Page 32 of Falling for Her Grumpy Boss

My temper snaps briefly.

I shove him harder than necessary, sending him stumbling backward into a stack of storage bins near the wall. Plastic crashes loudly onto the concrete floor inside the open garage.

Silence crashes down with it.

Both of us stand there breathing hard.

Jeremy wipes at the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand while glaring at me like he barely recognizes me anymore. My jaw throbs in time with my pulse, and I can already feel bruises forming across my ribs and stomach beneath my shirt.

Jeremy drags a hand across his mouth and stares at me for a long second, chest still rising hard from the fight.

Then he huffs out a humorless laugh.

“That’s the problem, isn’t it?” His eyes narrow slightly as they move over my face. “You already look at her like she matters more than your own common sense.”

The words hit somewhere deep enough to still me completely.

Because he’s right.

I feel it all at once with terrifying clarity. The constant awareness of Tess every time she walks into a room. The way my entire day shifts depending on her mood. The irrational possessiveness clawing through me anytime another man looks at her too long.

This stopped being lust a while ago.

My hands loosen slowly at my sides.

The fight drains out of me so fast that it leaves me feeling briefly unsteady. I straighten fully, chest still heaving from adrenaline while gravel shifts softly beneath my boots.

Jeremy watches me carefully now, anger still riding him hard enough to sharpen every line of his face. He looks ready for another swing.

Instead, I hear myself say, “I’m in love with her.”

The confession leaves me rough and unfiltered, stripped clean of every layer of control I usually keep wrapped around things that matter.

Jeremy goes completely still.

So do I.

Because the second the words exist outside my head, I realize they’re true.

Not obsession.

Not possession.

Not the reckless physical pull that’s been driving me half insane since Tess walked into my office wearing that sharp little suit and looking at me like she already knew exactly how dangerous this was going to become.

Love.

The realization settles heavily into my chest while my pulse still pounds hard from the fight.

I swallow once.

“Jesus Christ,” Jeremy mutters again.

This time, he sounds stunned instead of angry.

CHAPTER 8

Tess