My Brother's Billionaire Best Friend

Me: You do realize it’s not as simple as me just sexting him, right? To do that, I would have to know something ABOUT sexting. The closest I’ve ever come to dirty talk is the end of the year exam in sex ed.

Lena: LOL. Relax. You’re not going to start a sexting convo with him. You’re going to text him about your interview. And THEN, you’re going to segue it into the sexting.

I furrow my brow.

And she really thinks I’m capable of something like this?

Apparently, she’s lost her mind.

Me: How in the hell am I supposed to do that? Everything I’m coming up with revolves around, “Oh, so, by the way, would you care to engage in a little sexting with me?”

Lena: HA! Yeah, definitely don’t do that.

Me: See? I cannot be trusted to handle Phase 2. I’m completely incompetent.

Lena: Take a breath, girl. You can do this. You’re attracted to Milo, right?

I frown at my phone.

Me: Obviously, yes.

Lena: Then you’ve got the tools. When something you want to do to him comes to mind, just type it instead of keeping it to yourself. And, trust me on this, it does NOT take much.

The subway whines as it slows down at the next stop—my stop—and just before I can shoot Lena another message about how awful of an idea this is, a new text message comes through.

But it’s not from her.

Milo: I glanced at the clock and saw the time. I hope you’re not nervous about today, but if you are, just know you have no reason to be. You’re going to do great, kid.

God, it’s like his ears were burning or something.

My fingers hover over the keypad, tempted to tap out a reply, but I decide to wait.

I’ll text him after the interview.

And then maybe, just maybe, if I can find the damn nerve, I’ll put Phase 2 into action.

But right now, I need to focus.

Off the subway and up the stairs, I head toward my fate.

My first official interview with a publishing house.

Here’s to hoping Cassandra Cale actually likes me.

Milo

Time flows like hardened cement as I sit inside a meeting about our upcoming mergers and acquisitions.

It’s all very important shit we’ve been working on for a long time—shit I do, in fact, care about—but the guy leading the meeting, Earl from Finance, has the vocational charisma of a sloth.

His voice moves like molasses—so much so that I’m pretty sure Ambien is in the process of studying its chemical makeup—and he uses no gestures to accompany his words whatsoever. I can’t help but picture him as the male version of Elaine’s coworker on Seinfeld, played by Molly Shannon, who didn’t move her arms when she walked.

Across the large pine conference table, Laura, Fuse’s Head of Marketing, blinks her green eyes slowly, the top of her head starting to sag in a sleepy tilt forward before jolting upright again.

I bite my lip to fight my grin as potential drug names for an Earl-based sleep aid come to mind.

Monotonetelix.

Boresnorevidel.

Noinflectionplex.

Another glance around the table shows a large number of people at the end of their ropes. There might as well be invisible jail cells inside this conference room for all the enjoyment these people are getting. They’re doing ten-to-twenty-five, and the only option left is to bide their time.

I squint across the room.

Is that…is Jeanine from HR making a license plate?

I make a mental note to put Earl on projects that only require his numbers-genius brain and nothing else in the future. No running meetings, giving presentations to clients, or public speaking engagements of any kind.

Sadly, I’m responsible—I called this meeting. I’m the jailer and the fucking prisoner in this situation, and yet, I have no recourse.

I make eye contact with Lyle, my right-hand man in New York, and the agony on his face is almost comical.

“For the love of God, finish him!” his furrowed brow—a bushy, uni type that could have its own zip code—yells like we’re inside the game Mortal Kombat.

I shake my head on a smile. This is important. We both know it’s important.

Earl is giving the eighteen most important people working at Fuse’s New York offices the rundown on how we’re about to move further into the international market.

Taiwan. Tokyo. Rome. Melbourne.

They’re all on the cusp of the next big tech bubble, and Fuse is going to be at the helm of software safety for all of them.

We have to have this meeting. Still, Lyle’s mime-like depiction of shoving a pencil through his eye isn’t unwarranted.

Earl has started in on his detailed financial plan for the next six months, and if I’m not mistaken, I hear a flock of buzzards start circling above us.

My phone vibrates inside the pocket of my jeans, and I take it out without hesitation. Normally, looking at my phone during a meeting is a big fat no, but today…today, I’m thankful for any distraction.