Coin Operated

by Ginny Glass

  He tapped a fist on the empty reception desk and his eyes clouded, then snapped up to meet hers. “Bullshit.”

  Her heart hammered wildly. “It’s not bullshit, Eli. And you know what? I’m leaving.”

  “Fine. Go home.”

  “No, Eli, I’m leaving. Ad Vantage. You.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Look, this thing between us is—”

  “—is over. I understand that, I am completely on board with that, partner. But just because I won’t fuck you doesn’t mean you get to walk away with half of this business.”

  Anger exploded in her. She pushed past him and slammed toward her office. “You’re an asshole. It’s a good thing I never told you how I thought I felt about you.”

  Bea’s cheeks burned in shame and anger as she stuffed her phone and laptop into her briefcase. He followed, raising his own voice.

  “Yeah? How’s that, princess? How did you think you felt? I can tell you how you did feel. Wet and willing and loudly orgasmic and you loved every second. You’re just pissed because you want your orgasms attached to the business end of my cock, and you can’t handle the way I’d give it to you. So don’t give me this heartsick little-girl act.”

  It was as if he’d detonated a bomb—one that obliterated any censor she’d imposed on her fury. “Little girl? For someone who likes to dominate women, you sure wimped out when Lynn started out the door. You hardly said three words during the damned proposal. Maybe you should have hit her. That improved your mood yesterday.”

  His intake of breath was audible. “Get out. You think you lose half a year’s production and you get to stand there and insult me? Hardly.”

  “An insult would be to tell you that I hated every minute of our little encounter.”

  “That would be a lie.”

  “You don’t know dick, Elliot.”

  “And neither have you in a long time, judging by how quickly you came for me yesterday.”

  “You’re disgusting.”

  “You’re still here. Weren’t you leaving?”

  “Gladly.”

  Bea hefted her briefcase and barreled past him. He didn’t turn around. She didn’t cry until she was on the road, flooring the gas pedal to take her away from Elijah Elliot.

  Sitting in his darkened office that evening, Eli held the letter in his hands, staring at his name scrawled in Bea’s slightly florid script.

  He had read the contents a dozen times.

  Buyout options. She had been to a lawyer quick.

  On his desk were several wrinkled pages he’d found on the floor of Bea’s empty office, scattered around the wastebasket. He flashed back to the little notebook, the morning of the first Bows and Eros presentation. The same handwriting. Bea’s pros and cons.

  Pros and cons of sleeping with business partner.

  Pros and cons of D/s relationships.

  Pros and cons of loving Eli.

  Eli’s eyes smarted. She was always the planner between the two of them.

  He weighed his options. He could buy her out and they could never see each other again. He could call her. He could counter with his own proposal—he had a shark for a lawyer. He could call her. He could close down Ad Vantage altogether and…

  Eli picked up the phone. He got the machine. This time he didn’t purr any orders into the phone, he just listened to the happy chirp of Bea’s voice on the recorder and quietly hung up. He was screwing up, he knew it. Damn. Double damn.

  It shouldn’t be this hard. A few weeks ago, he was uncertain if she’d welcome his advances; now he was sure that she would. A few days ago, he was certain that their attraction was just that—a physical complication caused by the age-old explosive equation of man plus woman minus any personal life outside of work. Until something had divided them…and that felt worse than he had ever imagined.

  Eli was afraid of his own aggression. He was terrified that the lust in Bea’s eyes would cool if he pushed the way he wanted to.

  He took a deep, steadying breath. Too many fantasies and too many unrequited hours so close to her had given him time to amass a mental backlog of things he’d like to do to her. In his head, he was self-aware, he was confident, he gave the orders and got back facets of pleasure he’d never experienced in real life. It was a shame that his awareness came shrink-wrapped in industrial-strength guilt, strong enough to resist his every effort to fight against it.

  Eli gave his cell phone one last look before he tossed it onto the desk, got up and stretched out on the couch in the far corner of his office. Maybe he was brooding just a little, but he didn’t know what else to do.

  He wanted to break things. He was too much of a coward to cross the rigid line he’d drawn between them, so he couldn’t begrudge her the anger he knew she was feeling. Still, he wanted sweet, lovely, caring Bea back.

  All the little things she did for him—at first he had taken them for the personal touches of a great coworker. At first. Then, slowly, he had seen how she glowed when he approved of her, how she strove to notice all the nuances of their schedules, clients, and how she worked to make each day seamless. It should have been something that made Eli value her as a partner; he should have seen it as a sign of efficiency. Instead, it had incited a hunger in him, a rampant curiosity that gnawed holes in his head and filled those holes with curiosities about how accommodating Bea would be in bed.

  Would she take notice of the ways he liked to be touched? Would she meet all his demands with the same slightly subservient sultriness? Would she look at him lovingly from beneath that thick fringe of dark lashes, her eyes glittering when he murmured to her in low tones that she was perfection?

  The groan worked its way up from Eli’s chest and he smothered it with one of the couch pillows. It wasn’t just the sex, either. He wanted her laughing in the glow of the television. He wanted her angry with him for forgetting to stop for milk. He wanted her sleepy-eyed and drowsing in his arms.

  He needed therapy. He needed a drink. He needed Bea. He closed his eyes and felt a wave of something seize up his chest and steal his breath.

  He couldn’t imagine his day-to-day without her.

  He was in love with Beatrix London, and he was screwing up. Big time.

  Chapter Six

  Eli didn’t know exactly how he managed to fall asleep, but when he next opened his eyes, his office was pitch black and the neon numbers on his desk clock read eleven-thirty. He sat up from his awkward sprawl on the couch, wincing at a sudden crick in his neck. Office sleep was getting really old. He rubbed his eyes and swung his feet to the floor, standing. He felt woozy, disoriented.

  He stumbled down the hall to his bathroom and threw on the overhead light, squinting at the brightness. The mirror above the sink reflected a haggard version of himself. He scrubbed at his shadowed jaw. He needed a real shower. He needed a clean set of clothes.

  He groaned and pressed his forehead to the cool glass, thinking of the notes he’d found in her office.

  Pros and cons of loving Eli.

  Did she love him?

  He lifted his head. His chest seized echoingly, that foreign twinge of half panic and half elation that he couldn’t have put a name to before he had faced the possibility of being without her. He met his own serious eyes in the mirror.

  Think, Elliot.

  He needed to see her. He could still fix this. He knew where she’d be—she often texted him around this time.

  How did you get grass stains on your elbows?

  Extra starch in the whites?

  She liked to do laundry very late at night.

  The basement Laundromat was almost always deserted at this time of night. Bea loved being in the room so late. Usually, the hum of the machines and the humid, floral air were the perfect backdrop for her to unwind. Not tonight. Tonight was bittersweet, and she went through the motions of sorting clothes woodenly, without joy.

  The handyman and satellite TV ads that were tacked to the back of the heavy oak door fluttere
d softly. Bea measured a precise amount of lavender detergent into the cap of the soap bottle and stopped. Eli stood behind her.

  She knew he was there before he said anything. She had her back toward the door, quarters sliding into the coin slot of a top-load washer. More of Eli’s clothes tumbled in a dryer behind her. Her pulse tripped in her throat.

  “So you want that buyout in one lump sum, or can I make payments?” His voice reached to her, calm, at ease, with none of the heady roughness or the resigned contrition that had edged it earlier.

  She started shoving clothes into the washer, her irritation rising. “Whatever you can afford, seeing as how I wrecked our…your fiscal year.”

  His laughter, low and warm, sent fingers of heat streaking through her. Her nipples tightened. Her pulse thrummed in her ears. Damn him.

  “How did you get in here? That door locks.”

  “Doesn’t lock very well. Are you still mad at me?”

  “Should I be?” She felt suddenly exhausted.

  He moved closer. The scent of his cologne carried across the humid air of the room. It somehow overpowered the fragrance of the detergent. She felt a slow wetness start to warm between her legs. Her hands shook. He smelled…edible.

  “What will you do if you’re not working with me?”

  “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

  “You have your hot soapy hands all over my underwear and I can’t ask about your personal life?”

  Sudden anger flared in her chest, acid. Now he chose to show up? Now, with the thought that she was really leaving his only impetus? His panic was not what she wanted.

  He’s not willing to give you what you want.

  Bea turned and swallowed the biting reply parting her lips. Eli was dressed in a dark suit, a crisp white dress shirt cinched at his neck with a neatly knotted tie. The tie was a swirled green pattern, the material slightly pearlescent. This offered her something to focus on, which she did, afraid to meet his eyes.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Eli took a step toward her. Bea turned away, slamming down the lid of the washer. She started feeding quarters into the next machine, and then cursed when she realized she didn’t need another washer. She fussed nervously, putting her remaining coins into neat stacks across the top of the closed washer.

  Eli’s hands splayed on either side of the stacks and Bea could have fainted from the rush of awareness that uncurled in her. Solid and imposing, he radiated heat like a furnace. His cologne permeated her senses, layering gently with the notes of detergent and fabric softener already perfuming the air. She swallowed against a rising lump in her throat. Her stomach tightened. Her nipples chafed against the thin fabric of her T-shirt.

  “How was your day, playing hooky from work?” he asked, his breath a wash of warmth against her neck. His lips were millimeters from touching the nape of her neck and she battled the dizzying sexual need that roared through her. She couldn’t play games with him anymore.

  “Fantastic.”

  “What did you do all day?” His mouth grazed her neck. She caught her bottom lip, nearly panting.

  “Errands. L-lawyer.”

  Eli skimmed his lips down her collarbone and bit her, softly. A sultry dampness surged between her clenched thighs.

  “I missed you.”

  “Eli, this is a shared laundry room.”

  “So?” he said.

  “Anyone with a key could walk in.”

  “Easier than that. I don’t have a key.”

  Despite her protest, the thought of getting caught in a very compromising position with Eli made her stomach clench with excitement. “What do you want, Eli?”

  “I came to talk about us.” He lifted his hands from the washer top and ran his palms up her ribcage. He stopped just under her breasts, his thumbs sweeping back and forth over their outer curves.

  “There is no us, you made that clear.” She couldn’t stop her voice from shaking. The same held for every inch of skin he’d touched—and every inch that trembled, waiting for him to touch.

  “I’m an idiot.”

  “And I would be for humoring you.”

  He laughed again, but this close, it was like a caress.

  “Your body’s listening to me, even if you don’t want to, Bea.” He cupped her fully, his fingertips finding her hard nipples. He traced each peak in slow circles before plucking at them. Bea shivered, gasping her next words.

  “You said there was no us.”

  “Fine,” he said coolly, his own voice steady, as if he weren’t rhythmically palming her, rocking her back against his hard cock. “Let’s talk about work.”

  Her knees weakened. She wanted him naked against her, around her and inside her. She wanted the scalding, slightly suffocating weight of his pistoning body on top of her. She wanted…boy did she.

  But she was angry at him, and her anger clouded the desire, tainted it, left a dry sourness in her mouth. She lifted her hands to pull his long, lean fingers from their dizzying work.

  “I’m leaving, remember?”

  “The fuck you’re leaving,” he said, seductive and forceful.

  Bea drew a breath in through her teeth. She wanted to doubt his sincerity, but she’d never known Eli to be purposefully dishonest. He’d come here at damned near midnight to see her, and she could count on one hand the number of times he’d even been outside her building over the past two years, let alone inside it.

  She wanted to believe he’d decided to give them a chance. Her heart was raw and wary and, as of this moment, she could still carry the secret of her love for him without further rejection. If she turned him away. If she was sensible.

  He felt so good behind her. He felt like exactly what she’d wanted for years.

  Sense was overrated, anyway.

  Eli’s heart was three seconds from bucking out of his chest. He was grateful that she couldn’t see his face, wouldn’t be able to tell that he was nauseated with nerves.

  Do it. Everything you’ve fantasized about, every game you’ve ever played in your head with this woman. Get it together.

  “You messed up the financials for Bows and Eros.”

  Make it slow, savor it. He held his breath.

  She snorted and started to turn, but he pushed into her, fisting his hands against the washer top. His body was a wall behind her, her back hot against his chest.

  “Ah, ah, ah.” The whisper of space between them grew even more heated.

  She touched him, her fingers feather soft, tracing from his knuckles to his wrist, over and back, over and back. He buried his face in her hair, which smelled of shampoo, clean and cool.

  “I checked those three times, you know that. You signed the finals.” A quiver rounded the ends of her soft words with a subtle, tremulous vibrato.

  “Three dollars and seventy-five cents off on the final bid, Miss London,” he clarified. He reached out and upset the stacks of quarters. The hum of the washer sparked a wicked idea that filled him with a deep, thrilling wave of arousal. An idea that primed him nearly to the point of pain.

  “In life, Bea, you know it’s the little things that really count. The things that matter years down the road.”

  His hands flattened again and she covered them, interlacing their fingers. His voice was low and foreign to his ears, the husk of want evident, and the edge that came out almost predatory.

  “You mean more to me than I’ve told you, Bea, I…” A lump jammed in his throat and he couldn’t get the words out. She had to know that he was ready, that he was here for her.

  “Elijah,” she said, “if this is about three dollars, I’ll gladly reimburse you.”

  Oh, right. The game. The play, the back and forth that he hoped would lead to a replete, euphoric end. One that concluded with Bea wrapped in his arms, languid and sated as he peppered her face with soft kisses and whispered…

  I love you.

  “Three dollars and seventy-five cents,” he corrected her. His gut tightene
d. Fear made him tremble as he lifted a hand to gather her hair to one side. She didn’t flinch when he raked his teeth down her neck to suckle at the spot where her shoulder began.

  Her voice warmed, taking on the same rasp as his. “Eli…”

  He skimmed a hand over her hip, plucking at the waistband of her shorts.

  She arched and actually, hot damn, shoved her ass against him. He let go of her to scoop up a handful of the quarters.

  “Open the washer next to you,” he said roughly, his lips moving whisper-soft over her jaw. Her spine stiffened and she reached out with trembling fingers to feel for the lid. “Hurry.”

  Bea found the edge of the lid and shoved it open, the metal clanging as it met the back of the washer. Eli gathered the quarters in one hand and threaded his fingers through the heavy fall of hair at the nape of Bea’s neck. He made a slow fist.

  “Watch.”

  One word, but she obeyed. The stream of bright quarters cascaded into the steaming wash water. She started to turn to him. Two commanding hands on her shoulders, he bent her over the washer and stepped back. She didn’t resist and a thrill, hot and powerful, raced through him. It was followed by that same sliver of guilt, the worry that this was wrong. When he hesitated, she looked back over her shoulder. Her eyes held all the fire he had hoped for, and none of the recrimination he had expected.

  “A safe word.” He blurted. He had to be sure. He couldn’t go through the same horror with Bea.

  “Completion.” She didn’t hesitate.

  It was as if someone had let him out of a cage, off a very tight leash. He had imprisoned himself. He had tangled himself up. No more.

  “Bea, these years you’ve been with me have been good. Very good. But let’s talk about this error.” Her fingers tightened on the edge of the washer, as pretty a sight as he had possibly ever seen.

  “Put your hands flat on the machine,” he said, low, yanking his tie loose, shrugging off his jacket.

  She uncurled her hands, her eyes shining. “Eli, I don’t know what this…”

  “Yes, you do. You do know what it’s about. Now put your hands on the machine.” She put her hands, palms flat, on the top of the washer, and cocked an eyebrow at him.