The Boss Project by Vi Keeland

I heard Kitty saying something else.

Merrick nodded. “Yep. You were right. So do you mind if she gives you a call tomorrow? Because while Evie is too polite to rush you off the phone, I’m not.” His eyes swept over me, lingering on my lips. “Thank you, I will. Goodnight, Grams.”

Looking pretty proud of himself, he tossed the phone to the couch and hooked an arm around my waist. “Now kiss me.”

“What if I don’t want to? That was kind of rud—” My words were swallowed in a kiss. And not just any kiss, but one where I had to cling to his shirt to make sure I stayed upright because the man could seriously make my knees weak with his mouth. For lack of a better description, he kissed the shit out of me. I was breathless when we broke.

Merrick pulled back to gaze into my eyes. His were hooded and filled with enough heat to make between my legs start to throb. “Sorry I made you wait.”

I smiled. “I like your apologies.”

His eyes sparkled. “Yeah? I’ll have to piss you off more.”

“Did you just out us to your grandmother?”

He nodded. “Should I apologize again?”

I laughed. “I think you should.”

Merrick resumed kissing me, this time slow and sweet. He pulled back and rubbed his nose with mine.

“You just angel kissed me!”

“I don’t think that’s what you call it.”

“It’s what my grandmother used to call it. Whenever we would leave my dad and go stay with her, I had trouble sleeping when we first arrived. So when she put me to bed, she would give me an angel kiss, which meant the angels would watch over me while I slept. No one else has ever done that to me.”

Merrick kissed my forehead. “Maybe it means I’m supposed to take the job from the angels now.”

I blinked. “That’s so incredibly sweet.”

He looked around the room. “Did you eat yet?”

“No, I waited for you. I ordered Chinese. It’s in the kitchen.”

“Come on, let’s eat so I can get you naked. We’re saving some sweet and sour sauce so I can lick it off your tits later.”

“Aaaaannnnd we go from sweet to dirty in three sentences.”

He winked. “It’s a talent.”

We sat at the island eating Kung Pao chicken and Szechwan shrimp while Merrick filled me in about the problem that had kept him and his team late tonight.

I shook my head. “You basically gamble for a living. Does that mean you like casinos, too?”

“Depends on the game. I only like to gamble when there’s more to it than playing the odds. If you sit at a table playing blackjack, the dealer is just putting cards on the table and turning them over, and you’re guessing based on statistics. If you’re playing poker against others, it involves reading people and studying their habits. That’s basically what I do at work, except with companies.”

I held out a shrimp with my chopsticks, and he took it in his mouth. “I never actually thought about it, but our jobs are similar in some ways,” I said. “We both study people to learn more about them. We look for the things they don’t tell us to put the pieces of a puzzle together.”

Merrick held out a piece of chicken. “Tell me what you’ve learned about me that I didn’t tell you.”

I thought a moment. “I’ve learned that you’re a caretaker from the way you treat your grandmother, but also by the small things you do. For example, if we’re walking down the street, you always walk on the outside. You never want me to take the subway at night, and the first thing you noticed about my new apartment was that it needed an alarm.”

He nodded. “Anything else, doc?”

I looked over at the fishbowl on the coffee table and pointed my chopstick. “You also reflect on things people say, long after they’ve been said.”

Merrick followed my line of sight and then turned back to me. “I didn’t think I was capable of moving on, but it turned out, I’d never really tried.”

I set my chopsticks down. “So what have you learned by studying me?”

He reached over, plucked a piece of broccoli from my plate, and popped it into his mouth. “You like your hair pulled and when I talk dirty to you.”

I smacked his arm. “It figures you’d take this conversation there.”

He finished chewing and swallowed. “You’re gun shy about men because the ones you loved hurt you really badly.”

I sighed and nodded. “I don’t think that one was too hard to figure out.”

“Maybe not. But you’re also the most resilient person I know. Most people who went through the shit you’ve gone through, whether it’s with your dad or your fuckwad ex, would feel like the victim. But not you. You don’t know how to be the victim in your story. You only know how to be the heroine, and the heroine always dusts herself off and goes on.”

“Thank you for saying that. But there have definitely been days where I’ve let myself wallow and feel like the victim.”

“Well, you’d never know it.”

“You probably won’t be saying that next week. I have my first court date with Christian next Friday.”

Merrick frowned. “Still can’t believe that guy is suing you. Why don’t I come to keep you company?”