Page 4 of Boss from Hell

She looked sideways at me. “And Dylan and the girls?”

“Fine too.”

We moved our cleaning stuff to the next room.

“Did she say anything about getting a job?”

“You know the answer to that,” I told her gently as I wiped down a lamp. This was a big bone of contention between my mother and sister. Their conversations frequently ended in shouting matches with Rose accusing Mom of making her out to be lazy. Rose and Dylan had decided that she would stay home until the twins went to school. That didn’t sit well with Mom, but I was with Rose on this one.

“A woman should have something of her own,” Mom grumbled. “You never know when things can change. Dylan earns enough now, but he could lose his job.”

Mom had always been an optimistic person. It was the reason why Henry had managed to convince her to hop onto his dream. But these days, she saw the glass as half-empty, and who could blame her after the financial wringing she had gone through?

“He’s not going to lose his job,” I said. “And even if he did, dentists are in high demand in New York, everyone wants to have a brilliant smile.”

“That is true,” she conceded. “So tell me about this temporary job.”

I told her about Maximus Frost and how he had built his enterprise from scratch. I’d have told my “old mom” about how horrible he was and the bet, and she would probably have wanted in on the fun, but not now. It would probably piss her off that we were taking life so casually by betting on something as important as a job.

Life had become precarious for her. It saddened me to see her worry about everything, but there was nothing I could do about it.

After spending the morning cleaning the house, I made a salad and we sat down to eat lunch together. She regaled me with harmless gossip from the doctor’s office where she worked as an assistant. More than helping with the mortgage, the job kept her busy enough so that when she came home in the evenings, she didn’t dwell too much on what she had lost.

I left after lunch and headed to the farmer’s market to buy veggies for the next week as I’d be at work… working for Maximus Frost.

Chapter 3

Max

“Your coffee, Sir,” the waiter said, placing a cup of steaming black liquid before me.

I grunted a response and took a sip. It was my third cup of the day and it was only nine in the morning. Next week, the plan was to reduce it to a maximum of two cups a day.

Chris, my best friend and second in command joined me, and we briefly discussed the three new companies we were trying to acquire for the next twenty minutes.

Afterwards, we took the short walk back to our offices. Chris got off on his floor and I carried on up to mine. As I got out of the elevator, the security guard who manned my floor called out a morning greeting. Ignoring him I headed straight towards my office. After all this time, he still didn’t get it. His job was not to brown-nose me. His job was to guard the damn premises.

I ground to a halt at the sight of a woman sitting at the desk in my outer office.

“Who the fuck are you?” I barked.

She looked up, her wide blue eyes as calm as a blue lake on a hot summer day and… fucking smiled at me. Standing up, shestraightened her pencil skirt as if I had all day to wait for her. She grated on me before she even opened her mouth to speak.

“Good morning, Mr. Frost. My name is?—”

“I didn’t ask your name. I asked you what the fuck you’re doing here.” I snapped, cutting her off. I wasn’t interested in what her name was.

“I’m your new personal assistant,” she said, that eerily calm smile never leaving her face.

Robotically calm women gave me the creeps. I narrowed my eyes as I jogged my memory. I didn’t remember the temp agency emailing to let me know that they would send someone. I was just getting used to the peace and quiet.

Coldly, I stared her up and down. She was quite something in the looks department, but if she thought her sex appeal would cut it here, she had another thing coming. True I had a thing for women in tight pencil skirts, but only in totally different circumstances.

When I was at work, I was purely and totally in work mode. Oh well, maybe it was a good thing she was here. Work was starting to pile up.

“Fine. Get me a coffee. Black, no sugar.” I turned to go to my office before I remembered: I was cutting down on coffee. “No, don’t,” I said irritably. “Get me some water. None of that plastic stuff, make sure it’s in a glass bottle. I have a running account at the deli down the street.”

I entered my office, and even before the door had shut behind me, I had already turned on my computer. I logged onto my email account. Hell, without a personal assistant, my inbox was flooded with emails. I scrolled through, opening important ones and responding with brief replies where necessary. I was completely lost in my work when a knock sounded on my door, I looked up impatiently. A crack sounded from the back of my neck. I’d been sitting in the same position for too long.