by Kent, Julia
“Michaels.”
Her eyes widened. Somewhere in her twenties, she was exactly the kind of woman people assumed were his type. Long, silky brown hair. Big eyes. Great cheekbones. A v-neck top that showed everything but her belly button. If he wanted to, he could take her out for lunch and have a nooner with her in her car. Or a spare office.
Fucking a receptionist, though, wasn’t part of the plan. It also wasn’t part of Dylan’s heart. Dead to the idea, he only had room for Laura right now. The receptionist perked up, tilting her head and brushing her hair forward, over her clavicle. “Oh, yeah, Laura! What beautiful flowers. I’m Debbie.”
He nodded. “Dylan.” Her eyebrows arched as she looked him up and down, appraising him like a piece of meat. Oh, boy. Being hit on like this didn’t surprise him.
Having zero internal response did.
“Yeah, I need to deliver them. You know the drill.” He leaned on the desk, peering into her eyes. Play it up, man, if it could get him what he wanted. “Somebody must really appreciate her.” He eyed the flowers; the spread was gorgeous. The receptionist’s could be, too, and from her body language it was clear he could dabble in it at his discretion. “So, can you tell me where her office is?”
“Oh, oh no, you can just leave those here. She’s...I don’t want to disturb her right now.” A look of fake sympathy washed over her face as she created a reason to wave him closer. He obliged, his nose inches from her as she whispered, “She...she actually...well, I’m kind of glad to see the flowers here because she seemed a little upset this morning and we managed to pry it out of her that she was having some man problems.”
“Oh, gotcha.” He ran a hand through his thick hair, drawing attention to his face, posing just a little. One of his model poses that he knew would show off his biceps. Debbie practically ate him with her eyes. “Oh, man, I hate guys like that.” Dylan shook his head. “Just, you know...it makes me want to be a better man. Flowers don’t solve everything. You can’t be a dick and expect a few roses to fix it all.”
Ding. That seemed to get her, and now all he had to do was go in for the kill. “You know, if she’s had that rough a time, I think it would be better if I just brought these in and delivered them myself and that way, you know, give her a little extra perk up to a crappy day.”
He wasn’t even making any sense at this point, but it didn’t matter; he could have been reciting the Pledge of Allegiance for all Debbie the Receptionist seemed to care. She was practically drooling. “Yeah, sure. Room 311,” she said, pointing vaguely down a hallway.
“Thanks so much, Hon,” he answered. Following her directions, knowing that if he turned back around her eyeballs would be glued to his ass, he sought out room 311. Down a corridor, past the coffee machine, past the bathroom, and then...whoa! Some tiny little interior office. Poor Laura didn’t even have a window. Maybe being a business analyst wasn’t as glamorous as he’d thought. He knocked softly.
“Just a minute,” shouted the voice from the other side. Yup, that was her. This was going to be one wild surprise. Steeling himself, he arranged the latte in one hand and the flowers in the other, trying to decide whether to smile or not. Too cheesy? When she opened the door, her expression was not quite what he expected. He thought he might see surprise. He thought he might even see fear.
Disgust had never occurred to him.
“Dylan, what are you doing here?” She glanced around the hallway as if his mere presence were something she wanted to hide from others.
“I’m delivering roses from an admirer,” he said, piling on more charm, hoping this was going to take.
“Really? Aren’t they better suited for your girlfriend?”
Where was that one coming from? “My girlfriend? What girlfriend?” he asked.
Someone at the copier a couple of offices down paused and craned their neck, their ear perked, catching whatever wave of gossip they could grab from the conversation he and Laura were having right here in the hall and he took that as a cue.
Nodding toward the person he said “Do you really want to have this conversation out here?”
Her face changed. She glanced over. “No, I don’t.” Ice Queen voice. If she could be any colder she’d be a glacial shelf in the Arctic. Ouch.
“Please, let me come in and let’s talk, ‘cause I don’t have a girlfriend and I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
She frowned, seeming to consider her options. Finally, she reached for the flowers, grabbed the latte with a yank, turned around and left the door open. He took that as an opportunity, stepped through and closed the door. She set the flowers on a filing cabinet and took a swig of the coffee.
The room was the most boring office he’d seen— and he was a firefighter, so he’d seen his share. At least the fluorescent lights didn’t blink on and off like crazy and trigger eye tics. Everything was beige. The floor was beige. The walls were beige. Nope, change that. Putty, he had recently learned, was the official name of the most boring shade ever. He’d learned that because he’d had to do some requisition forms for some boring filing cabinets. Replacing some pre-World War II office equipment at the firehouse.
None of that mattered. What mattered was that the dozen and a half roses that he bought were by far the only color in the room other than Laura’s perfect lime-green sweater covered by a nice double-breasted suit. She leaned back against the front of her desk, her butt forming beautiful curves against the edge, her arms crossed over her now-swelling breasts. He could tell that she was aroused just by the sight of him, but could also tell that her anger ran deep.
Where on earth had this come from? he wondered. At least he had some explanation for why she’d fled his bed at three in the morning. She thought he had a girlfriend? What the hell had Mike been telling her? Wait, that didn’t make any sense, ‘cause Mike swore up and down he hadn’t said a word about them to her. So...what?
“Why do you think I have a girlfriend?” he asked.
She said, “Well, when your bedroom is plastered with pictures of someone who looks like she was part of the Olympic beach volleyball team, it’s kinda hard to come to any other conclusion.” She gestured down at her belly and hips. “I, obviously, wasn’t picked to play for that team.”
“My bedroom pictures?” Huh? “Oh, my God!” he said, washing his face with his hand, rubbing his eye until he calmed himself down. “Jesus, Laura. That’s not my girlfriend. That’s Jill!”
She snorted. “So who’s Jill? Your wife?”
“Jill is my...man, this is complicated.”
“Yeah...” she replied, drawing out the word. “It’s always complicated. It was complicated with the last guy I dated. Seriously—he turned out to be married, too.”
“Oh, so you think...oh, no, Laura, Laura, no!” Dylan shook his head. “Jill’s dead. Jill’s my...my...former lover.” The words came out like a mouthful of packing peanuts. How could he describe Jill? She was just Jill. Giving her a label reduced her to so much less than she had been.
“Dead?”
“Yeah. She died of cancer eighteen months ago.”
“And so you have pict—oh! Oh, oh, no, Dylan, I’ve made such a big mistake!” she cried. All of the anger drained out of her voice, her hushed tones triggering more hope than mourning in him.
“I didn’t bring it up because it was just our first date, Laura,” Dylan explained. “But no, those are pictures of Jill. We—” watch it, Dylan “I was with Jill for almost 10 years. And, she, well...she died. She has, she had non-Hodgkins lymphoma. And there was nothing the doctors could do after really trying everything. So, that’s...that’s my girlfriend, as you put it.”
He stuffed his hands in his pockets and stared at the industrial carpet for a few seconds, then looked up at her. “Is that why you’ve been putting me off? Is that why you’ve been ignoring all of my messages, my texts, my voice mail—because you got up in the middle of the night and saw some pictures of this...of some woman and jumped to one hell of a conclus
ion?”
Oh, shit! Laura thought. She could see the anger forming in him and she couldn’t blame him.
So all this time Laura had been blocking him, hiding from him—no, running away from him—and had fled straight into Mike’s arms because she thought he had a wife or girlfriend? Damn it! Leaving Jill’s pictures all over his bedroom had been just part of his life; he’d never even considered taking them down. Hadn’t really noticed them as part of the scenery. They were just there.
It gave him pause now. Was he really over Jill? He knew Mike wasn’t, had never even begun to heal, but Dylan assumed he was past the worst of it, and that Jill would just remain as a lingering “what if.” The three of them had started to talk about having kids the year before she was diagnosed. That potential had been shut down fast by chemotherapy and radiation and just getting through life day by day. Whatever remained of Jill inside him, though, was bigger than he had realized. If a bunch of pictures were that overwhelming and made Laura think he was a two-timer, then it was time to re-evaluate himself.
Laura’s entire demeanor had changed from a defensive, angry countenance to one of apology and self-reproach. “Dylan, I don’t know what to say. I am such an idiot! Idiot, idiot, idiot!” She lightly smacked her forehead with each repetition of the word. He smiled. Ah, how well he knew that feeling.
“I totally see where you made that leap, Laura.” He closed his eyes and inhaled, partly to figure out what to say next and partly because the room was so cold and corporate it was giving him the heeby-jeebies. “We haven’t known each other for very long.” He took a step toward her. She didn’t move back. Good, good. “And I can only imagine what it was like to wake up in the middle of the night in my bedroom.” Step. “Surrounded by pictures of Jill.” Step. Two more steps and he’d be within range to reach out and touch her.
Gorgeous, long blonde hair pulled tightly back made her look like a cold career woman and less like the Laura he’d fallen for on their date. She seemed remote, but as her face melted into something he recognized—arousal and intrigue—his heart warmed and a little swagger grew in him. He had a chance here. As the seconds passed, the odds leaned more and more in his favor. He glanced at the door. A lock.
Good. They would need it.
She relaxed against her desk, letting her arms drop from across her chest, and casually unbuttoned her suit jacket. Her fingers fluttered to her mouth, a gesture of contemplation as she seemed to measure what she was about to say.
“I need to say something.” Here it comes. She’s going to tell me about Mike. She pulled on her lower lip with her index finger, then touched a loose strand of hair, twirling it in her fingers, the gesture making her seem much younger and achingly vulnerable. “Guys like you don’t go after women like me,” she said quietly.
“Oh, come on, Laura—that’s not—”
Palms facing out, she made him stop mid-word. “Let me say my piece.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Her furrowed brow made him worried he’d mis-stepped. “You are a former model. Women pay thousands of dollars to go out on a bachelor auction date with you.”
He choked. “You know that?”
“I Googled you. There are more images of you than there are links about you, Dylan.”
“Oh,” he said. Anything more would seem like he was bragging. The swagger grew. How about that? Nice.
Looking down, she stared pointedly at her belly, her legs, and used her hands to flow down her body. “So what does a guy who looks like you want with a woman who looks like me?”
“I—”
“That night with you was unreal. Un-fucking-real. A little too unreal, you know? When I woke up and saw all those pictures of this surf-n-ski bunny all over you—”
“Jill wasn’t—”
“I’m sure she was more than that. Really.” She cocked her head and seemed to have a sudden flash of insight, but whatever it was she kept it to herself. This conversation most definitely was not going where he’d thought it would, but it was fine. Laura was sharing. Her willingness to be this open, this real, reminded him of Jill. How lucky was he? And why hadn’t other men seen the goodness in her? They—not Laura—were the true idiots.
“Laura—”
“So I ran.” Tears filled her eyes. “It was too good to be true. In my mind, you were just another asshole, like Ryan.”
“Who’s Ryan?”
“The last guy I dated before we met. He turned out to be married.”
“Ouch.”
“Yeah. See why I ran? Why I blocked you? I just— we’re so different, and I assumed you just wanted a one-night stand. So I gave you one.”
Now, Dylan. Now. Two more steps and he was there. A hand was all he needed. A hand was all she could handle right now. The soft whisper of his skin against the tightly-woven wool of her jacket’s arm sounded like a Greek chorus of chiding. It was good enough, though.
She glanced at his hand but didn’t shake him off, didn’t step away. Instead, she sighed, a tiny smile on her lips.
“Laura, it’s not like that.”
“And when you pursued me! Wouldn’t stop messaging me and texting me and calling and—Jesus, Dylan, you are persistent!” Her throaty laughter made him harden, his entire body seizing, breath hitching. If he wasn’t careful he’d groan, and the sound might scare her off. Oh, how he ached for her.
Easy, boy. Don’t overplay this.
Using every ounce of restraint he possessed, he leaned in toward her, his hand now stroking her forearm. “You’re worth pursuing.”
Indecision flickered in her eyes. Or was it disbelief? Had it really only been a handful of days since their date? And in the meantime, she’d started dating Mike, had slept with Mike, and now here he was chasing after her. She wouldn’t say a word about Mike; he knew that. And she didn’t have to, because what was he to her right now? Some guy she’d ditched in his bed because she thought he was screwing with her (literally and figuratively) and she left to protect whatever vestige of integrity and self-respect she had deep inside.
Walking out of his apartment in the middle of the night was an act of courage for Laura; he could see that now. It was her way of stepping back from the last bastard who had dallied with her. Dating Mike was an even bigger step, and he felt a rush of mixed emotions overpower him, filling his mind and veins and heart. That she liked Mike gave him tremendous hope. That she was willing to talk to him right now gave him more.
Getting her to accept them both and their unconventional relationship would take something greater, though. Something bold. Something that could cut to her core and transmit a very clear, very safe message that she was amazing and adorable and lovely and—everything they wanted.
Never one to back down from a challenge, and often the guy who took stupid risks, he felt one well up within him right now. Without thinking, he stepped back and put his hands on his hips. “I’m really angry right now.”
She blinked, her face shifting to confusion. “What?” Then the wall came down hard. “At me?”
“No. At all the assholes over the years who have mindfucked you and convinced you that you’re somehow less than amazing.”
Breathe, Laura. Breathe. When Dylan had walked into her office with a batch of flowers she had nearly died on the spot. Died dead. The last person she ever expected to grace the halls of the thirty-second floor at the Stohlman Industries building, Dylan had sauntered in like he owned the place. That was him, though—he walked with such confidence, a natural fluidity and power that said I’m here.
He really was here right now.
Here. In front of her.
Oh, God. Mike.
How could she want both Dylan and Mike? In her dreams she wanted them both, alright—at the same time. Threesome fantasies had become all-pervasive, filling her mind during quarterly accounting meetings, code reviews, train rides and coffee runs and hell—even when she clipped her nails. She couldn’t get these two out of her mind and had found herself not only enj
oying Mike more and more, but pining away for Dylan.
Who she had written off as a two-timing douche.
Boy, had she been wrong. Egg on her face and all that. A dead girlfriend? Could she have made a worse call? The light pressure from his hand on her arm felt like a branding burn, his heat so strong it emanated, rays of warmth and fire pouring through the cloth and onto her eager skin. How could his touch—a simple gesture of compassion—fuel so much arousal and deep yearning within her?
Mike.
And what about Mike? They weren’t exclusive, so she didn’t have to feel guilty about these reactions to Dylan, yet she did feel tremendously conflicted, because it was Mike. Nice, amazing, contemplative, easygoing Mike. Sex with him had been mindblowing, too. She couldn’t compare.
Why on earth was she thinking any of this in flashes of a second as Dylan’s eyes undressed her right here, in this drab office, her body moistening and pooling into a heap of hormones and cravings under his soulful eye? That familiar itch between her legs made her nearly groan aloud, for she knew what it meant.
Torment.
She wanted Dylan. Now. On her desk and in her. As she glanced down she saw her sweater, pooched a bit at her belly, right where the waistband of her skirt rested. Did he mean it? She wasn’t Jill. Would never be Jill. Couldn’t be the chick with fifteen percent body fat and legs like a beach volleyball addict. Oh, sure, she could surf. And ski. And maybe run with an inhaler and an ambulance driving two miles an hour behind her. Give her an Olympic bar and some squat racks and she’d do fine with the guys, lifting in the weight room, but they’d outlift her easily.
Call it whatever you wanted—fluffy, zaftig, fat, big and beautiful, plus-sized, curvy, big girl—this was her, and she wasn’t changing. Could Dylan (and Mike! Don’t forget Mike!) really want her? The fat girl?
His eyes changed, softening with a dark intensity, his lips parting slightly, his body moving closer. Unmistakable body language. Yeah. He really was into her.
