“Oh, God, Raff,” I begged. My dignity was long gone, if I’d even ever had any dignity with him. “Please, please Raff, I need it, please!”
“You sound so gorgeous like this,” Raff groaned. “If I was a fuckin’ twenty-year-old again I’d be fucking you a second time.”
The idea of me getting him so turned on again so quickly thrilled me. It was a pity he couldn’t fuck me again. I would’ve loved that. But just the fact that he wanted to…
“Please,” I moaned. I was so close, I needed it so badly.
“Well.” Raff’s grin was pure wickedness. He looked far too pleased with himself, but then, I supposed he had a right to be. “Since you asked so nicely.”
He dove back in and wrapped his lips around my clit, sucking hard. His tongue fluttered up against it, and between that and the suction, I had no chance. I went flying over the edge, my orgasm like a thousand pieces of glass piercing me, shooting me through with pleasure.
God. It felt like I could hardly breathe after that. It was so intense. For seconds, minutes, perhaps even an hour, who knew, I felt like I was just floating, like I wasn’t entirely inside my body. The only thing keeping me tied to earth was Raff’s hand as he gently stroked my hair, murmuring praise at me, how beautiful I was, how good I had been, how sexy that was.
Raff was considerate enough to clean us up afterwards, shushing me when I tried to protest that I could help. He was just taking care of it and acting like it would be offensive if I even tried to move a muscle. Like he wanted me to relax.
Dammit, I couldn’t let myself feel this way, all soft and reassured and safe. After Raff finished he pulled me into his arms and I went easily. I wanted it. I wanted him. Not just for sex but I wanted him to hold me. I wanted to feel safe in that way that only seemed to happen when he and I were curled up together like this.
This was completely unexpected. All right, maybe not so unexpected if you were Dawn, but for me? After all that had happened and all he’d done? I had thought I’d hate him until the end of time. And now, after just a few weeks, here I was feeling like I was… like I was…
Like I was falling for him all over again.
I’d been so certain about my feelings when I’d started this. I’d been determined to hate him. Loathe him. Distrust him.
Now I felt like there was no place in the world I’d rather be besides in his arms, just like this.
It was overwhelming, if I was being honest with myself. I was sure that was why I kept falling into bed with him. It was just—so much. I felt so good with him. Validated. Amused. Safe. Honestly, I’d been turned on by Raff long before we’d gotten to the club that night and started dancing. The looks of respect and pride he’d been shooting me all day during the meetings had me squirming in my seat a little.
And then! He had to go and dance with me like that!
Of course, I’d seen the way the other men were looking at me. I wasn’t stupid or blind. I’d had every intention of ignoring them. I wasn’t interested in a one-night stand, and I knew how hypocritical that sounded given what I’d been doing with Raff but the thing was… with Raff… it didn’t feel like a one night stand. It felt like something more.
Right now, held by him, curled up in his arms, felt like so much more to me than just a random hookup. If I was being honest with myself, I was fighting feelings for him from the moment I stepped into the office and saw him standing in front of me. Being with him felt more like a dangerous game, felt like I was going down the slope of a pool without knowing how deep the far end would actually get. It never felt like something I could just walk away from easily.
And now here I was. Cuddling him and panicking internally.
I felt like an idiot, and a lovestruck one at that.
This was dangerous. As much as I wanted to fall asleep in his arms like I had last night, I couldn’t let myself. I couldn’t let this become something I depended on. Already I could feel a tightness and sadness in my chest at the idea of never getting this again. The fact that tomorrow we’d be going back to San Francisco and we wouldn’t be able to do this anymore… that things would be going back to normal and all the distance that came with it…
It made me sad.
I didn’t want to lose this. I wanted to be able to kiss him. To go out with him. To be held by him and fall asleep with him and that was all dangerous.
Things in Rome were different. It was like a magical little bubble where the impossible and the crazy could happen. We were technically on a work trip but in other ways it was a vacation. It was removed from our normal lives.
But once we got back home… I had my daughter to think about. I had to keep her from Raff and so there was no way that we could be anything. This couldn’t go anywhere. I wasn’t going to be with a person while lying to them and I wasn’t going to let Raff know about Chelsea so…
God, it was so tempting to just close my eyes and relax into his embrace. But I had to leave now. I had to leave before I let myself fall further.
I hated how much that hurt to think about. But I had to do what was smart. Not what my heart wanted. When I’d gone with my heart the last time, four years ago, I’d ended up pregnant and alone. I’d gotten my heart broken.
This time, I had to be sensible.
“I need to go,” I said, sliding out of Raff’s arms.
Raff stared at me, but he didn’t seem all that surprised. Just hurt. I was surprised to see such hurt in his eyes. I hadn’t thought he’d be so disappointed. But then he smiled and seemed relaxed. Maybe I’d been imagining the hurt? It was probably just wishful thinking on my part, something that I thought I’d seen because I wanted it to be true.
“Are you sure?” he asked, sounding soft.
“Yes.” I sat up. “What happened here was just a fling. Now it’s over and we go home tomorrow. We can’t have this continue. You’re my boss and I’m your assistant. It’s unprofessional and we could get fired. We need to have clear heads about this.”
Raff nodded. He looked like there were things he wanted to say, but what could he possibly come up with that could argue with my point? I didn’t even have to touch on our history. The very fact that we were in the positions that we were at the office was enough. It was inescapable.
Even though there was a part of me that wished it wasn’t so and that we could find a way around it. Wishful thinking, I told myself sternly.
“Sleep well then,” Raff said. “See you tomorrow.”
I got up and put my clothes back on. “See you tomorrow.”
I snuck back into my room, took a quick shower, and texted Dawn to see if they were ready and awake so that I could talk to them. Having a video call with Chelsea made me feel a lot better. I was pretty sure that Dawn could tell that something was up, but she didn’t press, and I was glad for it. What could I possibly say, anyway? Hey, fun fact, I had slept with the man who was both my baby daddy and my boss? That I had in fact slept with him every night while we were on our trip?
Yeah, she’d lose her mind and I couldn’t blame her for it. It was stupid and reckless mixed in with a good dose of I told you so and she’d be well within her rights to berate me. I just couldn’t handle that right now.
I told Dawn that my issues were just Kelly’s behavior and missing Chelsea. “I have nothing against her, and I don’t think she really cares about Furio or about my flirting, she just can’t handle anyone besides herself getting attention from clients.”
“She sounds dangerously ambitious,” Dawn warned me. “Be careful.”
“I will.”
After the call was wrapped up, I collapsed into bed. I hated keeping secrets. First from Raff and now from Dawn. Ugh. And oh God, Trevor, who still didn’t know who my boss was. Damn it.
All of the secrets weighed on me. At first, keeping Chelsea from Raff hadn’t weighed on me at all but now… now I wondered if I really did the right thing. Should I tell him? Should I let him know about his daughter?
Fuck. I sure couldn’t do it w
hile we were sleeping together. I needed to get out of my own head and out of his bed, and just keep things professional between us again. Then, after a bit of time had passed and we had put whatever this weird thing was behind us into the past, maybe I could tell him…?
I had no idea. But I had to get home to sort all of this out. I curled up and went to sleep as best I could, and I told myself I didn’t dream about Raff.
17
Raff
It had been two weeks and I was already losing my goddamn mind.
I had accepted Cass’ feelings on the matter. I felt that Rome had been the start of something between us, she had seen it as an ill-advised fling that we had to end and move on from once we got home. But just because I could respect our differences in opinion didn’t mean that my feelings went away at the drop of a hat. I couldn’t just will them to disappear. My life would be so much fucking easier if I could.
But no. Now that I’d had a taste of it was so much harder to go back to being purely professional. God, I’d thought that she was tempting before? That I’d wanted her before all of this? I had been dead wrong. I wanted her so much more now. I wanted her constantly. My life felt empty without her.
Going home from work to an empty apartment just wasn’t cutting it anymore. Before, I had known that it felt a little empty, that I wanted to spend my life with someone. Sometimes I had let myself daydream about Cass, the one who had gotten away—who I’d told to go away, the person I’d abandoned and lost as a result. But now it was an active ache that I just couldn’t erase.
Every time that I was in my apartment, I couldn’t help but think about what it would look like with Cass in it. What it would be like if we could commute to and from work together. How it would feel to be able to just relax around each other.
She was right about our positions making it impossible for us to be together right now. But she wasn’t going to be my assistant forever. I was sure that I could encourage Parker to give her a quick advancement, and once she wasn’t working directly underneath me… maybe…
I had known that Cass would haunt me a little. After all, she’d haunted me to an extent for these past four years. But actually having her again had just made it all that much worse. I was going mad without her.
Every time I saw her, I wanted to grab her and kiss her. I wanted to prove to her that we could be great together. I was sure that I wasn’t the only one who saw our potential to be something more. It wasn’t just our sexual chemistry that was off the charts—it was the rest of it, too.
I kept thinking about our walk together in Rome, about how comfortable and happy I’d been just walking in silence with her, watching her take in all the sights and smiling. She’d been so happy. How could I be anything except happy on her behalf? I wanted to watch her be like that every day.
Then at the fountain… she’d been beautiful. Stunning. I’d been unable to look away. Like a sap, I’d just stared at her until she’d noticed. She was lovely and happy, and I’d wanted to stay in that moment forever.
We could be more together. I just knew it. I was sure that we could be an amazing couple if she would just give me a chance. But she seemed determined not to do that. She was keeping her distance with me now as if just being within ten feet of me was going to be a problem and I was ready to lose my mind.
I didn’t know how much longer my patience could last.
That evening, we worked late together after everyone else went home. It had kind of become a thing over the last couple of weeks. I was amazed and impressed at how quickly Cass had become indispensable around here. She was an invaluable asset and already she was able to help me out, support me, and tackle bigger projects than any of my previous assistants—none of whom had lasted very long, to the point where I had felt like I should just give up and learn to function on my own.
We had a lot of work ahead of us with Furio’s company. Just because we had laid out a plan that he approved of didn’t mean that our work was in any way done.
Cass was being a goddamn lifesaver. I would start to ask for something and she’d hand me the paperwork before I even finished the sentence. It was like she could read my mind.
I grinned up at her as I accepted the paper and then forced myself to turn away and not look at her… well, everything. Fuck. We were all alone in the office. Her hair had been pulled back originally but about an hour ago she’d groaned and undone all of the pins holding it in place so that her hair now cascaded down her shoulders and back. She was wearing a lovely pale green blouse that was perfectly appropriate for the workplace but was still making me want to, well, stare at her breasts.
Fuck, she was gorgeous. I wanted to rip off those tailored slacks and that blouse and throw her onto the desk, fuck her until neither of us could remember our own names. She was temptation itself and she wasn’t even trying to be. She was just being herself and I was losing my mind.
I’d had no idea that I would lose my mind this much over her. I was a guy who stayed in control. I was a guy who did what needed to be done. If I couldn’t, I wouldn’t have ended up where I was today. I’d had to leave behind the people I cared about so that I could take care of my family. I’d had discipline and I’d stuck to my guns.
But now it was like all of my self-discipline had vanished out the window. I cared about my career and I cared about being professional and getting work done for my clients. I wanted everything to be the best of the best. And yet here I was unable to think about a single damn thing except for those goddamn curves and how much I wanted to get my mouth on her again.
I wanted to tug on her hair until I could kiss her neck, I wanted to have her whimpering my name, I wanted to feel her coming around my cock again.
Jesus Christ, I was getting hard at my desk. There was no way I could stand up now. I thought of dead kittens and puppies as much as I could until my erection started to go down.
No way I could just sit here thinking about her. I got up and started pacing.
Cass glanced over at me. “No reason for you to be this antsy,” she pointed out. “Things are going well! Furio seems to like the work we’ve been doing.”
“You’ve been doing a lot of it,” I pointed out. “You’re taking more of a lead in this case than Kelly is. I don’t know how I could’ve done this without you.”
“You’ve managed to do other projects before me,” Cass replied. She sounded a bit embarrassed that she was receiving praise.
“I know,” I acknowledged. Hell, I wouldn’t have been able to get to this position if I couldn’t rely on myself and do the job. “But you’ve made it so much easier. Everything’s gone more smoothly. I like having a partner.”
“Kelly’s kind of your partner.”
“She has her own part of the project to handle,” I pointed out. “We’re not exactly working together.”
“Aww, has someone been lonely?” Cass teased me. She winked and went back to doing paperwork and I had to struggle not to drop to my fucking knees at the tone in her voice.
What would she say if I told her that I had been lonely? That I had missed her all these years, that I’d missed Trevor, that I’d wanted to go home and see them but hadn’t known how to do it?
Would she say that she’d been missing me as well? Would she understand?
I felt like I was going insane. I had to do something, or I would go completely mad.
“Okay.” Cass grabbed another piece of paper and started reading off from it. I couldn’t even hear a damn word she was saying. I just—wanted her. I wanted her more than I could think.
I moved up behind her and gently pushed some of her hair out of the way, then delicately kissed her neck.
Cass jumped a mile and stepped away from me. “Raff, no.”
“I know, I know, it’s stupid.” My mouth was dry as a desert. “But fuck, you can’t tell me you don’t want it.”
“Whether I want it or not doesn’t matter, we’d be fired!” Cass hissed, clutching onto her papers like they were a lifel
ine. “Here.” She shoved the report at me. “You can finish reading this on your own.”
She grabbed her purse and her heels, slipping them back on. She’d taken her shoes off earlier, around the time she’d taken her hair down while we’d been working, and I’d relished how relaxed she’d felt around me, how she’d literally been stripping down her professional armor and been more casual.
“I need to get home anyway,” she added. “There’s nothing here that we can’t do in the morning, it’s not like we’ve got the deadline at nine a.m. I shouldn’t have stayed so late in the first place.”
I grabbed her elbow as she started to leave the room. “Cass, you can’t fight this pull between us. I know it’s there. You know it’s there. Why are we trying to pretend that nothing’s happening between us?”
“Yes,” Cass snapped. “That’s what’s best for us. That we put it behind us.”
“Oh, so you haven’t been thinking about it? You haven’t been thinking about us?”
“Not at all,” Cass lied.
“So, you haven’t been thinking about how we kissed. About the way you trembled when I touched you. About the way I made you gasp.”
Cass trembled, her face flushing. “No,” she said. “I—I’m not thinking about it at all. You’re not that special.”
“Oh? So, if I kissed you now, you wouldn’t feel a thing. You’d be able to just walk away?”
Cass set her jaw stubbornly. “Yes.”
Oh, that was a challenge if I’d ever heard one. I grabbed her and pulled her to me, smashing our mouths together.
Cass inhaled sharply, and I used the chance to slide my tongue into her mouth, pouring everything that I could into the kiss. For a second she was stiff, unyielding, but then all at once she melted, wrapping her arms around me, her purse falling to the floor as she kissed me back.
Dating My Brother's Best Friend Page 11
