Page 130 of The Silver Fox Brother

I don't answer immediately. The truth is, I haven't stopped thinking about Winter since she got in that elevator. The way she looked at me. The way she felt. The way everything changed in the span of an hour.

Fletcher takes a drink of his beer.

"Do you want it to happen again?"

I cock an eyebrow and take a slow sip of my scotch, considering the question.

"I'd be open to the possibility," I say carefully.

"But this is uncharted territory for me. I've never gotteninvolved with someone I'm working with. Never mixed personal and professional like this."

"Yeah," Fletcher says, his tone more serious now.

"That's the cardinal rule. Don't sleep with contractors, don't sleep with employees, don't complicate business relationships with personal entanglements."

"I know."

"But you did it anyway."

"I did."

Fletcher studies me for a long moment.

"So what's different about her?"

The question catches me off guard.

Whatisdifferent about Winter Hayes?

Everything.

The way she challenges me. The way she doesn't back down when I push. The way she looks at design the same way I look at development—like it's not just a job but a calling. The way she walked into my conference room and demanded to be taken seriously. The way she felt in my arms.

But I don't say any of that out loud.

"She's talented," I say instead.

"Professional. Good at what she does."

Fletcher gives me a look that says he knows I'm not telling him everything, but he doesn't push.

The waiter arrives with our food and sets the plates down. I cut into my steak, grateful for the distraction.

"So what are you going to do?" Fletcher asks after a few bites.

"About what?"

"About Winter. About the fact that you clearly want to sleep with her again but you're worried about crossing professional lines."

I set down my fork. "I don't know yet."

"Well, you better figure it out. Because if you're working together every day and you're both pretending nothing happened, that's going to get complicated fast."

"It's already complicated."

Fletcher grins. "Yeah. But that's never stopped you before."

I shake my head and return to my steak. He's right, of course. I need to figure this out. Need to decide what happens next with Winter, whether we will eventually acknowledge what happened or pretend it was a one-time lapse in judgment. The time has been passing, and we have not addresses it at all.