Employed by the Boss (Managing the Bosses 7)

“And Erica?” Jamie prompted.

Mark turned to look at her. “What about Erica?”

Her eyes narrowed. “You know exactly what I mean about Erica. You can’t stop looking at her.”

He sighed. “I guess it’s kind of obvious.”

“Are you going to ask her out?”

“Should I?” Mark rested one hand against the edge of the counter. “I’m not sure asking employees out is the best idea, to be honest. If she’s not interested, it could become a problem. I don’t want to lose my best instructor because I couldn’t keep my romantic interest to myself.”

“Well,” Jamie said, leaning past him to pick up a washcloth so she could clean the twins’ hands. “Look at Alex and me. We did fine.” She smiled. “Better than fine, actually. It may have been a little rocky in the beginning, but that was more about your brother’s stubborn inability to communicate his feelings than the fact that he was my boss.”

“So you’re saying I should go for it?”

“I’m saying if you don’t then you’ll never know what might have happened,” Jamie said. “So it’s up to you. Is it better to know? Or to keep on wishing when she might have said yes?”

“You know that thing I said about you being right all the time? I stand by it.”

She laughed, and Mark started toward the door, pausing just inside the kitchen.

“Thank you, Jamie.” He smiled. “For everything.”

“That’s what sisters are for,” Jamie said. “Now get out there and find out.”

***

Mark didn’t ask Erica when he went back out. Instead, they finished moving things out of the apartment and closed it up. He pulled the gate shut behind himself as he came through for the last time, and felt a little pang of sadness at the idea of leaving. Living in the apartment had been a good experience. It had helped him get his life back together after his divorce, and made up for some of the years that he and Alex had lost when they were young. He had his brother back. He’d gained a sister. But now it was time to move on, and with that knowledge came a moment of longing for the part of his life that was closing.

Erica must have seen the expression on his face when she turned around to see if he was following, because she walked back toward him, laying one of her hands on his shoulder. “You doing okay?” she asked gently.

“Just a little bit of pathetic moving day blues,” Mark said, finding a smile for her. “I know that I’m still going to see them all the time, but it’s a little different living so close. Alex and I didn’t have a great relationship as kids, so this was a little like getting some of that time back. A forty-minute drive seems like a lot of distance after being practically just down the hall.”

“I felt that way when I moved out of the apartment I used to share with my brother,” Erica said. “We were both adults by the time I left, but it didn’t make suddenly being so far apart easier. But it was necessary. And our relationship is just as good as it always was, even with half a continent between us.” She patted his shoulder, and stepped away. “Trust me. It’s not going to be as hard as you think it is.”

“Thanks,” Mark said, “for caring enough to even say something.”

“Hey.” She looked back over her shoulder to smile at him. “You’re a great boss. I’m not going to let you wallow in misery.”

He probably should have laughed at that, but Mark’s thoughts had caught on the phrase she used. A great boss. Did that mean that he wasn’t anything more? Did she even see him as a friend, let alone potential boyfriend material? The question went over and over itself as Mark got into his car and followed the truck out toward the club. Had she just given him the answer the question Jamie told him to ask?

Most people didn’t approach their bosses with so much familiarity, though. That had to mean something. Maybe that was just her idea of humor to lighten the mood. The staff at the club was small, and most of them spent a lot of time around each other. Mark had started to consider several of them friends as much as employees, Erica included. She hadn’t ever seemed like she felt any differently.

Jamie had been right. He just needed to ask, and see where it went. That was the only real option. Otherwise he was just going to convince himself that he didn’t have a chance, and it was better to try and be turned down than to assume that she didn’t want anything more than an employer/employee relationship with him when she might have wanted more.

By the time they pulled into the drive of the club, Mark was sure. He was going to ask her.

He waited until they finished carrying everything inside. There were more stairs to go up here than at the apartment, but they got help from a couple of the cleaning staff and it went faster than the initial loading had gone. A little more than an hour later, there were boxes stacked in the living room of the bachelor pad, and Mark was pulling two bottles of beer out of the fridge. He popped them both open and set one on the coffee table for Erica, while he took his own to the couch that sat across from the one she was currently occupying. He was glad he’d had the foresight to have the apartment furnished before he moved his things in.

“How does it feel to be officially moved in?” Erica asked.

Mark looked around at the space, and through the window that looked down on the golf course and the wooded space beyond, and he smiled. “You know, it actually feels good. Guess I left the blues behind.”

“If there’s one thing you don’t want to bring with you when you move…” Erica took a sip of beer and leaned back into the couch cushions with a sigh. “At least we got everything moved in one go, so you don’t have to worry about hauling out another load tomorrow.”

“That is kind of nice,” Mark agreed. He took a drink from the bottle in his hand, and then another. If he was going to ask her he needed to do it soon, before she decided to head back home. He took a deep breath. “I was wondering,” he said. “If you would like to go to dinner with me.”

“To dinner,” Erica said slowly, looking up at him. “To dinner as in ‘thank you for helping me move’ dinner, or to dinner as in dinner-dinner.”