My (Mostly) Secret Baby: A Grumpy Boss Romantic Comedy(2)

The mother looked even more outraged, if that was possible. The little girl immediately cheered up and took the money, though. “Let’s go buy a car!” the girl said.

With one last dirty look for me, the mother hurried off with her daughter.

“Wow.” A young woman in her early twenties was standing beside me with a duffel bag over her shoulder. At another glance, I realized she was some sort of athlete. I guessed tennis from the lean build, somewhat muscular shoulders, and the giant stitched green tennis ball on her bag. She had sun-bleached hair, tan skin, and looked like she belonged on the grass courts of a country club moaning with each stroke she took.

I’d meant the thought to be dismissive, but it stirred up an irritatingly vivid thought of what it’d feel like to take a handful of her hair and listen to her gasp as she stroked something other than fuzzy yellow balls.

“Impressive, I know,” I said dryly. I’d perfected the technique of saying “fuck off” without actually saying it. The secret was all in the tone. You could say “have a nice day” and bring someone to tears if you really practiced. So when I started walking toward the hotel, I was surprised she hadn’t taken the hint.

She followed. “If you mean your ability to be disgusting and cruel to a little kid? Yeah. It was super impressive.”

“Is that all?”

She took two quick steps, putting herself in front of me and placing her fist on her hip. The way she cocked her ass out to the side like that made me want to laugh.

“Does that pose usually frighten people into taking you seriously? Once they get past the whole Barbie aesthetic, I mean.”

She pulled a water bottle from her bag, untwisted the cap, and then flicked it toward me. Cold water splashed from my forehead to my chest, but there was nothing cold about the anger that roared up in me. “What the f—”

“Sorry,” she shrugged, smiling in a sugary sweet, completely fake way. “I thought if you were actually Satan, water might boil off you or something.”

“Wouldn’t it need to be holy water? Or do tennis players carry that around in their bags now?”

“I actually just wanted to splash you. Consider it karma for all the little kids you probably stepped on to get out of bed this morning.”

I had to give her credit. She had my attention, and that was an accomplishment in itself. But I also knew better than to give my attention to those who demanded it. I needed to ramp up the asshole factor by a few levels to get her out of my life before she caused me problems.

“I didn’t get your name.”

“It’s Chelsea.”

“Wonderful. I’ll make sure when you eventually decide to take your pathetic career to the next level and get an agent, nobody will work with you. Have a nice day.” I’d already given her more energy and words than I cared to waste on strangers, but she seemed to rile me up more than usual.

“No.” She planted her other fist on her hip, blocking my way completely, unless I wanted to mow over her.

“No?”

“Yeah. ‘No.’ Ever heard that? It’s what people say when they don’t plan to take your shit. It means you don’t get to just talk to me like that and expect me to pretend it’s okay.”

I had to fight back a smile. To tell the truth, I did get tired of all the bowing and scraping. Being a ruthless asshole in a position of power quickly turned people into mindless “yes” people. So, in a way, she was right. The word “no” was foreign, but oddly appealing to my ears. It also made me take another look at her. I also couldn’t resist screwing with her a little.

“I hear ‘no’ all the time. When I’m firing people. When I’m ruining their careers. I’ll probably hear it as much as I want if I ask any other agents if they’ve ever heard of you, too.”

She smiled in a way that wasn’t friendly and bubbly like her unbleached hair and freckled nose would make you expect. It was a challenge. It was a statement that she wasn’t cowed in the slightest by my attitude. If anything, it felt like she looked more and more emboldened every time I tried to piss her off.

Yeah, there was a little bit of the boring Barbie look about her. But the closer I looked, the more I wasn’t so sure that was quite right. She had slightly imperfect teeth—like she’d had braces at one point and been too stubborn or lazy to keep up with wearing a retainer. Yes, I still wore mine at night, but that was only because I wasn’t the sort of dumbass to waste years of orthopedic suffering. Deal with it.

For some reason, she was just standing there, apparently fine with taking my insults and saying nothing.

She also had a little crooked slant to her nose, almost like she’d taken a tennis ball to the face. Or, judging by the way she was insisting on poking the bear at the moment, maybe a fist was more likely.

Whatever it was, I made an executive decision that I’d enjoy knocking her down a peg in a more personal way, especially if she wanted to just stand there looking smug.

“But I have a feeling I could make you say ‘yes.’”

“Excuse me?”

“With a little privacy and a few minutes. I’d practically have you screaming it.” I wasn’t sure if I was even serious, but I knew one thing: her straight back and confidence did things to me. They made me want to push until I found how much it took to make her bend. And damn, I had to admit I was starting to wonder how it’d feel to put my hands on her smooth, sun-bronzed skin and do a little bending.