The Guy Who Became My Grumpy Boss (Curvy Girl Crew #7)

Chapter 10

-Peter-

I spent the afternoon in back-to-back meetings, avoiding my lovely—and likely still furious—assistant. Although she had agreed to go mini golfing with me, which had filled me with equal parts excitement and dread. I was grateful she was bringing a friend, because I wasn’t sure how to act in this situation.

After an exhausting day, only made worse by the sweet tang of anticipation of seeing Jessica outside of work, in a feat of true heroism, I bolted from the office while Jessica was in the bathroom.

I was willing to fully embrace my cowardice.

Only, I had to meet Jessica at six.

I’d missed the train and had to wait, which had put me a few minutes behind.

As I stared up at the non-descript brick building that housed the golf course, I wondered if I was ready for this. New York traffic I could handle, but could I handle a conversation with a woman I admired?

Not many buildings in the city housed just a single business, and this one was no different. An advertising company occupied the bottom floor, and according to the sign, the upper floors housed a tech start up. Levels two and three were the golf course.

I opted to take the stairs, knowing I had plenty of physical energy to spare today, and came out next to the entrance of The Catastrophe Course.

The entire wall before me, including the door, had been covered from floor to ceiling in customized movie posters of disaster films with the addition of a golf green and hole somewhere impossible to get to in the pictures.

King Kong’s was on the top of the Empire State Building, using the spire as the flag, while Godzilla’s was right at the monster’s feet.

A familiar scent hung in the air, and a shiver went through me. I didn’t have to turn to know that Jessica was already here.

“Hey.”

I looked around and discovered Jessica sitting on a red velvet couch tucked in a corner.

Alone.

She stood. Dark curls spilled over her shoulders, and whatever she’d done to her eye makeup was going to be very distracting. She’d found the time to change from her normal work attire into a pair of wide-legged jeans and a dark green sweater that plunged much lower than I was used to her wearing.

I ordered my eyes up to hers and almost stepped back when her irritated gaze drilled into mine.

“Is something wrong?” I asked.

Jessica scowled. “Brooke had to cancel. I hope you didn’t already buy tickets.”

“I have not.”

She let out a long breath. “Good.”

The price of a single ticket was not a financial burden, and I wondered if Jessica was actually worried about something else. I didn’t have the space in my brain to figure it out, so I gestured toward the door. “Shall we?”

Jessica hesitated. She bit her lip, which I’d only seen her do when she was particularly stressed, and then nodded as if she’d come to some kind of conclusion. “Okay, but first, I’d like to apologize for my behavior earlier.”

I blinked. She was apologizing to me? “There’s no need.”

She held up her hand. “Yes, there is. I was disrespectful. It won’t happen again.”

Jessica thought she’d been disrespectful? Perhaps she had been, but I’d been too worried about coming apart to notice. Not knowing what else to do, I said, “Okay.”

“Good.”

I moved to the door and held it open for her. Jessica went through, and I stood still for a heartbeat longer than I needed to so I could catch my breath and get back on solid footing.

This was research.

Yes, I was with a woman I admired, but this wasn’t a date. It was for work. If I kept that barrier between Jessica and me, I might survive the next two hours without making a complete fool of myself.

“Welcome to The Catastrophe Course,” a cheery female voice said.

I entered and found myself in a sea of half-destroyed cardboard buildings that came to my chest and realistic monsters ravaging them. A counter occupied the far wall, and two young women wearing identical white shirts that read, “Welcome to the End” in dripping red letters stood behind it.

“Are you waiting for someone else?” one girl asked.

“Just two.” Jessica moved to the counter and pulled her phone out of her pocket.

Instead of letting her pay, I walked up next to her and put a hand on her arm. “Allow me.”

I’d touched Jessica before, and it had always elicited a spark inside of me. I don’t know if it was the fact that we’d fought earlier, or that we were alone and out of the office, but instead of a spark, a streak of lightning traveled from my finger, up my arm, and into my chest.

Was it possible for someone’s heart to stop in response to a touch? Because I think mine was going to.

“You don’t need to do that,” Jessica said curtly.

“I’ll use my company card,” I said. “This is for work.”

She studied me, and I somehow held her gaze. Her blue eyes were bright, and something I’d never seen before blazed in them. Aggravation maybe.

“Plus, you’re helping me out,” I added softly.

The two girls across the counter were watching intently, and I had no doubt that they would talk about our interaction for the rest of the night. For once, I didn’t care. My focus was on Jessica.

“Fine,” Jessica said through gritted teeth. “But I’m paying for snacks.”

“Work is paying.” I handed the shorter of the two girls my card.

Jessica snorted. “We’ll see.”

I’d heard her laugh with other employees at work, and she expressed herself in a myriad of ways on the Curvy Girl Crew channel, but I’d never actually heard her snort before.

It was adorable, even if she was upset.

The girls behind the counter brought us two clubs and two balls, one pink and one blue. The taller girl pointed to a QR code taped to the counter. “You can keep track of your score in the app. It’s easy to use and better for the environment than the paper scorecards.”

Jessica took a picture of the code and brought the app up. “Got it.”

“You start over there, at The Planet of the Apes .” The girl pointed. “There’s a snack bar halfway through, in case you get hungry.” She smiled. “Have fun.”

Jessica grabbed the shorter club and walked in the direction indicated.

I shouldn’t have been so engrossed by the way she looked in jeans, but I was, and it took one of the girls giggling behind me to provoke me into raising my eyes and following Jessica. Had I really once told Marissa that I didn’t like curvy girls? That was entirely untrue. Jessica’s curves were as distracting as her smirk, her smile, and the look of triumph she got on her face when she finished a particularly difficult assignment.

Miniature remnants of technology lay discarded beside the path we were on, and foreboding music I didn’t recognize played from unseen speakers.

My aunt had taught me that most people liked to talk. Silence was rarely appreciated, so I started with the first question I’d derived. “Have you ever seen this film?”

“Nope.” Jessica moved to a red rectangular mat on the ground that had three indents in a line. “I’m first,” she declared.

I didn’t argue and watched as she put her ball into the biggest indent, then stepped up beside it and studied what lay before her.

A curved path of green carpet, edged with corrugated metal, spanned twelve feet until it opened up into a round area where the top half of a decaying Statue of Liberty stood. A model of a rusted-out cargo ship lay in the middle of the ramp, and there was a slow rise for the first two-thirds, then a steep incline to the end.

By the time I returned my attention to Jessica, she had her back to me and was lining up for her shot.

If I’d thought the jeans were nice before that, the view I had at present was nothing short of enthralling.

Did everyone wiggle their back sides like that when they played mini golf?

Jessica suddenly became still, then she pulled the club back and hit the ball.

Not too hard, I noticed, but hard enough to get it up the hill and past the ship.

“Come on,” Jessica muttered as she clenched her fist. “Go over.”

Her ball slowed and almost stopped at the crest of the hill. I noticed that if it did so, it would roll all the way back to her.

Jessica leaned toward her ball, as if she could add momentum to it, then pumped her arm when it tottered at the top and went over to the other side. “Yes!” She turned to me, a look of triumph on her face that held even more joy than when she finished a project. She opened her mouth to speak, but when she saw me, she clicked her teeth together.

What had she been about to say? And why had she stopped?

“Your turn.” Jessica pointed at the red mat and moved out of the way.

Considering I had two YouTube videos and Jessica’s shot as reference, I decided to follow her example. I put my ball where she had and stepped up beside it.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

I glanced up at her. “Hitting the ball?”

“Aren’t you left-handed?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Stand on this side.” Jessica shook her head. “And don’t hold a putter like a tennis racket.”

An all too familiar twist ratcheted in my gut, and I felt the shame of being unprepared begin to engulf me. I hated not knowing what to do or what to say. Also, I knew how to putt. Or had. For some reason, my mind was drawing a blank on the process.

“You’ve really never played mini golf before?” Jessica asked.

“No,” I said in a tight voice.

“Oh.” She frowned, and her eyebrows knit together. “Why didn’t you say so?” Before I was forced to answer, she moved to my side. So close that our hips almost touched. Jessica didn’t seem to notice. “Hold the putter like this. Top hand here.”

Her proximity, not to mention her perfume, slowed my meltdown. She waited for me to copy her, and as I did, I willed more of my anger away.

“Good, bottom hand here.”

I once again did as she advised.

“Nice, now you’ll want to swing like this.” Jessica hinged at her waist as she turned the top half of her body one way and then the other, like the pendulum of a clock.

I tried but apparently failed, because Jessica bit back a laugh.

Ever since not knowing how to act at my mother’s funeral, I struggled in unfamiliar situations. There was a reason I reviewed every meeting before I went to it and did my best to research clients before I met them. The more I knew going in, the easier it was for me to interact.

This was something completely new. A week filled with as much stress as this one was going to have was not the ideal time for me to step into something I knew nothing about, but I needed to apologize to Jessica. I owed her. And I wanted to spend time with her.

The anger always began as an ache in my joints, but it quickly spread like fire through my bones until it overflowed into my brain where it tended to explode.

“Here.” Jessica moved to face me and put her palms on my elbows. Her voice held no impatience, and her touch was gentle. “Straighten these.”

I did as she commanded but didn’t look up at her. I needed a moment to get my reaction under control.

“Now, pivot back and forth.” Her hands slid from my elbows to my shoulders, and she moved me like a child would move a doll.

This is not how I’d pictured this evening going. My anger got pushed out by the tiny lances of electricity that crackled through my body.

“Keep the club steady, but don’t strangle it.”

When one of Jessica’s hands moved to mine, my arm went numb, and my brain short-circuited.

Unable to stop myself, I looked up and found Jessica almost at eye level. She had a soft smile on her lips and a glint of amusement in her eyes. Our faces were less than a foot apart, and I decided I didn’t need to breathe. Oxygen was overrated.

The moment our gazes met, her eyes went wide, and her lips parted in surprise.

Then, as if she’d just noticed her position in relation to me, Jessica jumped back. “Y—you try it,” she stammered.

There was no denying the blush creeping up her neck.

I didn’t blush, but there was a lot going on under my skin.

In order to distract myself, I did as Jessica had instructed and hit my ball.

I’d meant it to be a light tap, but it didn’t work out that way.