By a Thread

Dominic was staring at me like he couldn't decide whether to chop me into pieces or pull my hair and French kiss me.

Dominic

I got her fired. Okay, so I'd had a bad day and took it out on a bystander in a pizza shop. But there's nothing innocent about Ally Morales. She proves that the first day at her new job... in my office... after being hired by my mother.

So maybe her colorful, annoying, inexplicably alluring personality brightens up the magazine's offices that have felt like a prison for the past year. Maybe I like that she argues with me in front of the editorial staff. And maybe my after-hours fantasies are haunted by those brown eyes and that sharp tongue.

But that doesn't mean that I'm going to be the next Russo man to take advantage of his position. I might be a second-generation son of a... fill in the blank, but I am not my father.

She's working herself to death at half a dozen dead-end jobs for some secret reason she doesn't feel like sharing with me. And I'm going to fix it all. Don't accuse me of caring. She's nothing more than a puzzle to be solved. If I can get her to quit, I can finally peel back all those layers. Then I can go back to salvaging the family name and forget all about the dancing, beer-slinging brunette.

Ally

Ha. Hold my beer, Grumpy Grump Face.

Author's Note: A steamy, swoony workplace romantic comedy with a grumpy boss hero determined to save the day and a plucky heroine who is starting to wonder if there might actually be a beating heart beneath her boss's sexy vests.