I don’t bother to knock on Morgan’s office door. I just walk straight in.

Her head comes up from her computer, her eyes narrowing with anger on me.

I have flashbacks to college and her looking at me that exact same way on many occasions.

Dislike and disdain.

And, just like it bothered me then—not that I ever let her know that—it bothers me now. Even more so.

“I’m busy,” she says.

“This won’t take a minute. What you just saw in my office wasn’t what you thought it was.”

She barks out a laugh. “So, you weren’t just about to fuck my assistant.”

“No.” I grit my teeth. “I’d just come out of my bathroom after showering and—”

“Often take showers during the day, do you?”

“When I’ve just done a workout in the gym on my lunch hour, yes, I do.” I pause, gritting my teeth. I take a deep breath in through my nose and then exhale it out. “Look, Sierra and I have…a past. A short past. We slept together once before she started working here.”

“And you just didn’t bother to tell me?”

“I didn’t think it was any of your business.”

She laughs. “Typical, Wilder.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means, you never think further than the end of your cock.”

I grind my teeth. “Honestly, I didn’t want to cause a problem, and I knew, if I told you that I’d slept with her the night before you came in for that first meeting—”

“Hang on.” She holds up a hand. “Sierra was the reason you were late for our meeting? She’s the one who left that note on your shirt?”

I realize what I just let slip, and my balls shrivel up into my body. “Yes.”

She lets out a sound of disbelief, shaking her head.

“I would never have touched her if I had known she was going to start working here.”

“Yet you were just naked in your office with her pressed up against you.”

“That was all her. She was waiting for me. I hadn’t invited her, and I sure as hell didn’t want her there. But she wasn’t taking no for an answer.”

“So, she overpowered you and pressed you up against the wall?”

“I wouldn’t say overpowered—”

She laughs derisively, cutting me off. “You can go now. I have work to do.”

“Don’t fucking do that. Don’t dismiss me like I’m your assistant.”

“Well, don’t screw my actual assistant in your office in the middle of the day, and maybe I won’t!” she yells, rising to her feet, hands pressed to the desk, her face red, eyes bright with anger.

“I didn’t screw her!”

“Only because I interrupted you!”

“I wasn’t going to do a goddamn thing with her! Aside from the fact that she works here and I never touch employees, I never ride the same roller coaster twice.”

“God, you’re disgusting. Same game, different place. You’re working your way through the female population of Chicago just like you worked your way through Northwestern.”

“Except for you, Morgan. I never worked my way through you.”

Her jaw clenches, working angrily. “Only because I saw right through you. God.” She laughs. “Same old Wilder Cross. And here I was, thinking you’d changed. You sure had me fooled.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means, you’re still the same shallow, self-centered, womanizing asshole that you were in college!”

“Yeah, and you’re the same stuck-up, judgmental bitch that you always were!”

“Fuck you,” she spits.

“Original.” I laugh. “But maybe that’s the problem, Morgan. Maybe you want to fuck me, and you can’t. Maybe that’s been the problem all along. You wanted to screw me in college, too, and that was why you were so bent out of shape all the time.”

Her eyes narrow like lasers. I know I’m being a dick, overstepping the mark, but she pushes my buttons like no one. She’s always been able to push my buttons.

“God, I hate you,” she bites.

I narrow my gaze on her. “The feeling is one hundred percent mutual, sweetheart.”

“Don’t call me that. I’m not your sweetheart.”

“Thank God because, if you were, my balls would have frozen off by now.”

Her eyes close, and I hate that I can’t see what she’s thinking. She exhales slowly through her nose and then opens her eyes.

“Anything else?” Her tone is so even, you wouldn’t think we were just tearing each other to shreds.

“No.”

“Good.”

Her eyes move to her office door, and I take the blatant hint.

I’ve just opened the door when her voice hits my back. “Where’s Sierra?”

I glance at her over my shoulder. “I sent her home for the rest of the day.”

She laughs softly. “Figures.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that you do what’s best for you and screw everyone else.”

That’s like a match to my simmering flame. “Fuck you, Morgan. You don’t know the first thing about me. You don’t get to come in here and speak to me like this after five minutes of working here. Yeah, you might be co-CEO or what-the-hell-ever, but this company is mine, and irrespective of what you think just happened with Sierra in my office, I deserve some fucking respect from you.”

She sniffs. “Respect is earned.”

I give her a pointed look. “Yeah, it fucking is.” Then, I spin on my heel and slam her office door behind me.

I march to my office, ignoring Chrissy, who’s finally reappeared at her desk.

I slam my office door shut, stride over to my desk, and sit down in my chair.

I’m seething.

Who the hell does she think she is? She might be hot, but she’s still a bitch. God, I hate her.

Well, I don’t hate her. But I want to.

I’m sick of lusting over her.

And, after today, with her talking to me like that, screw that, I’m done.

I want her gone. From this office and out of my life and my thoughts.

My initial instinct to get rid of her was the right one.

And I will do whatever is necessary to make that happen.

I need ideas on how to get rid of her from here, but I can’t think of any because my mind is too damn twisted up with her to think straight.

I turn to my computer and open up my email. I start a new email, addressed to Coop and Dom. My fingers angrily hit the keys as I type out a message to them

Me: SOS. I need ideas on how to get rid of her.

Coop replies almost immediately.

Coop: Am I right in guessing that her is Morgan?

Me: Yep.

Coop: I thought you were getting on okay with her?

Me: I was, but then she caught me in my office with Sierra.

Coop: Were you fucking her?

Me: No, asshole, I wasn’t. And I wasn’t planning on fucking her either. Sierra turned up in my office when I got out of the shower, and she tried to seduce me.

Coop: You should have fucked her.

Me: Dude. Can you stay focused here?

Coop: Okay. Sorry…but what do I need to focus on?

Me: Getting rid of Morgan.

Dom: Just playing catch-up. And, dude, you want to get rid of Morgan? You don’t mean…kill her, right? Because I love you, man, like a brother, but I’m too pretty for jail.

Coop: No, I’m too pretty for jail. You’d just be the nerd they beat up every day for fun.

Dom: Fuck you.

Coop: You’re not my type, nerd boy.

Me: Jesus Christ! Can we please get back on topic?

But, before I do…no, Dom, I don’t mean I want to kill Morgan. You really need to stop watching Cold Case. It’s scrambling your brain.

I want her gone from the business, as in fired. But I don’t know how to make that happen. Especially not now, as she came up with this really great idea for the business, and my mom and dad love her even more for it.

Coop: So, sabotage her great idea. Make her look incompetent. Then, your mom and dad will fire her.

That makes me sit back. Could I actually do that? Sabotage her business idea?

No. Not only for the fact that I would never do anything to hurt the company, but I also couldn’t do that to her.

Me: No…I can’t do that.

I shut my email down and turn my chair so that I can look out at the city below me.

I feel a lot calmer than I did before, but I haven’t changed my mind.

I still want Morgan gone from here. I want my life to go back to how it was before she came here and messed everything up.

I just need to figure out how to make that happen. I need a plan of action of how to get Morgan fired that doesn’t involve fucking up the Ananda deal.

Morgan is about to learn that there’s only one boss at Under Her Lingerie.

And that’s me.