Cold feet was the reason. Come this morning she’d felt the embarrassment anew but was determined to face him. She had decided to be professional and polite and by the time she delivered him a second cup of coffee, she’d planned on saying something like, “Sorry I freaked out. Care to try again?”
Evidently, grumpy Eli was back and he wasn’t interested in trying again. No…disinterest didn’t seem to be what drove him. More like his feelings were hurt and he had erected a great big wall too tall for her to scale.
Fine.
He wanted things to be this way, and she could accommodate him. If Isa was anything, she was professional. She could learn about the construction business. Google was her best friend.
She sat down, emptied her tote, and fired up her computer. Then she dug in to the files next to her and set her sights on success.
* * *
Hours later, Isa stretched her arms overhead, blinking her grainy eyes at the time on her computer. Three o’clock! She surveyed the damage around her laptop as if seeing it for the first time. A browning apple core, an empty yogurt cup, and a wrapper for a granola bar had been cast aside amid piles.
Piles. On her normally tidy workstation.
She’d researched and read and organized. She’d fashioned a clunky schedule and worked up a spreadsheet for the budget. The only thing left to do was hand it over to Eli for his approval. She stood, her back giving an unhappy pop! since she’d neglected to get up and move around.
Angling for his office, she reminded herself again that she was a professional. Who probably shouldn’t make out with her boss or think of making out with her boss every time she looked at him.
Sucking in a steeling breath, she stepped up to the dividing wall that she’d come to think of as the Great Wall of Eli, prepared to confront him. This time there’d be no sexy distractions. No high heels, no short skirt, no revealed cleavage. She’d go in, hand him the file, and turn around and leave.
She poked her head around the corner, fist poised to knock. It took her mind a moment to wrap itself around what she was seeing.
Eli, doubled over, one hand grasping the edge of his desk, his lips peeled into a grimace. His other hand was wrapped around one knee, his knuckles white.
“Eli!”
She rushed to him and he spared her a surprised glance—he hadn’t heard her coming—and his eyes radiated so much pain, she swore she felt it herself. She rushed to comfort him, placing a hand on one rock-hard shoulder, the muscles in his arm standing out and strung as tight as cables.
“Get out!” His growl was accompanied by a glare, but the glare melted into a mask of pain when another wave attacked.
“What happened?” Her voice was borderline hysterical when she knelt on the floor and put her hand over his.
“Go!” His voice was low, not as loud, the one word fading as his face contorted again.
She’d read about this.
Phantom pain. Most amputees experienced everything from searing hot spikes to tickling to electrically charged nerve pain in the limb that wasn’t there. Meditation helped. Mirror therapy helped. And so did someone massaging the area that wasn’t actually flesh and bone any longer.
“Is it your knee?” she asked.
He blew out a stuttered breath through his teeth rather than answer.
She grasped his cheeks, her hands brushing against his soft facial hair as she forced him to look at her. “Is it your knee?”
“Foot,” he managed, his blue eyes watering.
She’d bet her bank account he was referring to the foot that wasn’t there. She moved a hand to his knee but this time he didn’t push her away. Then she moved down his prosthesis, which she could feel through the leg of his pants.
“No,” he said on an exhale, but he didn’t physically try to stop her.
“I’m going to help. Do you want to stop hurting or not?” She pegged him with a challenging glare of her own. Eli held her eyes for a few seconds before finally giving a small but reluctant nod of permission.
She kept sliding her hand down. When she reached his tennis shoe and untied the laces, Eli snatched her wrist.
“You have to trust me. It’s nothing I haven’t seen before.” When he continued frowning, she explained. “The morning you were doing sit-ups?”
“You mean when you couldn’t look at me?” He gritted the words out between his teeth, a sheen of sweat glistening on his temple.
This beautiful idiot. He thought she was what…disgusted by him? Turned off by him? Nothing could have been further from the truth.
She kept her eyes on his when she told him what he’d obviously overlooked. “I couldn’t look at you that day because I was so attracted to you I couldn’t breathe.”
The pain in his eyes receded some as he puzzled out this newfound fact. His fingers once again flinched around her wrist.
“Eli. Let me go so I can help you.”
He released her, jaw working as he watched her untie and slip off his shoe. She returned her attention to his leg, straightening the prosthesis and resting the foot on her thigh. She dug a finger into the arch through his sock. “Here?”
He winced, unable to look at her, or maybe unwilling.
“Here?” She tried again, sliding her fingers down.
“Higher.”
She moved her fingers up and massaged the false foot, watching as the pain melted from his handsome face. He let out a deep breath with a whoosh but didn’t close his eyes. He watched her touch him. He needed to in order to send his brain the memo that the pained area was getting tended to. Despite feeling unsure of herself, she continued massaging his prosthetic foot until Eli’s shoulders visibly unknotted.
When his hand rested gently on her shoulder, she stopped. He pulled his foot from her thigh.
“I wasn’t sure I was doing that right.” She gave him a weak smile and noticed her hands were shaking. That was intense.
“It’s stupid,” he mumbled.
“It not stupid. You suffered a major injury. One that took the lives of two of your friends and literally took a part of you. There’s nothing stupid about what happened to you, Eli.”
His eyes went to where she sat on her knees in front of him, then flicked to her mouth and danced around her face. She had to explain. Had to tell him why she’d run out on him that night like Cinderella at the stroke of midnight.
“Saturday night, I—”
Without warning, he grabbed hold of her ponytail, tipped her head back, and lowered his lips to hers.
The meeting of their mouths was electric on contact, shooting sparks into her bloodstream and erasing her mind of the explanation she’d been ready to give. The same undeniable force saturated the air no matter what they did, where they were, or what she wore.
Pure, unadulterated attraction.
His tongue slipped along the seam of her mouth and she rested her hands on his thighs, opening her lips to let him in, to taste him. She dug her fingers into his leg muscles, being careful to ease the pressure when she worried she might be hurting him. He hauled her up by the waist to thoroughly explore her mouth.
“Tell me to stop,” he said between kisses.
“Why?” She allowed her tongue to graze the soft hair of his returning beard. “Will you?”
“Yes.” He cupped her ass and met her eyes. “But I don’t want to stop, Sable. Not until you’re naked and satisfied and out of breath.”
She stroked his face with her hand. “Then I’d be a fool to ask you to stop.”
“Agreed.” His mouth twitched.
She’d amused him, and herself quite frankly.
Isa stood, bringing her breasts to eye level with him, but his gaze stayed locked on her face. Standing over him as he sat on his office chair, his chest expanding with each breath, she couldn’t think of anything she wanted more than him.
So she’d have him.
She unbuttoned the first button on her dress, watching as Eli swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing with the mov
ement.
“If only you had your knife,” she joked as she slipped another button free. “This process could be so much faster.”
“Don’t tempt me.” His voice was choked with lust instead of pain, which she preferred.
Another button open, then another, and she untied the fabric belt at her waist. His fingers dug into his thighs as he watched her slip the upper half of the dress off her shoulders. She may have dressed plainly for work today, but underneath she wore a silk cami and panties—both navy to match her dress. Judging by Eli’s shell-shocked reaction to seeing them, she’d chosen well. Not that she’d expected to strip for him, but now that she had…
May as well keep going.
She took a step forward to stand between his legs. He swept his hands up her skirt, to the backs of her thighs, his eyes following her fingers as she ran them down her neck and tucked her thumbs into the straps of the cami.
Then slowly, slowly slipped those straps aside…
* * *
Eli felt a bead of sweat trickle down his temple as he watched Isa strip for him. She had teased him by sliding the straps over her shoulders, and from the heated glint in her eyes, he could tell she wasn’t done yet. The more skin she revealed, the more he wanted to see.
She kept teasing him, tucking her fingers into the cups and tugging the material down to expose her breasts. She ran the tips of her fingers over dusky nipples that pebbled beneath her touch. By the time she circled in the other direction, closing her eyes and dropping her head back, Eli’s erection was full tilt. He was couldn’t sit idly by a second longer.
Splaying one hand across her back, he tugged her to him, closing his lips over one waiting breast and cupping the other with his free palm. Her hands went to his hair, kneading his scalp. He laved his tongue over and over her nipple, reveling in the sounds she made—soft, sensual, keening moans he hadn’t heard in far too long.
Sex. He needed it.
He needed her.
He dragged his mouth to her other breast as his hands went to work on the buttons remaining on her dress. Soon it was on the floor behind her, his hands roaming over her smooth-as-silk skin to a pair of scant panties.
Correction: thong.
He slipped his thumb around the tiny piece of material and skimmed along her bare bottom. Her fingers pushed and pulled through his hair, her breath sucking through her teeth as one magic word exited her lips.
“Yes.”
“Yes to what?” His lips left her breast to snake down her torso, then he drew a line with his tongue along the waistband of her panties.
“Yes to you. Yes to right now.” She kicked off her shoes. She put one knee on his chair, then the other. When she was straddling him, she sank slowly onto his lap as he held on to her plush body. “Yes to this.”
She ground against his hard-on, and he bit down on his lip. Pure pleasure saturated his bloodstream. His hold on her tightened as she slipped over his cock, mimicking what they could be doing naked if she gave him the chance.
“What say you?” she asked, a naughty smile playing on her full mouth.
He stopped her, holding her over his erection as he reached for the lap drawer on his desk.
Her lips curved when she saw the scissors.
“In case of emergency.” He lifted the string of her thong and snipped. “This is an emergency.”
She bent to kiss him as he discarded her ruined thong and rummaged with one hand in the drawer again. It was in there somewhere—aha. She pulled her lips away from his when he dropped a condom on the desk. He shut the drawer with a slam.
“Do you always keep condoms in your office?”
“No.” He’d put the condom in there Saturday night. He’d come in here to work, frustrated about how the evening had ended, and emptied his pockets into the lap drawer. He didn’t want to explain. He just wanted to feel human. Wanted to feel her. Wanted to feel something other than pain and guilt and frustration.
She lifted his T-shirt and he undid his belt. By the time they were both fumbling with his zipper, he lost his concentration and kissed the breasts hovering in front of his face again. Isa tasted of heaven, her cinnamon-spice fragrance abrading his brain. Her light brown skin glimmered like gold in the firelight from the hearth behind him, a trick of the light that infused her hair with bands of copper.
“Been a while.” She shook the condom packet in her hand.
“For me or for you?” He snatched it away and tore open the gold foil, working the latex over his length as quickly and carefully as he could.
“Me, definitely,” she said. “You, probably.”
“Maybe I’ve been waiting.” Sheathed, he turned his attention back to the gorgeous woman hovering over his cock.
“For?”
“You.” On the word, he slipped the tip along her smooth folds. “What were you waiting for?”
Had she been waiting for a prince charming, or any man who didn’t treat her as a ticket to a free ride to her parents’ company? Did she need sex or closeness or both?
She leaned close and licked her lips, hovering over him but never fully seating herself. “You,” she breathed.
She sank down and he gripped her hips, breaching her entrance as both of them let out a long, satisfied sigh. Isa licked her full lips, scrunching her eyes closed. He brushed a few stray strands of her hair aside that had wrestled from her ponytail.
“Sable. Are you okay?”
Those whiskey eyes opened, focused on him, pupils dilated. A grin spread her lush mouth and she tilted her hips, taking him in until there wasn’t any more of him to take.
“I’m better than okay, Eli.” She placed her hands on his shoulders and began to move, her rhythmic motions syncing with his clumsier ones. With one shoe off, he had no leverage on his right side. His foot slipped on the floor.
“Fuck.”
“Hey.” Warm hands closed over his face as she rerouted his gaze to hers, knocking every frustrated thought from his brain. “We’ve got this.”
Holding his cheeks with her palms, her dark eyes locked on his, she slid off his cock and then lowered slowly, impaling herself again. Lost in her eyes and the truncated breaths they shared, Eli’s mind blanked.
Isa set the pace, an agonizing one, and he shifted his focus to her raspberry-tipped breasts and the feel of her tight channel as she rode him. Every rise and fall scooted the chair’s wheels across the floor until they bumped into the edge of the hearth, her plush bottom cradled in his hands.
She picked up the pace, slamming down onto his lap. Riding him until he felt a lightning bolt strike his spine and streak to his balls.
He held fast, his arms wrapped around her back, his face against her breasts as he used his upper body to move her a few final pumps.
His release hit him so hard, spots appeared behind his eyelids, a primal growl tearing from his throat. It took him several blissed-out moments to settle, to catch his breath, to come to, for God’s sake. When he did, he became aware of his surroundings one by one.
Isa’s fingertips in his hair.
Her pillowy breasts pressing against the side of his face.
Her lips closing over his forehead as she caught her breath.
“Sorry.” He shifted and placed a kiss on her chin. “I owe you one.”
Her dark eyes blinked and as a relaxed—and yeah, satisfied—smile pulled her lips, he questioned his need to apologize.
“Maybe I’m not sorry.” His lips quirked into what felt like a dopey smile, but hell if he cared. He hadn’t felt this good in forever. If ever.
“No apologies necessary.” She kissed him briefly, but he held her head gently and finished the kiss the way he wanted.
Wet.
Deep.
Soft.
He was rewarded with another of her smiles, one he’d put there, which made him damn happy.
“It’s understandable you didn’t notice my enjoyment since I laid yours on pretty thick.” She flicked her tongue over his top lip a
nd whispered, “Emphasis on the thick.”
Okay, definitely sporting a full-on dopey grin now.
“I like this.” She touched the corner of his mouth. “I’ve been trying to get you to smile since I started working here.”
“Well now you know how to do it.” He hugged her closer, enjoying her warm laughter and the ease between them. This was what had been missing Saturday. They’d both been on edge, uncomfortable. The attraction had been there, but not like this. He raked his fingers into her hair, wrestled it from the elastic, and let her hair fall down her back and over her smooth shoulders.
She shifted and he moved to help, both of them talking in hushed tones.
“You should—”
“I should—”
They shared a nervous smile.
“Right,” she said. “Do you need my help with…anything?”
“No.” More importantly, he didn’t want her to help. “I have it. If you could just…give me a minute.”
“Oh, sure. I’ll just…” She lifted off him and they took a moment to appreciate the slow slide of him leaving her body. “Be out there,” she finished on a breath. Hastily, she gathered her clothes and trotted away from him.
He sat frozen on his chair watching her ass sway and her hair trickle like a black waterfall to the middle of her back. The way her golden skin seemed to shimmer as she stepped from his office into the interrupting daylight.
Best damn idea he’d had in a long time, he thought with a grin.
The Bastard Billionaire Page 13
