She groaned. She was acting like a complete idiot. Why was she hiding from Bain?
Maybe because you’re attracted to him? Because you keep thinking about him? Because you don’t know how to act normal around him?
It could also be because she’d gone and revealed that stuff about her anti-anxiety medication. And if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d also likened him to an ogre.
Idiot.
Now, she was back to avoiding him. She had never met someone so completely masculine in her life. He was pretty much the opposite of what she thought she liked in a guy. He was huge. Muscles that went on forever. And tall, at least a foot taller than she was, which put her at a real disadvantage.
And moody. He was always frowning or scowling. Especially when he was telling her off about something.
And yet, she couldn’t stop thinking about him. She couldn’t be in the same room as him without her body going into hyper alert. It was so annoying.
Especially when she was pretty certain he hated her. He seemed to walk around in a perpetual bad mood, barking out orders.
He was gorgeous. Sexy. And a total crabby pants.
A clearing of a throat had her slowly turning her head. Two legs stood by her desk.
“Uh-oh.”
“Uh-oh?” He crouched down, somehow managing to still be intimidating even folded in half. “What are you doing under the desk?”
“Um, I lost a paper clip,” she said quickly, congratulating herself on her quick thinking.
He raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Really? A paperclip?”
“Um. . .well. . .”
He sighed. “Why are you hiding?”
“I’m not hiding. There’s a paperclip down here.”
“Then get out and let’s look for it.”
“No.”
“No?” He gaped at her, looking like he’d never heard that word before. Maybe he hadn’t. She guessed not many women said no to him. “What do you mean, no?”
“We both know there’s no paperclip,” she told him with a sigh. “I’m down here because I was hiding.”
“From who? Is someone bothering you?” He stood as though he was going to go search them out. “Who is it?”
“You. It’s you.” Shit. Why did she say that? Idiot. She needed to go back to guarding her words. It was better for all of them.
“Me? I’m not bothering you.”
She bit her lip. “So you weren’t looking for me to tell me off?”
“Why would I tell you off?”
“I don’t know. You’re always doing it. It seems to be your default status.”
He scowled. “What are you talking about? I have never told you off.”
She held up a hand, ticking things off as he crouched down again. “You told me off for standing between you and Larry. You told me off for telling you to leave me alone with Larry. You told me off for running through the apartment—”
“First of all, I wasn’t telling you off, I was informing you about the protocols you need to follow in order to allow me to do my job better.”