Page 1 of It Must Be Love

Chapter 1

Naya

"Ithink Naya has a crush on you, Amias," I heard Ann's voice right before I was about to knock on my company's CEO's office door.

"I've known Naya for years," Amias replied.

"And she's had a crush on you for years. Everyone knows it."

"She may have a thing for me, but everyone also knows that I don't think of her that way. She's Nolan's sister, for fuck's sake."

Ann laughed and there was a teasing note in her voice. "Ah, you do know about her crush."

"It's a little hard to miss. I wish she wouldn't be so obvious. But it is what it is."

"It is a little pathetic the way she keeps watching you. Are you really not interested in her, even just a little bit? I mean, I know she's dull but…some men like that."

"I'm not interested in Nolan's fucking sister," he growled.

"Really?"

"Oh, for god's sake, Ann, please tell me you're not jealous of Naya. Have you looked at her? The woman has no curves to speak of; she has terrible fashion sense. Added to that, she's boring as fuck."

I stood frozen outside his door. Not sure what to do or how to do it. I just needed to raise my hand and knock on his door, and they'd stop talking about me.

"Then why did you hire her?"

"I was doing her brother a favor, alright? And she's a decent programmer."

A decent programmer?

"She went to a state school; how decent can she be?" Ann said.

I'd gone to the University of Massachusetts in Amherst and had graduated with a degree in computer science engineering. I was recruited from university and worked at Google in the San Francisco Bay Area for three years before returning to Boston when my father fell sick. I moved in with him and took care of him until he passed some months ago.

Nolan said he had a family, so he couldn't take care of Daddy and would have to put him in a home. I knew my father was frightened of that because of how he had seen some of his friends treated at hospices, which is why I became his full-time caregiver. I hired a nurse to be with him during the day and tried to work from home as often as possible.

"She's an okay programmer, Ann. She needed a job in Boston, and I helped out. And she's Ethan's problem. Not mine."

Ethan's problem? Ethan Rogers, my boss, always told me I was his star employee. Was he gaslighting me?

I wanted to walk away, but I couldn't. We were on a deadline, and I needed to run the specs of the program the team had been working on by Amias.

Finally, after pulling together all my courage, I knocked on his door, not letting my mind wander. I had to compartmentalize. Keep things in their place. Emotions locked in one file server. Password protected.

Now, forget that password, Naya, don't think about what he said, and walk in with your head held high.

"Come in," I heard Amias' deep voice.

I opened the door and smiled wanly. "Amias, we have Project Phoenix on the calendar. We have a milestone deadline today. Hi, Ann."

"Right, yeah, we have a meeting," he said absently.

Ann, Amias, my brother Nolan, and a few others had all gone to MIT together and were part of the same friend group.

I'd fallen head over heels for Amias the first time I'd seen him when he'd come to our place with Nolan. His popularity with women was well known, and I'd heard about all the women Amias was banging when his friends ribbed him about it. And now, as one of the rising tech stars in Boston, he was always enjoying a woman until he and Ann had decided to end their on-again, off-again romance and become a proper couple. Now, they were banging only each other. Or so the story went.

I thought I'd hidden my crush. After all, I didn't talk to him or many others in a social setting. I felt ashamed that everyone knew. Tears pricked the back of my eyes, but I shoved them away.