I was looking forward to seeing her again, wondering how she would react to my return. Any reaction was good as far as I was concerned. It meant I’d gotten under her skin as much as she had wormed her way under mine.
Just how much so became clear the next morning when I stood in my makeshift office talking to Cole about the trip. I got stuck halfway through a sentence when Abby walked past, and I unashamedly followed every long-limbed stride as she strode down the hall. I shuddered. Oh yes. Abby was exactly where my attention needed to be.
“You were saying?” Cole waved a hand in front of my face, not bothering to hide his smirk.
I blinked, pulling up the thread of my previous conversation with some difficulty. “That, ah, we have to move on this quickly.” I rubbed a hand over my eyes and faked a yawn. “Sorry. Jetlag.”
“Sure.” Cole chuckled slyly and his gaze slid to the now empty doorway. “Can’t say I blame you.”
My pulse sped up. “Don’t even go there.” I warned Cole, then smothered a groan as I realized my outburst would only intrigue him further.
Sure enough, Cole’s smile widened. “Because she’s soooo busy. Right?”
“Right.” I growled. “And I’m busy too, so unless you want to look for other accommodation…”
“Say no more.” Cole put up his hands and backed away. “But let me know if you want to discuss the Nagasaki deal.” He friend held my gaze for a moment. “I’m glad you’re giving Rob a chance.”
I nodded, watching him leave. Cole and I had worked on a few deals together and I trusted him implicitly. Just not around Abby. I glanced down the hallway toward her office. What she didn’t realize was that the more she retreated, the more my interest was piqued, my competitive streak kicking in.
I never backed away from a challenge. So, if Abby really didn’t want any kind of relationship outside of the bedroom, I needed to know why. And what it would take to change her mind.
I gave her a ten minute head start.
“I’d like to catch up on where you’re at,” I said as I strolled into her office.
Luckily the line was already rolling off my tongue, because the sight of Abby up close was like a punch to the gut. I paused by the doorjamb, taking in the sight, the sound, the scent of her. Just a hint of citrus, the perfect complement to her pale yellow shirt and thick fall of dark, fiery hair. Impeccably groomed as always and not a lock out of place. I considered for a moment whether I preferred this professional persona or her just-fucked look, when wisps of hair unraveled to curl around her face and her eyes were wild and lust-filled.
Her brow puckered with impatience as I continued to stare, enticing me to reach out and rub away the crease in her forehead with my thumb. Or my lips.
“Cole is fully aware of my findings so far. I’m sure he can fill you in.” Clipped and polished, her voice still managed to send a spike of lust right through me.
Which probably wasn’t the reaction she was going for, if the chill in her tone was anything to go by. God, Cole was right. I did have it bad. Everything she did turned me on.
The question was, how bad did she have it?
“I’m sure you won’t mind sharing your thought process with me.” I pushed away from the door to stroll closer. The top of my thigh brushed against her desk and I watched with interest as Abby tracked my every move. I hid a smile.
The beginnings of a flush moved up from her neck to her cheeks and she wrenched her gaze away from my crotch back to my face.
“Certainly, Mr. Brookhein. If you’d like to make a time for us to discuss this.”
“Now please, Ms. Harkness.” I liked that she was rattled and wasn’t about to give her space to collect her thoughts.
I pulled around a chair from the other side of the desk and sat beside her. With only inches of space between us, her heat tugged me toward her with sweet promise. I allowed the outside of my thigh to graze her leg and I knew I wasn’t alone in feeling the stab of awareness that shuddered through me. It traveled straight to my cock like a pleasure-tipped arrow and I noted with satisfaction the tremble in her fingers as she clicked on the mouse to close down her emails.
“Your foremost company, Brookhein International has been set up as a shell corporation.” With barely a breath to steady herself, Abby launched into a run-down of my business position as she saw it.
It took me a moment to stop listening to the sound of her voice and start listening to her words. She was good. Really good. I was impressed she’d gotten to the crux of my businesses so quickly. It did pose a problem, though, if she wrapped things up before I’d had a chance to convince her she wanted me. I wasn’t done playing yet. Not by a long shot.
The room was suddenly quiet. Abby had finished speaking and I looked up to find her staring at me expectantly. Mocking me.
“So you want to look at setting up some offshore funding?” I filtered through her conversation to grab hold of her final words, a trick I’d had to employ once already today.
Abby nodded briskly. “Yes. But I need to investigate some of the international regulations first to ensure there aren’t any legislative pitfalls.”
“Yes. Good.” I had started down a similar path before other business matters had started sucking up my time.
I caught the sound of her breath releasing and the delicate sag of her shoulders. She thought I was finished with her.
“Why didn’t you take my calls?” I threw out the question, knowing it would catch her off guard. I’d phoned her while I’d been away and she hadn’t answered. That irked me more than I cared to admit.
“I didn’t want to waste your time when you’re obviously so busy.” Abby kept her eyes fixed on the screen. “And Cole has been invaluable in providing me what I need.”
“Cole?” I pressed my lips together, red-hot jealousy poking me in the ribs.
Abby noted my reaction and tried to hide a satisfied smile. I locked my jaw tight, realizing I’d just conceded a point.
“I’m back now,” I said grimly. “And I’d like you to come to me in future if you have any requirements. Business or personal.”
“Oh, I’m sure there’s no need—” she started to protest, making me squirm even more.
I closed my fingers around the edge of the desk. “There’s every need when it is my business. You’d do well to remember that,” I bit out, shoving back my chair.
Shit. I skulked back to my office, wondering how the hell she’d done that; turned me from my goal of winning her over, to her pushing my buttons? My fingers drummed out a fast staccato on my thigh. One point had become abundantly clear. The thing between me and Abby definitely constituted a thing.
And not only was I determined to find out what it was. I intended to crush her with it.
Chapter Sixteen
Abby
I slumped in my seat the moment Marcus left my office.
Well, that’d been interesting. As soon as I’d caught a whiff of his presence, my professional demeanor had evaporated. Stacy would be jumping up and down, clapping her hands together with glee if she could see me now. I groaned and lowered my head to the desk, but the cool wood did nothing to soothe my scrambled thoughts.
“I see you’ve already met with Marcus this morning.”
I looked up, my neck cracked in protest. Cole stood in the doorway, a smile warming his eyes.
“You have the look of someone who’s tangled,” he said with a laugh.
“What do you mean? Actually no.” I shook my head. “I really don’t care.” I turned my attention back to my computer to emphasize my point.
“Don’t you?” Cole’s lips quirked and he came over to tap his fingers against the stack of financial papers. “Surely these numbers tell you something?”
I snorted. “They’re just numbers.”
“If you say so.” Cole shrugged.
I waited until he walked away before taking another look at the columns of figures. In truth, I had always been able to push past the jumble of numbers to wh
at lay beneath. You could tell a lot about someone by the way he ran his business. I just hadn’t wanted to see what Marcus’s spreadsheets told me.
I settled my hand on my chin and sifted through the information. Marcus paid his employees well. The percentage of wages to profit was much higher than the national average. On the other hand, his entertainment expenses were low, so obviously he wasn’t one of those fat cats who spent all of their time dining out. Lastly, his travel costs were high, so chances were his trip to New Zealand had been about business and not about me.
I blew out a breath and let the papers fall back into a pile. So what? It didn’t mean anything. And I had a job to do.
I checked my watch and calculated the time difference before putting in a call to Stacy.
“Have you got the details about New Zealand’s service tax for me?”
“Is he back?”
I held back a sigh. “If you haven’t got anything constructive to say about the Brookhein tax situation…”
“Oh, so there is a situation?” Stacy’s voice pitched higher, then dropped to a whisper. “Soooo, he must be back.”
I shook my head and counted to five. “Tell me again how you became a partner of your own consultancy firm? I could swear you were still in kindergarten.”
“It’s my damn kids.” Stacy sighed dramatically. “They sucked the IQ right out of me.”
I couldn’t help laughing. “Honey, no wonder you’re an accountant if you think that’s what you were feeding them.” I was treated to an inelegant snort from the other end of the line.
“Don’t try to change the subject,” Stacy warned me in mock sternness. “Is he back. Yes or no?”
I closed my eyes and huffed out a sigh. “Yes.”
“Oh, goody.” Stacy’s excitement rose a level, the sound of clapping filling the background. “Right. Have you seen him? Yes or no.”
“Yes. Obviously. How else would I know he’s back?”
“Good point. However, I just require a yes or no, so hold back on any additional comments, if you don’t mind.”
“Yes.”
“Yes what?”
“Yes, I do mind.”
“Oh, har-de-har-har. You’re in a mood today. I wonder why?” Stacy’s voice brimmed with laughter. “So, did you like seeing him again?”
I chewed over the answer to that one. No, I hadn’t very much liked the way he’d waltzed into my office and laid down the law about who I could talk to. Fair enough it was his business, but so far everyone had been able to answer any questions I had.
On the other hand, yes, I had very much enjoyed laying eyes on Marcus again. I’d known as soon as I came in today that he’d returned, the buzz in the air had set my hips swaying when I walked past his office. Seeing him again was like waiting in the queue for a roller coaster. I was scared shitless of what was going to happen, but there was no way I would step out of the line.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” Stacy gave up waiting and offered her own interpretation of my silence. “Are you going to sleep with him again?” She followed up with a sly drawl.
“No! No…fuck…I don’t know…I think…” I raked my fingers across my scalp. “I think I want to come home.”
“You can’t.”
“Why not?” I whined.
“Because. One, you are a tax professional, and I stress the word professional. Two, it isn’t going to hurt you to figure this thing with Marcus out. And three.” She put in forcefully when I started to protest. “Three. Nicky rang today.”
I gripped the phone as the floor seemed to disappear beneath my feet. “Nicky?”
“Yes. Sorry Abby, but unless you’re ready to have a heart to heart with your sister, you’re better off not being here. ’Cos I’m telling you, she’s not giving up.”
“Fuck.”
“Exactly.”
Okay. It looked like I was staying in Wellsford a little longer. Because if I had to choose between seeing my sister again and spending another couple of weeks with Marcus? Marcus won hands down. No contest. Three years wasn’t long enough to get over what my family had done. Hell, several lifetimes wouldn’t be sufficient.
Hopefully, Marcus wouldn’t cause me to regret that decision. Which meant I needed to set a few things straight, because so far every move he’d made had been a Bobby Fischer special. Cool. Calculated. I had to stay one step ahead.
“Just so you know, I will require any further meetings between us to be scheduled.”
“Oh?” Marcus’s head came up as I entered his office without knocking and stated my demands.
“Constant interruptions are a distraction I cannot work with, not if you want me to complete this project in a timely manner.”
Marcus stared at me, unmoved. “Bending the rules again, Ms. Harkness?”
“And I don’t enjoy the dictatorial management style you seem to be displaying,” I challenged.
Marcus exhaled and shook his head. “Fine. I’ll set up calendar meeting times and email them through.”
My gaze homed in on the smug smile flirting about his mouth, wondering why he’d given in so easily. “Fine,” I snapped, executing a stiff about turn and stalking back to my office.
Ten minutes later I knew exactly where his self-satisfied air had come from. Meeting requests started pinging into my inbox, one after another. He was blocking out ten minute meetings with me every two hours, stretching far into the unforeseen future.
“Ridiculous man,” I muttered, setting about declining each and every one of them. I clicked open a new email and composed a message. A ten minute heads-up before you require a meeting will suffice. Clicked send.
“Agreed.”
I just about fell off my seat when Marcus spoke from the doorway. He waved his phone at me, from which he was reading my email. Irritation pricked and I rose from my seat, barely restraining myself from slamming the door in his face.
“Ten minutes,” I barked as I clicked the door shut.
Marcus’s laughter followed me all the way back to my desk.
Chapter Seventeen
Marcus
By the end of the week, I was left wondering whether I’d played Abby wrong. Maybe I’d pushed her too hard, or maybe I wasn’t pushing hard enough.
True to her word, she refused to see me unless I gave her a ten minute warning. And every time we did meet, she retreated behind a thick, professional veneer. Untouchable. Which only made me want her more. My focus on the end game was the only thing stopping me from completely flipping my shit.
The end game. Initially, it’d been about wanting to know Abby and getting her to let me in. But time was catching up and my chances of winning her were dwindling with each passing day.
I pressed my fingers against my eyelids. My usual strategy would be to keep upping the ante until she broke, yet something stopped me where Abby was concerned. While most of the time she had her game face firmly in place, at other times, her façade seemed so brittle I could see clear through it. Mostly, I thought she enjoyed our verbal sparring matches, the undercurrent of sexual tension sizzling through the air whenever we were in a room together. But now and then I’d catch a glimpse of something else and it made me hesitate.
Who had hurt her?
I looked across the dining table we were using for the team briefing today, a strategy meeting about Nagasaki. I was well aware Abby had entered but I waited until she sat before turning my gaze on her.
She took my breath away. Her hair cascaded in bright flames to drip over one shoulder, clothes impeccably tailored to fit every curve. I smiled as she positioned her notebook squarely in front of her and lined up two pens to the side, doing her best to ignore me.
Did she look as good spread out on mahogany as she had on redwood? Catching her frosty frown, I threw her a quick smile. The heat in her gaze told me she was thinking the same thing. And she wasn’t as immune to me as she pretended to be.
But I’d already figured that out. I’d caught her eyes resting on me durin
g my frequent visits to her office. Her lips would part and a look of hunger would flit across her face. If I brushed against her or laid my hand in the small of her back, she would shudder and lean close for a moment before pulling away. As if suddenly remembering where she was. The heat that pulsed between us hadn’t lessened. If anything, it had grown.
I frowned. She looked worn-out this morning. I moved to her side to bend in close and wrap my hand around the back of her chair. Flexing my fingers, I was barely able to stop myself from touching her.
“You seem tired.” My breath skipped across her ear and I felt her tremble. I was ever hopeful that I was the cause of her restless nights. God knows, she featured in my dreams often enough.
Abby sat up straighter. “The hotel…it was noisy last night.” She trotted out some lame excuse, refusing to look at me.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” I gave in to temptation and touched her arm, watching her fingers curl in response. The buzz of awareness intensified and I leaned in further. “You could stay here, you know. I have plenty of room. Although I can’t promise to be silent.”
“No.” Her refusal shot out, a blush sweeping her cheeks. I knew she was remembering our night together in Baltimore, on a table much like this one, where we’d been anything but quiet.
I said nothing. Biding my time. She still hadn’t moved her arm and I couldn’t help increasing the pressure to turn it into a short caress. Abby gave a barely detectable twitch.
“Why not?” I asked. We both knew I meant more than just her accommodation.
“The price is too high.” She re-straightened the perfectly aligned pens and threw me her practiced, polished look. “Now, if we could get to business?” She arched a brow.
I bit back a growl, aware the rest of my team had arrived and were watching our exchange with interest. Including Cole, who’d flopped down in the chair beside Abby.
“She’s not busy now,” he challenged, grinning.
I moved back to my seat, making up my mind. Fuck going easy. It was time for a new strategy—go hard or go home. I’d have her in my bed by the end of the week and from there, it would be a short step to her giving in.
His Rules (One Night Stand Series Book 1) Page 7
