On Saturday I wake up humming like an idiot from a fucking Disney movie. Like if I held out my arms, little birds would land on them or something equally ridiculous. And why? Because I get to spend the day with one of my employees? And her sister?

Not just one of my employees, a little voice in my head whispers. Her.

Hannah.

I still don’t know what it is about her, why she’s gotten under my skin like this. She’s cute, yes. Beautiful, really. And the juxtaposition between the dirty emails she’d sent me and her real life persona are a turn-on, sure.

But it’s more than that. There’s something about the way she can put me in my place with one breath and then completely give herself over to me in the next. Something about the way she makes me laugh, the way she looks out for her sister and her friends, the way she makes sundresses look sexy as hell.

Fuck. I glance at myself in the mirror. “You need to seriously cool it, loser.” I shake my head. I can’t remember the last time I was this hung up on a woman — but Hannah is like a drug, and I only want more.

Hannah had given me the address of their apartment so I hop in the modified SUV I rented for the day and head over there. No driver today; I like the drive out to Luke’s place in the country, and it will be nice to spend the time with Hannah and get to know her sister.

When I get to their apartment I’m relieved to see that it’s a pretty nice building with a doorman and a secure front entrance. I’d hate to think about them living alone in a rough neighborhood or a bad building.

I ring the bell and Hannah and her sister come down. Hannah introduces me to Ally.

“It’s nice to meet you,” I say, shaking her hand.

“You too,” she says, but there’s a coldness in her voice and she looks me up and down as if she’s assessing a bag of rotting cabbages. I just give her my most charming grin — I’m used to sisters and best friends not exactly being a fan of me. Though in Ally’s case, at least I can say that she has no real reason to worry.

I open the back door of the custom SUV and hit a button, which unfurls a low ramp onto the sidewalk in front of us.

“Will this be okay?” I ask Ally.

She glances at Hannah and nods reluctantly.

“Thank you,” she says, and I can see Hannah biting back a grin. I glance at her and wink and she gives me a smile that’s almost enough to make me start with the damn humming again.

Luke’s place is about an hour outside the city, and on a Saturday afternoon, it’s a nice drive. The conversation’s a little awkward at first but Ally seems to be a big fan of Loft & Barn so I find myself telling them all about how Luke and I grew the business.

“Luke’s always been good with his hands. Our father was in finance but he enjoyed woodworking as a hobby. He tried to teach all of us but Luke was the only one who picked it up. I, on the other hand, am terrible with my hands.”

I feel Hannah glance at me and when I look over she raises her eyebrows. I can’t hold back the smirk that flits across my lips.

“What about your other brother?” Hannah asks. “You never talk about him much.”

“Jace. He lives in New York.” Jace was a sore point in my history — the one part of running a business that I wasn’t proud of. “He used to work for Loft & Barn too for awhile but … it wasn’t a great fit. We don’t talk that much anymore. I think he works at a bar.”

“And Luke,” Ally asks. “Does he really still design all the pieces himself?”

I nod. “All the main pieces, yeah. Designs and builds the prototypes. When we expanded into soft furnishings we started outsourcing that stuff, but the heart of the collection is still all Luke.”

“I didn’t even realize that until I started working for you,” Hannah says.

“Well, Luke’s not a fan of the spotlight. He likes to just do his thing.”

“Tortured artist type. I got it.”

I force a grin. “Pretty much, yeah.”

I don’t want to tell her that Luke’s insistence of still being so hands-on was holding us back. We couldn’t mass produce his complex designs nearly as efficiently as we could have with a simpler line, and it seemed like every year it took longer and longer — and cost more and more money — for us to get the collection together. Luke refused to see that, but he wasn’t the one staring down the numbers every day.

We reach the turn-off for Luke’s place and I take the SUV up the mile-long driveway. Luke likes his privacy but this place is so far off the beaten track that it feels like going back in time.

We finally pull up to the house — Luke lives in a fully restored farmhouse. Well, more of an estate, really, it’s that impressive. His workshop is what used to be a grain warehouse. It’s massive. He can fit an entire season’s collection in there with room to spare. I’ve been here hundreds of times and I still feel a moment of awe whenever I walk into that space. I can’t wait for Hannah and Ally to see it.

I’m just helping Ally out of the car when Luke comes out the front door. My brother and I look a lot alike except for our style. While I prefer custom suits, Luke is much more at home in jeans and flannels. Even the few times I’ve tried to get him dressed up for investor meetings or launch parties, he’s fought me tooth and nail. Once he even showed up to an industry dinner wearing a plaid flannel tie he’d cut out of one of his shirts — it was his form of protesting when I told him he absolutely had to wear a suit. That was the last time I ever tried to dress my brother.

Today is no exception. He strolls out of the house wearing a tight black t-shirt and a worn out jeans, lightened along the thighs by constantly wiping his sawdust-covered hands on them. Even though my outfit isn’t much different — black polo and jeans — we wear it completely differently.

I introduce Luke to Hannah — I’d already filled him on the fact that I was dating someone who worked for us, and he thankfully hadn’t seemed too concerned.

“Nice to meet you,” he says to Hannah, shaking her hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Hannah smiles and raises her eyebrows at me.

“Not that much,” I protest, but Luke just grins and claps me on the back. He turns to Hannah’s sister.

“You must be Ally,” he says. “Luke Whittaker.”

“Oh my God.” She shakes his hand. Her face pinks up the same way Hannah’s does when she’s flustered. “This is … wow, I can’t believe I’m meeting you.”

Hannah laughs and squeezes her sister’s shoulder playfully. “Ally. You have absolutely no chill.”

“I’m sorry,” she says to Hannah, laughing, and then says it again to Luke. “I’m just a huge fan.”

“Hey,” Luke says. “Don’t apologize. You’re making me feel like a rockstar.”

“You kind of are, at least to Ally,” Hannah laughs.

The vibe is so easy and good-natured that I can’t help the smile that takes over my face. I admit I’d been a bit nervous about bringing everyone together like this but so far so good.

“Anyone for some iced tea?” Luke asks, and the girls both nod. He goes into the house and reappears a few minutes later with a pitcher and a tray of glasses. He pours out some tea and we all hang around outside for a while, enjoying the view of the wide open fields that surround Luke’s place.

Finally, my brother turns to the girls. “Well, you didn’t come out here to drink my iced tea. Can I show you around the workshop?”

Ally actually claps her hands together and even Hannah looks excited. We all start towards the barn but I let Ally and Luke pull ahead of us and then pull Hannah into an embrace.

“Hey,” I say, leaning down to kiss her. I’ve been wanting to do that all morning but I wasn’t sure what she was comfortable doing in front of her sister.

Now though, she kisses me back, pressing her lips against mine, letting her tongue get tangled up with mine.

“Hey yourself,” she says breathlessly, when we finally break apart.

“This is going well, right?”

She nods, looking up at me with the softest chocolate eyes.

“Good.”

I squeeze her hand and we start off after the others.