The Boss (6 page)

"And you don't regret it?" he asked
cautiously.

I shrugged. "I do wonder what might have
happened differently in my life, but I'm happy where I am."

"Good." He paused. “I've thought about how
things could have been different, as well."

My throat almost closed off with the anxiety
those words inspired in me. Did he mean between us? Or the way we
parted? Or just that yesterday would have been so much easier for
him if I'd spent it in Japan?

"I have to be honest."

I absolutely hated when other people used
that phrase, and Neil was no exception. Those words made me
simultaneously denounce everything a person said so far as a lie,
and suspect everything that came after. And that was a shame,
because I really, really wanted to believe what he said next.

"I've often regretted the way we left things.
And I’ve wondered how it might have been different, if we’d stayed
in contact.” His mouth quirked, and melancholy lines deepened on
his forehead. “I almost had the driver turn around and come back
for you on my way to the airport. And then at the gate, I kept
hoping that you’d... I don’t know, somehow show up. Or the flight
would be delayed again. I almost didn’t get on the plane. But at
that point I knew it was too late. I’d fucked it all up the moment
I’d left that hotel room. If I could do things over, I promise, I
would do them differently."

It's utterly bizarre how a kind sentiment can
hurt you as much as a cruel one. My heart shattered in my chest.
Yeah, I'd thought of what my life would have been like if we'd
gotten on that plane together. Maybe we would have met up again in
Tokyo. It could have been a
Lost in Translation
kind of
thing, and we could have lived happily ever after. The fact that
he'd been considering such an outcome as well wounded me
deeply.

Which was absurd, I reminded myself.
You
knew him for less than twenty- four hours. Love at first sight
doesn't exist.
Though I knew deep down that I was mourning the
idea of him and not any great love, it still hurt.

"Are you all right?" he asked, concern
darkening his gaze.

I nodded, and took a sip of my water to
swallow down the lump in my throat. Setting the glass back on the
table, I said with forced cheerfulness, "Isn't it strange that
we're meeting up again now?"

I realized the moment I said it that he would
take it for more than it was, as though I were professing some kind
of fate or destiny situation. His eyebrows rose, and he glanced
nervously away, as if he were looking for a net to suddenly
surround him. "Yes, well, I couldn't... get involved with you. Or
with anyone, right now. I'm going through a bit of a nasty
divorce."

"I wasn't - " I stopped myself. Better to
forge ahead than try to explain away the past in these types of
conversations. "I wouldn't be interested in anything, either."

"Oh?" Was that disappointment I heard in his
voice? "You're seeing someone, then?"

"I'm not seeing anyone." I liked the thought
of letting him stew with that, but it seemed too dishonest, and
dishonesty hadn’t done us any great favors so far. "The truth is,
I've never found anyone who... measures up."

And then, hand to God, Neil Elwood,
billionaire publisher and entrepreneur, giggled. It was the most
charming, teenage-boyish sound I'd ever heard from anyone over the
age of twenty. Just like that, I was utterly smitten with him
again.

I could either work around him every day and
drive myself crazy, or I could continue on this honesty trend. I
took a deep breath and stepped off the most insane cliff I'd ever
stood on. "Look, this is going to sound... I don't want anything
serious. You don't, either. But we're obviously attracted to each
other, and now we're in this situation. If we wanted to see each
other casually, what would that hurt?"

I swear I left my body for a second. I looked
down on the scene with the most crushing sense of self-awareness I
hope never to experience again.
What was I doing?

I had just propositioned my boss.

I remember sitting in the back of the taxi
that day six years ago, his hand on my thigh over my jeans, his low
voice telling me, "Anything you want."

And like that, I came back to myself, and I
was staring into Neil's gorgeous green eyes, trying to guess what
he was thinking.

"Sophie, I'm your boss." My heart sank, but
then he continued, "We would have to be... reasonably discreet
around the office.”

"Absolutely. I worked too hard to get where I
am." I frowned. “You don’t think I would do anything to get us
noticed? I’m not stupid.”

He looked briefly puzzled at that then said,
"You're right, I'm not giving you enough credit. I suppose I’m
remembering you as that impulsive young woman in the airport. You
were what, all of twenty-five back then?”

Oh. Yeah.

I cleared my throat. "About that. I maybe
fudged a little on my age.”

His eyes narrowed. "You fudged?"

"Yeah, I wasn't heading to NYU for a graduate
program." He was going to be mad. Really mad. "I wasn't
twenty-five. I was eighteen."

"Eighteen. Really?" His normally easy speech
was stilted and nervous, pitched higher than before. "So that would
make you twenty-four - "

"Twenty-four," I said at the same time he
did. "That's not a problem, is it?"

Neil had been forty-two when we'd hooked up.
He'd expressed some discomfort at our age difference back then, and
that was when it had been less than twenty years.

He made a few inarticulate sounds, like he
couldn't get his sentence started, then paused and collected
himself. "It is a bit of a problem."

"Ah." When was our food coming? How fast
could I scarf it down and get out of here?

"You see..." He issued a short, disbelieving
laugh. "You're the same age as my daughter."

Chapter Four

"Your daughter?" I
must have misheard him. I was sure I had. Because if his daughter
was my age, that meant... "You were married? When you were with
me?"

"No, no, I wasn't cheating on my wife or
anything like that," he said quickly. "I wasn't married at the
time. Emma is my child from a previous relationship. My wife and I
have only been married for two years."

I let out a relieved breath. I would never
want to help someone hurt another person that way. Even though it
would have been far shittier on his part to have committed the
adultery, I would have felt illogically culpable for unwittingly
helping him. I was relieved to know he’d been a free agent at the
time of our tryst.

Now there was just the problem of the
bombshell that had exploded between us. We sat in silence for a
bit, thinking our private, horrified thoughts. So, Neil was a
father. Of a woman my age. Oh no. He'd
spanked
me. That
suddenly seemed more creepy than hot. I downed the rest of my
water, and eyed my coffee resentfully. I should have ordered wine.
Or hard liquor.

It was clear that neither of us were
comfortable with this new development. I didn’t bother to retract
my suggestion of a casual fling. It seemed to be a given that it
would just not work out.

At least I was getting a promotion. And I
bet, after today, Neil would avoid me like the plague, so there
wouldn't be any future awkwardness between us.

I tried to find a natural path out of the
conversation, and settled on, "So, do you have any other...
kids?"

"No. I'd always planned to, but the timing
was never right. And now, with one child who is an adult, I feel as
though those days are behind me." He leaned back in his chair.
"This is quite a mess we've found ourselves in, isn’t it?"

I shrugged.

"I do hope you'll consider the position with
the beauty department, in spite of all this," he added. I had no
reason to doubt his sincerity. I couldn't imagine what he would
possibly gain from keeping me at the magazine if he didn't want me
there.

"I will." It was a great opportunity, though
I had never really imagined I would end up working in the beauty
department. I'd been strictly focused on clothing. Still, it was
better than job hunting, and he was right, it would be too weird to
stay on as his assistant.

Neil and I made small talk as we waited for
our food. With our past out in the open between us, I had expected
lunch to be interminable. After all, I couldn't run out screaming
if I wanted that job, but with our one-night-only affair rekindled
for five minutes to die a painfully embarrassing death, it was
almost asking too much of myself to sit there and eat with him.

To my surprise, I found myself relaxing,
enjoying myself even, as he told me about his interest in the
magazine and some small changes he expected in the future. He asked
me about NYU, and why I had focused on fashion, and it seemed like
the hour we spent eating and chatting passed slightly too fast.

Neil picked up the check, "As your boss," he
clarified after handing his black credit card over to the waitress.
"Not as a former lover."

I laughed. "You know, if you're going to be
my boss, you're going to have to stop bringing that up."

"I've thought of that, believe me." He
smiled, and took a last sip of coffee. "Henceforth, we won't
mention it again."

The car was waiting for us when we left the
restaurant. As we pulled away, I asked, "So, this beauty editor
job. If I did decide to take it, when would it start?"

He considered a moment. "I might need you to
train your replacement, but I don't see why you couldn't start on
the February issue."

I mulled that over.
Porteras
worked on
a ten week schedule. The February issue would hit the stands the
first Monday in January, which meant the content collection process
would begin in a week.

"Take as much time as you need to decide," he
said, as if he'd read my thoughts. "That's only an estimate."

We rode in silence for a few blocks. Then,
apologetically, he said, "I'm sorry; I promise this is the last
time I'll bring it up. But I have to know... did you ever try to
contact me during those six years? I’ll admit; I didn't try to find
you. I didn't know how you would react. Every time I thought I
might look you up, I realized I didn't have anywhere to start. I'm
not flattering myself by saying it, but I'm an easy man to find.
Especially in your business, you're bound to have known of me.”

This was one of the bits I still couldn't get
my head around. As confusing as the rest of the entire situation
was, I couldn't come up with a single reason that I had never made
the connection between Leif at the airport and Neil Elwood,
publishing magnate.

Cautiously, I thought out loud, "I suppose
when you were fresh in my memory, I wasn't paying attention to who
was who in the industry. I was just trying to get through college
alive. And then when I was actually working..."

I had seen his picture countless times, and
clips of interviews. But I hadn't worked for an Elwood & Stern
company, so I hadn’t troubled myself too much with what they'd been
up to. I'd been so focused on learning how
Porteras
worked
and trying to carve out a place for myself there that I hadn't had
the time or inclination to look past our walls.

"I noticed that you looked remarkably like
Leif, but there's something different about you in person than from
pictures." Without thinking, I mused, "Maybe you just look
different when you're looking at me."

Do you know what Maybachs really need?
Ejector seats. Even if the only option for escape is to be flung
into traffic.

We pulled up beside the building, and my hand
immediately went to the door handle. Neil waved me ahead. "I have
another stop I need to make, I won't be coming up."

I can't say I wasn't grateful when I shut the
door and went on without him. The thought that he might be watching
me slowed my steps, and I forced myself not to look back, even when
I’d entered the lobby. I rode the elevator in a daze. So, one of
the big mysteries of my life had been more or less wrapped up. I’d
found my sexy stranger again, and things weren’t going to work out
the way I’d sometimes fantasized they might. I was disappointed,
but in a detached sort of way, like when a favorite television
show’s plot takes a turn I don’t like. The world wasn’t going to
crumble over this incident. It didn’t even feel particularly
cry-worthy.

I was back at my desk for about two minutes
when Rudy came through the door, frowning.

"Where's Neil?" he asked, peering past me at
the open door to Neil's office.

"He said he had to make another stop on the
way back from lunch." I pulled up his schedule and checked the
time. It was two-thirty-five. A meeting on cover design had been
planned for two-twenty.

Rudy stood beside me and leaned over my
shoulder. "What is going on with him?" he muttered to himself. To
me, he said, "If he were Gabriella, what would happen?"

"It would end with someone jumping out a
window on fire," I snarked before I could stop myself.

Rudy straightened. "Well, that person is not
going to be me. Could you let Neil know that I handled the meeting,
and I'll fill him in when I get back from Betsy Johnson?"

"Sure." I pulled up my company email and
typed the message.

Rudy was almost to the door when he stopped
and turned. "I like the way you did your eyes today."

I didn't get a chance to say thank you before
he was gone. I chuckled to myself. I actually liked people like
Rudy. I view the whole "not knowing where you stand with them,"
thing as a challenge.

Neil and I crossed paths only briefly during
the rest of the day, and I was thankful for that. The shock from my
borderline poetic car confession hadn't worn off yet. Since he’d
never mentioned his unscheduled stop, I assumed Neil had just blown
off his after-lunch meeting to be driven around the block a few
times so he could avoid riding in the elevator with me.
Unfortunately, that messed up his entire afternoon, and he
mentioned sheepishly that we might be working later than my usual
six o’clock. As the day ticked on into the evening, I kept myself
calm and on track with the promise of another hot bath – sans
sexual fantasies about my boss – and waited patiently for him to
tell me I could go home.