A restless night of very sexual dreams—and a buzzing brain from the late-night espresso, not her best decision ever—had her resolved to test him, just a little. At least to see if she could entice him into opening up some about his personal life. Despite his cool reserve and overall genial nature, he had a kind of sadness about him. Could be the divorce had wrecked him. That was what Nancy in accounting said, that he’d lateraled over from a sister firm in the UK after his ex cleaned him out.
Though he seemed far from destitute. Maybe Nancy meant cleaned out emotionally or some such. Heavens knew her own folks had divorced over twelve years before and her dad had taken years to recover from it, though he’d finally remarried. Her mom did a lot better, but women did, didn’t they? Hung out with their friends and went on girl vacations—or with Amber and her sisters—but her dad had spent a lot of time alone. Or at work. Just like Alexander Knight.
She debated a bit over what to wear. Alec hadn’t said. Would he be wearing one of his suits? Did he ever wear anything else? No Casual Friday for him, that was for sure.
In the end, she dithered too long if she was going to catch the train in time to get there by seven. So she went with what she wanted to wear—a white halter-top sundress and flat sandals—pulled her hair up into a ponytail high on the crown of her head, and dashed out the door with only minutes to spare.
Then, of course, being a Saturday, the trains ran differently and the weekend desk guard didn’t know her, taking forever to check her ID. She blew in ten minutes late, flustered, and was greeted by the ever-unflappable Alec, who raised an eyebrow at her hasty entrance.
“Sorry I’m late!” To make up for it, she plopped herself into her chair, pulled the laptop out of her carry bag and booted it up, pretending not to see the Starbucks bag and venti cup sitting nearby. Restraining herself from offering a flurry of excuses and further apologies.
“Indeed,” he said in that coolly polite tone. “I’m most disappointed in you, Ms. Dolors.”
Well shit. Perversely, guilt made her feel defensive. “You know, you can call me Amber.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” His pen scratched on the paper in the ensuing silence. Not in a suit, but still far from casually dressed, he wore pressed trousers and a soft violet dress shirt, open at the collar. “Have your breakfast, lest it get cold. I forgot to ask what you wanted, but I think I got your usual correct.”
Picking up the cup, she deciphered the barista’s shorthand. Nonfat peppermint mocha twist. And an egg white wrap in the bag. Bemused she took it out, casting him a long look. How had it happened that Alexander Knight noticed what she typically grabbed from Starbucks?
“Exactly right,” she told him. “Thank you.”
When he barely grunted in reply, she had to keep going. “It says Alex on the cup.”
“Yes. You Americans think it should be Alex and not Alec, as is proper.”
“Alexander is spelled with an x, not a c,” she pointed out.
He raised his head, dark eyes sweeping her from head to foot, simmering with something that wasn’t impatience, though he tried to make it look that way. “Do you intend to while away the morning discussing nicknames on both sides of the pond?”
She grinned at him, just to watch his eyes narrow. “No, sir.”
“Then get to work, lest I be forced to add laggardly habits to your list of transgressions.”
Watching him over the rim of her cup, feeling a bit giddy, both from the sexual tension coming off of him and the sugar and caffeine hitting her bloodstream, she decided not to say anything about the items on this supposed list—and what the punishments might be for them. Instead, she said, “Can I call you Alec?”
“No.”
“You let some random Starbucks barista call you Alex but not your faithful assistant who gave up her weekend to be your work slave and who found something really interesting when she worked even later last night?”
“You’re not going to bait me. The next words out of your mouth had better be something of interest in Curlew’s records.”
“How about that I think I found the data from the missing months?”
That got his attention. He focused that sharp dark gaze on her, nostrils flaring as if he caught the scent of something. “Misfiled, were they?”
“Mislabeled for sure. You should see.”
He hesitated, infinitesimally, then rose and came down the table, peering at the screen and what she pointed out. Walking him through the way the files appeared to have been deliberately buried, her skin prickled with his proximity. And with the certainty that his gaze had brushed over the rise of her breasts from the neckline of the sundress. The exposed back of her neck warmed. The scent of coffee on his breath and his spicy aftershave combined to give her the sense that they were sharing an intimate morning together, perhaps after a long night of sex.
“Well done,” he murmured. And touched her bare shoulder.
Barely a brush of his fingertips, a pat of approval, thoughtlessly done perhaps, but it jolted through her as if she’d put her finger in an electric socket. Her nipples hardened in a flash and she went instantly wet. Impossible that such chaste contact could turn her inside out so fast and yet...she pressed her lips together against a soft moan of longing.
Catching his breath, he stopped, hand motionless on her arm, a long, still moment. Then he dragged his fingers up again, stroking against her skin, an excruciatingly slow caress full of sensuality, rounding the curve of her shoulder.
Pausing at the strap of her halter.
Then moving up to feather over her throat. Down to trace her collarbone.
She stayed perfectly still, as if any movement on her part might scare him off. Send him back into his remote formality. He cleared his throat and she heard him swallow.
“Forgive me,” he said, voice rough. But he didn’t take his hand away, instead, his fingers flexed, dimpling her flesh.
Letting the quiet moan out, she tipped her head back, meeting his intense gaze. So close. Close enough to kiss her and then finish the caress, to slide those long fingers inside to cup her breast and thumb her nipple. To squeeze harder. Vising on her, like his hand on her shoulder.
The one he snatched away then, as if she’d burned him.
“Forgive me,” he repeated and took a firm step back. “I apologize for that transgression. Unforgivable, actually.”
She swiveled in the chair to face him, tempted to simply rip open that so-correct shirt and run her hands over him until he stopped talking. Instead she smiled. “I liked it. I like you. Alec.”
* * *
His hand still tingled from the velvet softness of her skin, from the way she’d heated under his touch and the fine tremor that had run through her. Even now her nipples made hard points against the white cotton of her damnably innocent-looking sundress, the creamy curves of her breasts only shades darker rising above the clasp of the fabric. She held his gaze, wide blue eyes full of sensual knowledge. He had no doubt that, if he pushed her full skirts up those long, limber thighs, thrust his hand between them, she’d be hot and wet for him. And she’d drop her head back again as she just had, exposing the swanlike line of her throat and making that throaty moan of approving desire.
“We can’t do this,” he managed. “I can’t do this.” He said it to remind himself. Firmly. Then thrust his hands in his trouser pockets, needing desperately to relieve the pressure on his raging hard-on.
Her eyes dropped there, pretty mouth curving before she tilted her head. “Looks like you can.” She had a teasing note in her voice, an invitation, but also uncertainty. Not as confident as she’d hope to be then.
“I’m your boss, Amber.” He said it gently, so she’d know he wasn’t rejecting her. Far from it. He seemed to be totally unable to resist her. To his great shame and detriment.
&
nbsp; “I’m an adult. Consenting. We’re both unattached. Both interested.” She probably hadn’t meant that last to be a question, but it came out that way.
With a long breath he sat on one of the chairs ringing the room and scrubbed his hands over his face. He’d barely slept, thinking of her and her graceful gestures, her melodious voice and teasing laugh. She’d cajoled him into eating a cannoli, apparently unaware of how she looked, wrapping her lips around the pastry, then rolling her eyes in ecstatic delight at the flavor, delicately licking crumbs from her fingertips and dabbing at the corners of her mouth. The image had stuck with him all night and, when she’d rushed into the room, cheeks flushed from hurrying and full skirt flying around her dimpled knees, it had taken all his self-control not to pull her into his arms for a long, heated kiss.
Which was why he’d had none left to stop himself from breathing in the sweetness of her skin, from running his hand along the seductive texture of it, to extend that moment of devastating contact.
“It doesn’t work that way,” he finally told her, when he had a modicum of ability to think again.
She tilted her head, crossing her legs, so her dress revealed a glimpse of the underside of her thigh. “We’re not both consenting and interested?”
“No. I mean, yes. That is.” He sat straight, instructed himself to handle this better. “Those things don’t matter. I hold power over your job, arguably your future career. I can’t be interested in you. It would be unfair to you, to my partners, to the company as a whole. Most of all it would be unfair to you.” With that he stood, thankfully able to breathe again, and went back to the other end of the table. “We won’t speak of this again.”
“Not speaking of it won’t make it go away,” she insisted.
“Yes, it will. Trust me—I know.”
“How do you know?”
“Because, if we take our attention off of the idea, we’ll stop feeding it. Now that we’ve discussed the elephant in the room, it can return to a manageable size and be eventually banished.”
“I’m not sure I believe that.”
“I’m older and more experienced than you are. I know about these things.” The temper rose, snapping in the wake of unfulfilled lust.
“You’re not that much older than I am.”
“Old enough to be your father.”
“My father is sixty-three.” She smiled sweetly and batted her lashes when he glared at her. “I was a late-in-life baby for him.”
“And, let me guess, your mother is quite a bit younger.”
“Got it in one.” She looked smug, but some uneasiness lurked beneath. Something that alerted him to a weakness there.
“How’s the marriage these days?”
She visibly faltered. Transferred her gaze to the computer screen. “They divorced a long time ago.”
“Ah.”
Her turn to glare at him. “Don’t give me that oh-so-British, superior ‘ah.’ The age difference wasn’t the problem. Besides, I wasn’t proposing anything more than a hot fuck.”
Pissed off now. And, despite his best intentions, hurt. Better for her to be mad at him though. To put an end to this ill-advised attraction.
“Regardless, nothing more than a professional relationship between us will occur. I would not blame you should you decide to file a complaint against me. Or perhaps transfer to another team or division.”
He almost hoped she would complain. It would be a mark against him—one he ripely deserved—but nowhere near as severe as it could have been. One inappropriate touch and the consequences would sting enough to get it through his addled brain that he could not, under any circumstances, have her.
“What if I did that?” She pushed the laptop aside and folded her forearms on the table, a position that compressed her lush breasts, the curves tantalizing as any forbidden fruit. “If I’m not your direct report, then we could—”
“Absolutely not.”
“Why not?”
Persistent, full of fire and drive to get what she set her sights on, that was his girl. And just young enough not to consider the consequences.
“Let me ask you something—would you call yourself ambitious?”
She frowned slightly, taken off-kilter by the question. “Yes.”
“Of course you are. That’s why you’re here. This job is a good opportunity for you, isn’t it? You’ll have figured out your steps, charted the ladder to get where you want to go.”
“Well, yes, but—”
“Just listen for a moment. If there are rumors about you, even a whisper or snigger in the copy room that you somehow gained career success by shagging the boss, how will that affect you? Affect what you want?”
“I don’t care what people gossip about.” But a look of uncertainty crossed her face.
He pointed a finger at her, because she began to understand. “You might not, but it would affect you nevertheless. There’s always one or two looking to snipe, to cast aspersions on the bright and successful. You’re an intelligent young woman. You work hard and diligently. I can see you doing very well indeed. As well as anyone. CEO of your own company someday, perhaps. Would it be worth it, really, to have a shadow on that because of a passing fancy for a man you once worked with?”
She stared at him, paler than usual. Then firmed her lips. “You’re right.”
“I know.” God, how he hated that he was right. “I’m sorry for it. Sorry for my part in this, but I promise you it won’t happen again. We will never happen.”
She nodded, looking at her screen again, hiding the sheen of tears in her eyes.
“Under the circumstances, I understand if you don’t want to carry through on this project this weekend. We can say that you became ill. Food poisoning from Luigi’s. No one will think a thing of it.”
She brushed the back of her hand under her eye. “We ate the same things,” she argued, but her voice trembled and it took every ounce of the tattered will he had left not to go to her and wipe those tears away.
“I’ll say you were a pig and ate both cannoli. That alone would make anyone ill.”
That made her laugh a little. Watery, but there. “I need to visit the ladies’,” she said, standing and shaking out her skirts. “And then I’ll get back to work.” She met his gaze, defiantly, daring him to comment on her tears.
“Understood.” He nodded, then put his focus on the file. Staring at the blur of it until she left the room.
Chapter Six
She managed to get through the rest of the weekend. Barely.
It helped that Alec retreated into a politeness so brittle he sometimes seemed like a robot. They shared no more meals. He sent her to eat with money from petty cash, saying he needed to make some calls from his desk, then went out later to get something on his own. And he told her to go home at four-thirty, commenting only that she’d be safely home earlier than on a normal work day.
By midafternoon Sunday, they’d wrapped up the review of Curlew’s accounts. The results looked damning indeed, as Alec put it, with a viciously triumphant smile that he immediately squelched. He offered for her to take the next days off, to make up for her time over the weekend, but it struck her as a salve to make her feel better.
To give her time to feel more herself instead of like a rejected, lust-crazed idiot.
She really hated that she’d wept over it all. That she’d lingered in the ladies’ room, furiously brushing away the hot spurts of tears that kept coming and then had to fix her makeup. Alec hadn’t commented when she returned and the way he studiously ignored her somehow made it that much worse.
She’d practically thrown herself at him and he’d shut her down with logic so infallible it embarrassed her that he’d had to point it out. All his “I’m older and more experienced” crap and then he had to go and prove it
.
But she’d learned from the experience and she refused to feel any more humiliated.
So she went to work on Monday—looking sharp as hell if she did say so herself—and, even though Alec asked her to be in on the meeting to report on their findings, managed to hold her head high and treat him as professionally as he treated her. When Lily stopped by her cubicle at the end of the day, her heart tripped a little, thinking that Alec had transferred her over. Or had said something.
Instead, Lily smiled warmly. “You should know you really impressed Alec. That’s not easy to do. I imagine he didn’t bother to tell you, either.”
“No. Well, I mean, kind of. Over the weekend, he said so and, like that.” Shut up already.
Lily didn’t seem to notice her babbling. “Good. I think you’ll benefit from working with him, but if you ever want to, I’m happy to have you on my team.” She raised her eyebrows with a wry look of annoyance. It wasn’t common knowledge yet, but Curlew would be gone as soon as they lined everything up.
The conversation shouldn’t have rattled her, but it did. Churning up the memories of the weekend. The heat of his touch. The cold edge of rejection.
* * *
“Technically, he did not reject you,” Kiki pointed out ruthlessly, over their second happy hour glass of wine. Her roommate had spent the weekend with a guy she’d met and hadn’t come back to their shared apartment until late on Sunday, so she missed being updated until they’d both been rushing out the door that morning. She’d prodded at her to agree to drinks, and Amber had spilled the whole sorry tale before they’d ordered the second round.
“You weren’t there. You didn’t hear how he spoke to me, like I’m in danger of becoming some office bimbo who sleeps her way to the top.”
“Oh, stop that. He did not. He obviously would have loved to jump you—and who could blame him?—but he was looking out for you and your rep.”
“’Cause I was too stupid to do it.”
“No, a guy like him, he’s been around the corporate thing for a while and he’s seen how things go down. Also, he’s smart enough to know he’s got to protect himself. What if he had an affair with you and things went south, you got pissed and decided to file sexual harassment? What if you sued the company? Guys have had careers destroyed over that. Probably women, too, though we don’t hear about that as much.”
Under His Touch Page 5
