Enemies With Benefits (Loveless Brothers 1)

I may have gone slightly off the rails there at the end.

There’s a long, long pause, and I start to wonder if he’s hung up on me for being a lunatic.

“Yes, ma’am,” he finally says.

Another pause.

“Is there anything else I can help you with today?”

I thank him, get off the phone as quickly as I can, grab my notepad and pen, and book it out of my office.

The biggest conference room, where the all-staff is taking place, is clear on the other side of two former dairy barns. Sometime in the 1970s, when Bramblebush went from being a working farm to the venue and inn that it is now, the space between the two was enclosed and the whole thing turned into one big building that houses staff offices, store rooms, and the kitchen.

I break into a half-walk, half-jog, my heels clicking on the tile floor. Every office I pass is empty. It doesn’t help the anxiety slowly blossoming in my chest, so I pick up a little speed, rounding a corner.

Right into a brick wall.

I bounce, then flail backward, stumbling several steps before finally landing on my ass, my notebook and pen flying in opposite directions.

“Are you okay?” the brick wall asks.

It’s not a literal brick wall.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” I say, already collecting myself, grabbing my notebook and pen from where they flew, my face red hot with embarrassment already. “Sorry, I was in—”

Hold on.

I look up. I’d heard that voice recently, like last weekend recently.

“No,” I say, my gaze crashing into his.

Eli’s mouth hitches up on one side, both eyebrows rising.

I wish for the thousandth time that he hadn’t turned out so damn handsome, because I definitely feel that smirk somewhere deep inside me that Eli isn’t supposed to have access to. Somewhere personal.

“Yes,” he says after a moment.

“What are you doing here?”

“Well, I was having a leisurely walk down a hallway, when —”

“I mean here here. At Bramblebush.”

“I work here. What are you doing here?”

I’m still on the floor, butt still throbbing. I’ve managed to sit up cross-legged while I stare up at Eli Loveless, who’s claiming that he works here after showing up in my life for the second time in four days.

Also, he still has that expression on his face. The obnoxious one that gives me some funny tingles that I do not approve of.

“No, you don’t,” I say, ignoring his question.

“Yes, I do.”

“No, you don’t.”

Eli leans down, offering me one hand. I look at it. He rolls his eyes.

“It’s my hand, not a cobra,” he says.

I put both my hands to the floor and push myself up, ignoring Eli’s outstretched hand out of sheer pettiness, brushing the floor dust off my black pants.

I silently offer a quick prayer of thanks to whichever deity oversaw my wardrobe decisions that morning. I wore pants and not a skirt. If Eli ever saw my panties I’d probably have to murder him, and then I’d have to spend the rest of my life in jail because I’m not the kind of person who could get away with a murder. The police would look at me sideways and I’d break down in tears and confess, I’m sure.

“What do you mean, you work here?” I say, ignoring my now-sore butt in favor of the uneasiness crawling into my chest.

“I’d have thought it was self-evident,” he says, crossing his arms. “But if you’d like, I can really break it down for you. See, I’ve got what’s colloquially known as a job, where I come in to a place of business and exchange my services for money —”

“You don’t have to be a dick about it.”

“I’m being a dick about it? You just crashed into me and then told me I was wrong about working here before you’d even gotten off the floor,” he says.

“Why were you standing in such a weird place?” I snap back. I’m losing the argument and I know it, and that annoys me more than almost anything else.

I hate losing. I hate being wrong, I hate being late, and I definitely hate literally running into my former nemesis when I thought I was safe.

Also, if we’re listing things that I hate: his smirk, the way his forest-green eyes feel like they’re looking straight through me, the way his button-down shirt is an iota too tight, the fact that Eli clearly works out and isn’t at all bad to look at.

Too bad about the personality, though.

“You mean, why was I walking through the halls of my workplace in a perfectly normal manner?” he says, still sounding calm. “I’m going to a meeting. Though now I’m going to be late.”

Tell him it’s in another building, I thought, suddenly feeling devious. Then he won’t show up at all and maybe his boss will realize he’s not there and then he’ll get fired and you’ll never have to see him again.