Unworthy Heart: The Donnellys, Book 1

by Dorothy F. Shaw

  “You’re bad, Maiya.” He shook his head.

  She laughed. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “I have a BMW too. Still think I’m typical?”

  She flipped her hair off her shoulder and headed for the door. Two cars? Seriously? “Absofuckinglutely.”

  “Don’t get excited, they’re both ten years old. For a second I worried you might be shocked, however I have a feeling nothing shocks you, does it?” He followed her outside and then walked beside her, his arm brushing against hers while they made their way to his car.

  The small contact was a brand on her skin, right through her jacket and satin blouse. “Not really. But I have a feeling I do a top-notch job of shocking you.” It was a lie, she was shocked…a little.

  The corner of his mouth tipped into a crooked grin. “I’ll deny it till the bitter end. Nope. Not shocked at all.”

  “What’s this? I don’t get to drive?” Maiya teased with wide eyes when he opened the passenger door for her.

  “Now I know you’re in shock because you must’ve lost your damn mind.” He laughed and the sound rippled over her skin and centered between her thighs.

  When she sank into the deep leather seat, Maiya crossed her legs, trying to relieve some of the tension. “I know I teased you, but I do like your car. For being ten years old, it’s in perfect condition.”

  “Stop, please.” He placed his hand on his chest in a dramatic display. “I don’t think my heart can take the shock.”

  She turned toward him when he slid behind the wheel. “Ha! See? I do shock you. Oh come on. I’m being serious. I do like your car.” She widened her eyes, trying to look as sincere as she could. “Porsches are badass, even if it is a Boxster. And I still think you should let me drive it.”

  “You’re not driving my car.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re nuts.”

  “I am not. I’m serious.”

  Ryan shot her a sideways glance. “Yup, totally nuts.”

  “Fine, we’ll see.” She crossed her arms and stared out the windshield. “It’s a Boxster for fuck’s sake. May as well be a Miata,” she mumbled.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  Ryan grumbled something back she didn’t make out and she suppressed a giggle. She was having a blast jerking his chain. He had a thing for cars, but she did too. It made her curious what else they had in common.

  Ryan made the left into the hotel parking lot, and for a split second she thought he might pull into the parking garage. Instead, he looped in front of the entrance and stopped. Damn. A twinge of disappointment curled in her gut. Taking a deep breath, she pushed the feeling away and turned in her seat to face him. “Thanks for the ride.”

  He rested his elbow on the windowsill of his door and met her gaze. “Not a problem.”

  Maiya ran a hand through the length of her hair. “Thanks for coming tonight too. I had a good time.”

  “Me too.”

  They stared at each other for a moment, and then he leaned toward her. She braced for the kiss. Instead, he bypassed her lips and came cheek to cheek with her.

  With his chest pressed against hers, his heart beat against her own—which was slamming like a bass drum in a marching band. Every inch of her insides quivered from the feel of his stubbled cheek against her face and the pressure of his body against hers. Each sensation ran over and through her. Maiya closed her eyes and placed a trembling hand on his neck.

  “Sweet dreams, Maiya.” The breath from his whispered words tickled her ear…and then he opened the car door behind her.

  The loss of body heat was profound when he pulled away. Shivering, Maiya sighed and opened her eyes. The bastard was grinning. Grinning!

  She cleared her throat and schooled her expression in an effort to hide her embarrassment. Obviously this was all one sided. “You too, Ryan.” Stepping out of the car and closing the door, she started what she considered the walk-of-shame toward the hotel entrance.

  “Hey, Maiya.”

  She froze at the sound of her name, and then turned around.

  He’d lowered the window farther. “C’mere.”

  She walked the few steps and bent forward, peering into the car. “You forget something?”

  “Yeah. Come here.”

  She leaned inside the car. Ryan stretched across the console, cupped her face in his hand and gave her a soft, chaste kiss on her lips. When he pulled away, he stroked the tip of his tongue over her top lip. Then he shifted back into his seat as if nothing had happened.

  Half hanging in his car, shock and arousal zipped through Maiya’s body like a bottle rocket. She swallowed and licked her lips, tasting him. “Mm, thanks.” She backed out of the window and straightened next to the car. Her legs had turned to jelly. Such a soft little kiss and yet it resonated through her entire body, setting it on fire. And she wanted more.

  “Good night, Maiya.”

  “Night, Ryan.” She watched while he pulled away, and then plopped her ass on the bench outside the hotel entrance and lit a cigarette.

  The man was toying with her, and it was working.

  Chapter Four

  Ryan released the breath he’d been holding and drove away from the temptation he’d left standing in front of the hotel. God help him. Did she want him the way he wanted her? He shifted in the driver’s seat and the hard bulge in his pants pressed against his zipper.

  Between how she poked the bear with her smart-ass comments and then flipped like a light switch, flirting with him by sucking a drop of drink off her fingertip, he hoped she did. Her mixed messages were maddening. Either way the result was the same, he had a hard-on the size of the Eiffel Tower the entire time they were sitting at the table. Again.

  What her smart mouth would feel like around his dick consumed his thoughts while he drove. He bet she gave head like it was an art form. When she’d gone off to the bathroom, Ryan considered following her, with the intention of pinning her against the wall and kissing those sarcastic lips until neither of them could breathe. Thanks to the little fantasy, he needed to taste her, and gave in. The brief kiss in the car had been enough to transform his prick into a Maiya-seeking missile. The drive was short, thank God, and he’d definitely be taking care of the problem when he got home.

  With the house to himself this week, he sent up a holler of thanks for a hard earned night of privacy. Ryan stripped his clothes off on the way to the bedroom. Her scent still lingered and so did her sweet taste. He licked his lips—for probably the thirtieth time since he’d kissed her.

  Lying back on the bed, he closed his eyes and palmed his hard length. In an instant, he was back at the pub, in the hallway by the bathrooms with her. Ryan’s cock twitched in his fist and he gritted his teeth. He could’ve pushed her into the bathroom, locked the door and bent of her over one of the sinks. Her sweet ass taunted him, made him want to slide between her full cheeks and then sink inside her wet channel. Arching his back on the bed, he cupped his tight sac in his other hand massaging, and stroked his shaft with the other. “Goddamn!”

  What kind of noises would she make when he filled her with his thickness? How tight would she be wrapped around him as he slid in and out of her cunt? Fuck! Ryan sucked a harsh breath through his teeth and his cock pulsed in his grip. When she came she’d probably squeeze his dick—something he’d give anything to feel.

  Ryan’s orgasm hit like a freight train and his body went rigid. The first hot lash of semen hit his belly and he arched off the sheets, calling out her name. He stroked again, from base to tip, spurting more creamy fluid down his hand and onto his abs, shivering as his hand passed over the sensitive head.

  Blowing out a harsh breath, Ryan stroked his now softening length. He reached for a towel and wiped up the mess he’d shot all over himself. He’d come hard—the fantasy all too real. Rolli
ng off the bed, he stumbled, on tingling legs, to the shower.

  Her hot and wet mouth; her sweet lips wrapped around his length. Ryan bit back a moan and his cock twitched, eager to come back to life. Ignoring his rising desire, he stepped under the spray and tried to push the thoughts of what it might be like to press her against the wall in his shower, wrap her long legs around his hips and fuck them both into a state of exhaustion.

  Jesus, it had to happen now. Jacking off wasn’t going to be enough.

  Ryan would have her.

  Chapter Five

  Ryan sat at his desk after attending his weekly staff meeting and an instant message popped on his screen.

  Maiya Rossini: Hey!

  Ryan Donnelly: Well, hello there. How are you today?

  Maiya Rossini: I’m fine. You?

  Ryan Donnelly: Pretty good. Did you have a good night last night? Sleep well?

  Maiya Rossini: Now, Ryan, is that an appropriate work question? Kidding. Yes I did. You?

  Ryan Donnelly: LOL Fair enough. Yes I did. ;) So what’s up?

  Maiya Rossini: Project issue. Can you meet me in the conf. room at 3pm?

  Ryan Donnelly: Uh oh, that doesn’t sound good. You want to tell me what’s going on?

  Maiya Rossini: A gap’s been uncovered. We need to put our heads together and figure out a solution…and fast too.

  Ryan Donnelly: How is it that you know about this before me?

  Maiya Rossini: Because I was on an executive call with the client and Tony, and they were doing some testing on their side. Relax, I’m not jumping over your head.

  Ryan Donnelly: Sorry, just shocked to find out I’ve got an issue. I’ll see you at 3.

  Maiya Rossini: See you then.

  It rankled, learning there was an issue on his project. The last thing he wanted was to screw up the shot at a promotion. He needed to show his manager he was more than ready to handle his own team. However, it bothered him more knowing Maiya had been the one to find the issue instead of him. Definitely a healthy case of his ego talking, maybe a little bit of male pride too—which even he had to admit was stupid.

  She was senior to him in title, and tenure. He didn’t have a problem with it, but she wasn’t his manager and he wanted to be able to handle any business or issues on his project without her jumping in, or getting to them first.

  Maiya was a tiger lady, handling her team and any obstacles with a special kind of finesse rarely seen in management. Most people lost their heads when issues arose. Not Maiya. She kept her cool, got people to do whatever it was she needed, and they usually walked away smiling. It was impressive, to say the least. She’d earned her spot at the company and with it, the respect of all her peers.

  With fresh cup of coffee in hand, along with his laptop tucked under his arm, Ryan strolled into the empty conference room at three. Empty except for one person sitting at the table typing away on her laptop. At the sight of her, all rankled pride and ego smoothed right out. But then his steps faltered and his breath caught in his throat. Last night’s fantasy parked itself front and center in his mind. With his mouth as dry as the desert, he swallowed, and unglued his tongue from the roof of his mouth. “Hey, Maiya.”

  “Hey, Ryan. Pull up a chair. We’ve got a lot of documents to go through.”

  “Where’s everyone else?”

  “Oh, yeah, everyone else. Hmm.” She tapped her bottom lip with her fingernail, a contemplative expression on her face and then looked around the room. “Well, looks like it’s just us, big guy. Everyone else had somewhere they needed to run off to. You know how it is, families and such. Fun times right?”

  Ryan took the seat next to her and opened his laptop. “My kind of fun.”

  She’d pulled her hair up into some sort of knot, and somehow made it stay with a pencil stuck through it. Amazing. She had a whole sexy, hot-librarian look going, and his dick was more than pleased to send up a salute in approval. Stifling his dirty thoughts, he signed in to his computer. “So what’s going on?”

  “It appears we’ve missed a technical element in the marketing layout.” She studied her screen. “We need to go back through our documentation and find where the gap is in the design solution.”

  “We submitted our mockup to them and they approved it. I can’t imagine what happened.” Ryan leaned close to her, causing their shoulders to touch, to peer at the document she was reading on her laptop. The heat of her body penetrated through their layers of clothes, warming his skin, and damn, she smelled good. Too good. He liked it. A slight lingering scent of cigarette smoke was there, but it didn’t seem to bother him like he figured it would.

  Maiya scrolled through the document. “This is the section where we should see the design and layout for the particular feature in question. For the life of me I can’t find the miss.”

  “Let me pull it up on my laptop and search for it too. I swear we had everything covered.” He pulled away and focused on his screen. Though he still sat close to her, their shoulders no longer touched. The immediate loss of her warmth against him sent a shiver rippling through his body.

  “Cold?”

  Damn, she noticed. “Um, no, not really.”

  “Okay then. I’m gonna grab some of the crap break room coffee. You need anything?”

  He glanced at her. “I’m good. Thanks.”

  Being stuck at work wasn’t such a hardship after all. There may be a mess to clean up for his project, but he couldn’t have picked a better person to be stuck with.

  Unable to catch her breath, Maiya drew on every ounce of self-control she possessed to keep from running from the conference room. With Ryan close to her while looking at her laptop screen, his scent—clean soap with a hint of cologne—hit her senses like a Mack truck and sent her head spinning.

  Every inch of her skin smoldered, lighting up like a Roman candle on the Fourth of July. Only their shoulders touched, and she had to force back the urge to turn her head and press her lips to his neck. They were in the office for crying out loud! She needed to get her hormones under control, and damn fast. There was a lot of work to do—throwing him onto the conference room table and screwing his brains out was not on the agenda.

  After grabbing her coffee, she did her best to compose herself. She entered the conference room in time to see Ryan scrub his hands over his face and then run his fingers through his hair. She paused, taking in his appearance. With his hair mussed, he still looked hot, but with a shot of cute added in. Damn. “Find it yet?”

  “Not yet.”

  She gave his shoulder a quick squeeze when she passed behind him and then took her seat. “Don’t worry, we will.”

  “Maybe it’s in one of the many change requests we received via email from them.” He leaned back in his chair and stretched.

  Giving in to the urge, she glanced at his stomach where his shirt was pulled tight and then her gaze traveled to his groin. Jesus, he had a nice body. She cleared her throat. “Good point. I’ll start searching my email files.”

  After an hour or more of searching, they located what they were looking for.

  He sighed. “Damn, that’s a big miss. Not good.”

  “Yep. Now comes the analysis and figuring out how we fucked up.” Maiya pulled the pencil from her hair and shook out the long length with both hands. “I hate this part. It always makes my brain hurt, you know?”

  “Sure as hell do. You want more coffee?”

  “Yeah, that’d be great.” She ran her fingers under her eyes and then covered her mouth with the back of her hand as a yawn escaped.

  “Tired?”

  She batted her lashes at him. “Yes, of course. I was up a little late last night.”

  He gave her a crooked grin and stood. “Me too.”

  When he left the room, Maiya leaned forward, rested her elbow on the table—chin in her palm, and focused on the
data. She wasn’t reading anything on the screen though. Instead, she was absorbed in the memory of the small kiss he’d given her before he left last night. What would a real kiss be like? Better yet, what would he be like in bed?

  Lots of men were a disappointment on the mattress. All talk and no action. Ryan might be no different. It would suck though, risking her job to have a night between the sheets with him, only to have him bomb in bed. Maiya glanced at the clock on the wall and then forced her focus back to the computer. If she didn’t get this done soon, she might not be able to keep it together.

  Ryan placed a fresh cup of coffee next to her on the table. “Any luck?”

  Maiya reached for the cup and their fingers touched. Snap! She yanked her hand away, curling her fingers into her other palm. “Ouch!”

  He grabbed her hand. “Shit. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. That freaking hurt, though.”

  “I’m sorry. Damn static electricity. Happens to me all the time here.” Pulling her hand to his lips, he kissed the tip of her fingers.

  She froze, and their eyes met. Oh, shit.

  He brushed his lips over her fingertips again. Maiya sucked in a hissing breath and a whole different jolt of electricity shot up her arm and through her body. Ryan sucked her finger between his tempting lips.

  The warm, wet haven of his mouth caused a ravenous hunger to form in her belly and her nipples tightened beneath her bra to hard points sharp enough to cut glass. “Wow.” She exhaled.

  He guided her up from her seat to stand in front of him. Removing her fingers from his mouth, he opened her hand and pressed his lips to her palm.

  Someone moaned. And she realized it was her.

  His blue-gray eyes widened for a moment in response before he closed them and moved to the skin of her wrist, kissing and nipping a spot, which had suddenly become an erogenous zone.

  Tidal waves of arousal pumped through her veins and Maiya panted, dragging in breath after breath. Unable to think straight, she didn’t know what to do. Should she grab him and press her body close, or push him away and try to regain some sort of professionalism? They weren’t exactly alone in the building.