Boss Me (Private Listing #3)

Elizabeth straightens as I approach.

“Are you ready to go?” I reach my hand down for hers.

She smiles and uses my hand to stand. She stumbles a little and falls against my chest.

“I’m so sorry.” She smiles up at me. “I must have had too much to drink.”

Her eyes spark with a hint of cunning. She’s not that drunk. She’d never give up that much control. It’s one of the reasons we didn’t work well as a couple. She couldn’t relinquish control to me.

Holding her shoulders, I help her straighten. It’s time to make this clear. “I’m not into playing games, Elizabeth. This was a favor to your mother. Nothing more. I don’t want you back in my life.”

She purses her lips and narrows her eyes at me. “I don’t know what you expect me to say to that. Obviously, I hoped to rekindle our romance. You seem lonely and worked to the bone, like me. You have so much on your plate with your assistant and the guys, I just thought you might like a distraction from the toils of your life. I know I could use a distraction.”

“Not going to happen.”

Aware we’re still in public, I offer her my elbow and she puts her hand on my arm. As I’m leading her out, we get stopped by some clients and by some of her friends. It takes much longer to get to the car than I’d hoped.

Everything in me wants to get back to Madison and hold her in my arms. We could have lost her tonight. If Patrick hadn’t stopped him, what fresh hell would Madison have gone through? How far can she bend before she breaks?

At least this guy, this Jimi Alan, can’t go underground as easily as Val and her boyfriend did. He has a life and can’t just disappear. Some pieces of this whole mess don’t quite fit though. That’s one piece. Why go after her in a public place when he’s had her cornered and alone?

“Seth?” Elizabeth looks at me expectantly.

“Yes?” I gaze down at her, not really seeing her as my mind tries to piece together all that we know.

“The car is here.” She sighs and her lips press into a flat line. “What’s on your mind?”

I cock an eyebrow her way as I guide her down the steps.

“What?” she persists. “I’m a good sounding board. Even if you don’t trust me, you obviously have something racing through your mind. You always figured things out best by talking to me. So talk to me.”

I give her my hand to help lower her into the car before I go around to the other side to get in. As much as I don’t want to talk to Elizabeth, my mind is spinning out.

“Fine.” I close the door, and the driver heads to Elizabeth’s place.

She crosses her legs and folds her hands on her lap as she turns to me.

“Our assistant has a stalker.”

“You mean Coop’s fiancée?”

“Yes.” That burn in my chest goes out faster this time. “We think he revealed himself tonight, but something isn’t adding up.”

“Okay.”

“It’s someone she knew from school, which makes sense with the timeline. But something is bothering me.”

“Maybe the fact that you want what you can’t have.” She arches her eyebrow. Her words are still a little slurred.

I press my lips together and wait. She’s been chewing on something herself and it’s time she let it out.

“You want that woman. I can tell. I think a blind person could probably tell.” She chuckles. “You want what you can’t have because she’s Coop’s. Don’t think I didn’t notice how tense you got when he announced their engagement. It’s kind of funny if you think about it. I went after Coop while dating you, and now you want Coop’s fiancée.”

Leaning back in my seat, I watch her. This woman who at one point I thought I might love. She’s just as cold today as she was back then. If not more so. She doesn’t care that I want someone else. She just wants to use me any way she can get me.

“If you need someone to fuck, I haven’t gotten any for a year and you were good at what you did.” Drawing closer, she puts her hand on my thigh. “Of everything we did together, fucking was the only thing we could get right.”

I pick up her hand from my thigh and put it back on her lap. “When are you going to get this through your head, Elizabeth?”