, right, and center, and-”

I held my hand up to stop the chatty intern. “All
right, all right, I get it. It's bad. Thank you for bringing this to my
attention. Take a seat over there, why don't you?”

The intern looked confused and borderline frightened.

“But sir, I'm just an intern, this meeting is for-”

“You had enough initiative to bring me this news
without hesitating, so please take a seat over there. Pay attention and you
might learn something useful.”

She nodded and scurried to an empty chair.

I looked out over the sea of faces staring back and on
each
one
I could see the same expression:
worry. They each knew about the tweet after I had interrogated them all. So
they knew this was a crisis situation, and we had to do some serious damage
control to keep it from escalating. Our reputation was at stake.

Something going viral that comes across as insulting
or hate-filled toward a particular group of people had the potential to utterly
destroy
a company. If we didn't play our
cards right, we could find ourselves in the midst of a firestorm of bad press,
lost clients, and possibly even lawsuits.

I stood in silence for a moment, not quite knowing
what to say, running through the situation over and over in my head. There had
to be some way to deescalate the torrent of bad press that had already begun

I stood from my seat and faced the room. “You're my
family,” I said in a tone of quiet but firm authority. “And whatever happens,
I'll protect all of you. I'll take the rap for this myself if someone has to go
down.”

It was what my grandfather would have said—and what he
would have done.

“Perhaps nobody will have to go down,” piped a
familiar voice.

Lilah.

Everyone turned to look at her. She was standing
confidently, addressing the group. A surge of intense attraction billowed
through my core.

“Why is that, Lilah?” I asked.

“Everyone is expecting us to back down, to
cower
, to grovel at their feet for an apology.
Right?”

“I suppose they are.”

“Screw 'em. Don't
apologize
.
We are a team, despite our diversity. I know if I were to ask all of you, you
would each identify with various groups. That’s what makes us all such a great
marketing team. Everyone here has a different background and therefore a
different way of looking at things.

“We all know that quote was taken entirely out of
context, but let's run with it. There's actually nothing inherently transphobic
about the statement, even when taken out of context. Sure, it's a bit
old-fashioned, but it says nothing about transgendered people at all. That's
just what the politically correct fascists are reading into it.

“So, let's hit them with something completely out of
left field. Let's
not
apologize
. Let's run with the campaign exactly
as planned–putting a heavy emphasis on the badass, male aspect of it. Let's
make the ad campaign even more about a badass man's man than it was going to
be.

“Let's show whoever is behind this that we're not
going to be intimidated, that a bit of bad press and words taken out of context
aren't going to knock us.”

“Are you sure about this?” asked one of my senior men
from the back. “It's a risky card to play, especially considering the
implications if it backfires.”

“I don't think it's going to backfire,” countered
Lilah.

I looked everyone in the eye, individually, as I
glanced around the room. Every one of them had contributed to the campaign that
was currently being taken out of context, and like Lilah had said, we were a
diverse group. That is how I knew her idea would work.

“And, I don't either,” I agreed. “In fact, I think it
might just turn this thing around completely. It's a bold, audacious and an
entirely unexpected move. I think it's going to work.”

Murmurs of agreement started to flutter around the
room. Eventually, everyone agreed that it would indeed be the boldest course of
action to take and likely our best chance of making it through unscathed.

“Good!” I said, charged from the sudden burst of
optimism. “It's decided, then. We'll go forward with the 'when men were men'
campaign and intensify the message. Let's hit
'em
team, let's hit 'em with everything we've got! Get to work.”

Everyone began to file out of the conference room,
Lilah being one of the first ones before I could even give her a pat on the
back for the bold idea. Another team member stopped me before I could try to
catch up with her.

So, thirty minutes later, I walked past Lilah's office
and considered heading in to speak to her about Savage and the flowers sitting
so boldly on her desk, but I wasn’t so sure I wanted to hear about it if she
was considering going out with him. I decided against it.

Besides, she had been extremely insistent about
keeping things between us professional, and if that was the way she wanted it,
that was how it would have to be. I wasn't about to overstep those bounds, even
though I felt the way I did about her.

One of the most senior members of my team almost
collided with me as he rounded the
corner
because I was so lost in my thoughts about Lilah. He glanced over at her office
door, seeming to know that she was on my mind.

“She's quite a firecracker, that one,” he said with a
knowing half grin.

“That she is,” I replied wistfully.

“She's brought a lot of fresh energy to this company,”
he remarked. “Good job on hiring her. You're a good judge of talent and
character, Asher. You remind me a lot of your grandfather. He and I were
friends for a long time, son. After all, I've been with this company for over
three decades now. He'd be real proud of what you've achieved, I can promise
you that.

“This little Twitter thing, it'll blow over, trust me.
Besides, with that young woman's brilliant strategy, we may even be able to
turn it around and work the angle in our favor. Don't worry, son, everything's
going to turn out all right. It will always work out the way it should. Life
has a way of doing that…with everything,” he added as he glanced in at Lilah
and then back at me before giving me a reassuring wink and a solid slap on the
shoulder.

“I hope so,” I murmured in reply. “I really hope so.”

***

I hadn't been able to stop smiling all morning. The
entire day, I'd felt as if I'd been walking on air. The taste of victory was sweet,
and it lingered delectably on my palate.

Lilah's strategy had totally worked. After a few,
carefully-orchestrated magazine articles, several positive blog write-ups, and
a brilliant social media strategy, the negative bloggers had been silenced, and
the social network had mostly turned against them for taking our words entirely
out of context. We had tens of thousands of new followers on social media. Many
were even congratulating us openly on how well we had handled the crisis and
owned the image.

And, the success had all been because of Lilah.

Even though she and I had hardly said more than two
words to each other over the past few weeks, I had to talk to her. In a
strictly professional manner, of course. I called her on her direct office
line.

“Lilah,” I said as she answered, “could you come to my
office please?”

“Sure,” she said. “I'll be there in a few minutes. I'm
just finishing something up.”

When she arrived, I found it hard to look her in the
eyes. My feelings for her hadn’t waivered, even though I knew there was no
point. They burned as intensely as they ever had. Still, I had made a promise
to her to keep my affections out of this. Strictly professional. I wasn't about
to default on that promise.

“You've heard the news, I take it?” I said as she
approached my desk.

“I have,” she replied with a smile.

“Well, it's all because of your brilliant
strategizing.”

She blushed and it made her even more beautiful. “I
can't take all the credit, I mean-”

“Nonsense. It was your idea, and it worked like a
charm. Don't be so modest. You had a great idea, it succeeded, and now… Well,
now you get to reap the rewards.”

Her eyes brightened as I said this.

“I do? In what way?”

“A bonus, of sorts. What would you like?”

“That's a pretty broad question.”

“All right, let me narrow it down for you. You get a
five a day vacation, anywhere in the world, with all expenses covered. How does
that sound?”

“If I can bring a friend, it sounds perfect.”

A rush of
jealous
heat spread through me. How was I going to deny her if that “friend” turned out
to be Brendan Savage?

“What friend did you have in mind?” I asked,
regretting the words as soon as they escaped my lips. Asking probably made it
sound as if I would have put stipulations on her reward and it likely made me
sound exactly what I was—jealous.

“Meghan, my best friend. She and I have talked about
taking a trip to Hawaii for ages, and this would be a great opportunity to do
that.”

I breathed a subtle sigh of relief, thankful she
hadn't
said
Savage.

“Consider it done. There's a long weekend coming up
next weekend. I'll give you
two
extra
days off to make it five days.”

“Thank you, Asher. This is very generous of you.”

“You deserve it. However, since you’ve chosen Hawaii,
I hope you and Meghan won’t mind putting up with me on the flight. I have some
friends there I’ve been meaning to visit. An old buddy of mine owns a resort
there, and I'd like to catch up with him. We'll take my private jet.”

She smiled. “I think Meg and I can handle your company
for the duration of the flight. It'll be tough, but we'll do our best,” she
teased.

I laughed along with her. It was so good to hear her
laugh and see that genuine, carefree smile on her face. I saw something else
there, too, an intense sparkling in her eyes as she laughed. She was doing her
best to suppress it, but it was there.

“Great! It's done, then. I'll see to it that all the
arrangements are made.”

“Thanks again, boss,” she chided as she left my office
and closed the door behind her, leaving me with a little optimism that maybe
Brendan Savage was, in fact, no longer in her life. I could only hope that when
I met with Matt later that afternoon, he could confirm.

***

I hadn’t met with Matt in over a week. At our last
meeting, he’d informed me that Savage had called Lilah several times, but she
had only answered twice. They’d had drinks once, but it didn’t appear to be
intimate. So, I’d been holding out hope that Lilah had given Savage his walking
papers—straight off a cliff.

As I was on my way out of the building, I didn’t have
to wait for my meeting with Matt to get an answer to my question about Savage
and Lilah. A black Bugatti sat by the sidewalk and sitting in the driver's seat
was Brendan Savage, grinning smugly as he always did. My heart immediately
began to hammer, and I felt a cold sweat breaking out on my back when I saw
Lilah walking around to the passenger door to get in.

I hung my head and trudged off to meet with Matt, a
host of negative emotions flooding through me. What could I do? She was free to
make her own choices.

I just wished one of those choices had been me.