by Jenika Snow
This literary work is fiction. Any name, places, characters and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or establishments is solely coincidental.
Please respect the author and do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials that would violate the author’s rights.
Piper
It was supposed to be a summer job, something to help me transition from graduating high school to starting college. But to me, this wasn’t just some office cleaning position.
I’d be working for Zane, the one man I’d loved for longer than I even wanted to admit.
The one person who could make me weak in the knees with just a glance.
My father’s friend who was far too old for me, but sexier than sin.
Zane
I hired Piper to keep her close, to help appease my need for her. But I played it off like I was helping her earn some money before starting college.
I was too old for her.
She was too innocent for me.
She was my friend’s daughter.
Off limits.
But I’d wanted her since she turned legal last summer. I saw the way she watched me, the way she bit her lip, the fact that her pulse jumped at the base of her throat when I was near. Did she know how obsessed I was with her, how I’d go to any means to keep other men away from her?
I could see how much she wanted me and that was dangerous.
Because her need for me made me territorial, desperate.
Everything I was, everything I had, belonged to Piper.
All she had to do was ask and it was hers.
Warning: If you like possessive, territorial, and obsessed men in your stories, this insta-love one is just for you. With an older celibate hero, an innocent virgin heroine, and all the gooey juiciness you love in romance, make sure you have something cold to drink as you read this one.
Chapter 1
Piper
“You nervous?”
I looked up at my father, who sat across from me at the table, his chipped and old “World’s Best Dad” mug in his hand. I’d given him that mug when I was six years old, and it was still his favorite and going strong.
The handle had been glued on a few too many times, the print on the side was faded to hell, but still he refused to get rid of it.
“What’s there to be nervous about?” Of course, I was lying. I was nervous as hell. But it wasn’t because this was my first full-time, summer job. Although I was almost nineteen, my father had refused to let me get a job while in high school because he wanted me to focus on my studies.
But a part of me thought that he just wanted me home more. After my mother had left us high and dry when I was twelve years old, I saw a change in my father. It wasn’t a bad change, per se, but he kept me close, maybe worried that I would leave him as well.
And I supposed I was, in a sense. This was the last summer I would be here before I started college. Although the university was only an hour away, I would be living in a dorm and might not even be able to come home every weekend, much to my father’s dismay.
“Well, you’re working a full day and you’ve never actually done that before. Not to mention, you’re working for Zane.”
At the mention of my father’s childhood friend, my heart sped up. But I stayed calm, collected. I didn’t want my father to see that the very mention of Zane had every part of my body coming alive.
Zane Alfonso.
Rich.
Sexy.
Powerful.
He was the opposite of my father in many ways. Whereas my dad worked at a construction yard, got dirty, and sweated all day as he did manual labor, Zane wore a suit and had business meetings.
Where my father had to work overtime to make ends meet, and didn’t have a fancy degree under his belt, Zane had a multimillion dollar architecture company, was rolling in money, and could retire now if he wanted to.
But before he’d found success, he and my father had gone to school together, grew up in the same shitty neighborhood, dealt with the same kind of drunken and abusive fathers. And even now, despite being on opposite ends of the financial spectrum, they were still closer than ever.
And that’s how I got this job. Although it was just a cleaning position in his office, there was no interview, no background check. He’d hired me on the spot last weekend when my father mentioned how I wanted to work before going to college, save up and get some experience under my belt.
But God, it would be hard as hell being around him and trying to hide how I felt.
The receptionist stood, her body perfectly toned … of course. The tight pencil skirt she wore showed off how long her legs were, and her white blouse amplified her massive breasts.
In other words, she was everything I wasn’t.
I felt pretty inadequate standing next to her in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, my outfit far from luxurious in this architecture firm.
I probably looked like a bum compared to her. She eyed me up and down, and I could see the disinterest on her face.
She opened her mouth, maybe to tell me to leave, to give me a smart-ass retort, but the sound of heavy footsteps coming closer, and then of a masculine throat being cleared, had my entire body going rigid … coming alive.
“Piper,” Zane said, and his voice, so deep and rugged, masculine with a touch of a gruffness in it, had every feminine part of my body coming alive.
I became wet, my nipples hard underneath the thin material of my shirt. My heart pounded, my palms sweating. It was the same reaction I got any time I was near him. We didn’t even have to say a word to each other. Just one look at him and my body instantly ignited.
I could imagine all the things he’d do to me, how he’d use his much bigger body to press me down on his mattress. He’d use his hands to spread my thighs apart, his warm breath teasing the most intimate part of me. I knew nothing about this, apart from my fantasies, sexual acts that were only things I’d read about or unabashedly watched on the Internet.
Here I was, a virgin who thought filthy, inappropriate things about a much older man, her father’s best friend. My throat was tight, my mouth dry. I curled my hands around the strap of my purse, not sure what to say, but sure as hell not wanting to seem like a teenager who couldn’t get her emotions in check.
I was here for a job, nothing more.
“Mr. Alfonzo, I didn’t know you knew her,” the receptionist said in a much happier, sexually laced voice than the one she’d used on me.
But Zane ignored her, waving his hands in dismissal before placing one on the small of my back and guiding me down the hallway. I glanced over my shoulder at her, her eyes wide and her mouth slightly parted.
A little piece of me felt triumphant, even if how he acted toward me was probably nothing more than affection because of who I was, not because of any desire he felt toward me.
“Here it is,” he said, as we walked into his office. I looked around, everything so clean, so pristine.
“You need a cleaning lady?” I turned around, looking up and down the office. “Because this looks pretty damn clean right now.” Shit. Like I needed to swear to my boss in his office. “Sorry,” I said and looked over my shoulder at him. “But seriously, this place is immaculate.”
He grinned and shrugged. “It’s just a surface clean. I have no doubts you can get the hard-to-reach places.”
I chuckled and looked around the office again. If you say so.
“Mr. Alfonso, your first meeting of the day is set up when you’re ready,” his receptionist said softly.
Zane didn’t take his gaze off of me.
“I’ll be there in a minute.”
We were left alone again, and I swallowed, feeling my body come alive in his presence.
“Are there any other offices I need to clean, any other things you’d like me to work on?”
He took a step toward me, this strong expression covering his face. “No
other offices, no other places in the building. You’re mine, Piper.”
The way he said that had my toes curling. I could imagine he meant that in the very basic, literal sense, and his expression hinted that possibly that was the case. But maybe that was just in my head?
“Just get acquainted with the layout.”
“Don’t you want me to start working? I don’t want any special treatment because you happen to be my father’s best friend.” I chuckled, but it sounded a little awkward.
“No rush, Piper. I’m just glad you’re here, and I can help you out with this steppingstone before you start your life.”
He gave me a warm smile before turning and leaving me alone in his office. My body still buzzed with his presence and he wasn’t even here anymore.
God, this was probably a bad idea if I couldn’t even get myself under control where Zane was concerned.
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