Can't Buy Me Love

by Rin Daniels

  Adam leaned back in his chair, dragging both hands over his face. He’d felt so good when he’d finally dragged himself to bed last night. Alone, sure, but that couldn’t be helped. He wasn’t done with her yet.

  Granted, it wasn’t the first time he’d invited a woman out for sex, but it was the first time he’d done it so... openly. He’d usually tried not to abandon them mid-way.

  Not that Kat had seemed to mind. In his experience, some women liked to cling and others liked to go.

  Kat was, well, not a clinger. But was she a blackmailer?

  It didn’t feel right.

  Of course, nothing did when it came to Kat Harris. Or maybe he meant that everything did, and that was a problem.

  He stabbed at his keyboard. The screen went dark. “It doesn’t matter,” he said flatly. “Pay it.”

  His assistant’s eyebrows slammed up. “Are you sure?”

  “Pay it,” he repeated. “It’s just ten thousand. Maybe it’s some kid who thought he had a good thing going.”

  Jordan’s expression eased from surprise to wary resignation. “Or,” he countered mildly, “it’s not.”

  “We’ll find out if they ask for more.” He rose, his leather-padded chair rolling back on slick wheels. He tucked his hands into his pockets, not because they shook but because the energy that filled him made him feel like he wanted to grab something, someone, and work out this frenetic energy.

  His personal trainer was on vacation. His pool was a car-ride away.

  Jordan wasn’t his type.

  Adam smothered a laugh, dry and a shade too far into angry. His gaze focused outside the wide windows of his office, scraped across the scenery. The sun dappled the eastern hills with brilliant shades of green. The flowers the Sulla Valley city commission insisted be part of the city’s charm turned the streets below him into a riot of color.

  The Valley’s business district didn’t hold a candle to the bigger cities he’d preferred to live in. Laramie Industries occupied the largest building at eight floors, flanked by shorter modern deco structures. Still, despite the city’s relatively small size, the panorama from his seventh floor office usually calmed him.

  Usually.

  Somebody had breached his privacy. And, probably Kat’s. He wanted to think so. If she’d known about the sneak photographer, he couldn’t imagine that she’d have responded to him quite so...

  Sweetly?

  Openly?

  God. Just looking at those photos threatened to land him with another hard-on he couldn’t afford to work off, not now. Not today.

  Maybe later.

  “All right,” Jordan said to his back. Mild again. It told Adam all he needed to know about his assistant’s opinions on the subject.

  Anger and arousal made for really uncomfortable bedfellows.

  “Your three o’clock with the board has been pushed to half past three,” Jordan continued. “We couldn’t ask for any more time. Mr. Goldberg will be in attendance today.”

  Adam turned away from the window, mouth flattening. “I’m almost done with the new proposal. Has Glover checked in?”

  Jordan swiped on his tablet. A quick scan later, he shook his head. “I’ll drop by and ensure he’s on time with his materials.”

  “Good. Any news on the lost data?”

  “The IT team is working on nailing down the issue. They haven’t been able to recreate the problem.”

  Damn it. On the plus side, that made it less likely that someone had sabotaged his work. Computers were his livelihood, but they still glitched. “Keep me posted. That’s all.”

  His assistant hesitated. A fraction.

  Adam sighed. He leaned against the edge of the large desk he’d had imported from New York. “What else?”

  Jordan pulled the file out from under the tablet and held it out. “Data on Ms. Harris.”

  He reached for it, paused. Then took the file before he could convince himself not to. This bad habit he’d developed of wanting to trust in Kat Harris wasn’t something he usually struggled with.

  He didn’t trust women, at least not the ones he slept with. Especially not Kat.

  He was pretty sure he knew what that said about him instead of the women he did date, but Adam didn’t let that bother him. Usually.

  He was breaking a lot of ‘usual’ these days.

  Adam set it on the desk behind him. “I’ll look at it later,” he promised. “That’s it?”

  “One last concern,” Jordan said, but this time, a faint smile tugged at his mouth. For the first time, he scratched at his temple—a sheepish tic. “Mr. Laramie wants to know when you’re going to quit dicking around and get yourself a proper secretary.”

  Adam’s crack of laughter wasn’t all humor. “Tell the old man to keep his nose out of my affairs.”

  “Yes,” Jordan agreed, deadpan. “I suspect he hopes you’ll engage in one if you have a pretty secretary.”

  “He can take his outdated views and shove them.” Adam gestured to the door. “Get out, Jordan.” He pulled his own tablet from the desk behind him, sliding it out from under the unlabeled folder. His gaze snagged on it. Narrowed.

  The man he’d known for over a decade didn’t bow or scrape. He simply inclined his head good-naturedly and crossed the office, snapping the cover on his tablet closed.

  “I’ll be back at two with materials,” Jordan said over his shoulder, pulling the door open. “I should—Excuse me,” he added, abruptly enough that Adam’s gaze lifted, eyebrows climbing.

  “Sorry,” an all too familiar voice said quickly. “I might have the wrong office.”

  Adam couldn’t be sure, but he thought he detected a note of resigned humor as his assistant said, “No, I don’t think so. Excuse me,” he added again, and sidled past her.

  Kat’s sudden appearance, framed in his office door, shouldn’t have hit Adam like a fist to the chest.

  It did.

  She did.

  The weather app on his tablet claimed the temperature had risen to eighty degrees already, with humidity at a hundred and ten percent. It was, all things considered, far too warm for the sunny yellow raincoat she’d belted around her waist.

  Then again, the legs he couldn’t get enough of were bare. Her shoes, tall spike heels and strappy, were orange. Gold buckles winked at her ankles as she hesitated in the door frame.

  “Hey.” Huskier than her earlier words.

  Behind her, the door to the waiting room outside his office closed.

  Adam’s pulse flared like a drum solo. “Hey, yourself.”

  She’d done something with her hair, or maybe the humidity did. He’d never been sure what was normal for a woman’s hairstyle. Artless was the fashion, and he knew they worked hard to achieve it.

  Hers looked natural, like she’d finger-combed the sable waves, left her bangs to frame eyes like a cool, crisp forest pond. Mossy dark, gut-wrenchingly sultry as she tucked her hair behind one ear.

  Did she come to seduce him in that raincoat?

  Cliché as hell, but God, he wanted it.

  “Come in,” he said.

  She did. And she shut the door behind her. Color stained her cheeks, as she leaned against it. One tall heel hiked against the panel.

  The raincoat slid up her thigh.

  That pulse knocked in his erection.

  “Are you busy?” she asked, her gaze sliding to the window. No blinds. He didn’t like them. The sun-treated glass filtered out the heat and the worst of the glare, but didn’t do much for privacy.

  Very deliberately, he set the tablet back on his desk. “No,” he lied. What would she do?

  Her lips curved into a grin. Feline mischief, stunning seduction even with the damned coat on. “Wanna be?”

  “Well, that depends, Ms. Harris.” Adam placed both hands on the desk he leaned against. Only he knew how his knuckles popped against the wood.

  Take her. Again. Right here. Window be damned.

  “On?” she asked.

  “On
whether or not you plan on keeping that coat on.”

  Her eyes lit, but whether it was laughter or heat, he couldn’t tell. Objectively?

  Forget it. He didn’t have it in him to bother with objective. She turned him on with every breath.

  Kat reached behind her and locked the door.

  He gripped the edge of the desk.

  Her fingers lifted to the first large yellow button at her collar. Hesitated. Fierce color washed over her face, took the heat already staining her cheeks and turned her skin rosy.

  He held his breath as the first button slid free.

  Then the second.

  “Yes,” he said hoarsely.

  Her fingers hovered over the third button. Her tongue slipped out, wet her lower lip. “I... didn’t expect this to feel so...”

  “What?”

  Her gaze fell.

  “Tell me, Kat.” A husky command.

  She sucked in a quick, quiet breath.

  Not quiet enough. Every muscle in his body locked as need knotted inside him. Take her.

  He firmed his feet against the floor. “Show me.”

  Even from across the expanse of his bright office, Adam could see her fingers shake. She fumbled with the button. It caught.

  Slid free.

  The gap at her throat widened, sunshine yellow material framing pale skin.

  Pale blue lace.

  Jesus Christ, this was happening.

  Adam’s breath caught in his chest.

  The final button unfastened, but her elbows clamped on either side of the slick fabric. The thinnest glimpse of light blue lace and pale skin was all she allowed him.

  Was he drooling?

  Adam ran a cupped hand over his mouth. His jaw. “Don’t stop.”

  Her eyes met his. Her mouth hitched at one side, and slowly, achingly slowly, she pulled the coat off her shoulders. The bare curve of her shoulder, dusted with gold. But only faintly. The other shoulder.

  His eyes pinned on the fragile dip of her clavicle.

  Trailed lower.

  Hadn’t he just told himself to end this?

  “So?” she asked huskily, hands bunched into the fabric barely hanging on over her breasts. Thin blue straps slid down one arm. “What do you think?”

  ‘Think’ might be overstating it some. Adam blew a low whistle. “Dangerous.”

  Her gaze flicked to the window again.

  “Come here,” he instructed.

  Echoes of that moment last night stretched between them, but this time, there were no shadows to hide in. No greenery. Just a brightly lit office, the desk he perched on, various chairs he couldn’t help but picture her draped over.

  Hanging onto.

  Himself, balls-deep inside her.

  “Goddamn,” he rasped, and couldn’t help the throaty way his voice growled out. “Come here, Kat.”

  She didn’t walk in those heels. She sashayed. Sauntered.

  Her hips swayed.

  Adam wanted her bent over his desk. Right. Fucking. Now.

  Kat had other ideas. Ideas that flickered to life in his overheated brain the instant she sank to her knees in front of him.

  His eyes fixed on her mouth.

  “Kat,” he warned.

  She smiled. One hand touched his knee.

  The coat gaped, revealing her slender body cupped lovingly in sky blue lace.

  Both hands slid up his thighs, and if he’d intended to exhibit cool control, the sudden pounding in his rock-hard dick stripped that vain hope from him.

  He flattened his hands over hers, bracketing his belt buckle. “At the risk of sounding like a complete wimp,” he said tightly, “this is a bad idea.”

  “I know.” Her fingertips edged under his waistband. “But I want to taste you, Adam.”

  Holy God, what lucky coin did he step on this morning?

  When the pressure over her hands eased, she slipped his buckle free. The clink of the metal fractured through his unraveling grip.

  The coat slid down her arms, caught at her elbows, and she was bare for him. Beautiful. The mark he’d left on her last night throbbed just over her pulse.

  He wanted to lick it again.

  Open his mouth over it and bite down until he could be sure that mark would never fade.

  The savagery of that need shocked him.

  And then the cooler air of the office slid into his open pants, into the dipped waistband of his underwear, and he forgot to be shocked. Forgot to be suspicious.

  Forgot that he’d meant to end this before it got so far.

  Kat’s breath eased hot and damp over his bare flesh, and he shuddered, head falling back. He braced his weight back on his hands, palm flattening over the folder he’d left there.

  Her lips brushed the head of his cock. He hissed out a breath.

  This was dangerous. On so many levels.

  And all he could think about was the fact that Kat Harris knelt in front of him wearing an open raincoat and blue lace and wrapped her lips around his dick in the middle of his own office.

  He’d died.

  He’d done something good for someone somewhere.

  Whatever karma put him here, he’d take it.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HE TASTED MUSKY, tasted like something illicit and sexual and so very exciting. Kat could barely believe she’d done it, that she’d come to his workplace wearing that cliché raincoat they always wrote about in erotica articles. She was positive that everyone she passed knew exactly what she’d been up to.

  Even thought she’d seen a faint smile on the other guy’s face as he left her to enter the office alone.

  But it was so worth it.

  His cock was, in a word, beautiful. Thick and hard, taut, hot skin jutting in an upward curve from a nest of dense brown hair. She wasn’t much of a connoisseur, save in the sense that she liked what made her feel good¸ and this? This had more than potential.

  It was a proven ride.

  Adam jerked when she took him into her mouth, hissed out a ragged groan as she wrapped her tongue around his shaft the way she’d wanted to. Curling her fingers at the base of his cock earned her insensible encouragement, but when she took him deeper, widened her lips and eased him as far as she could, he said nothing but fisted both hands into her hair.

  She didn’t mind. He didn’t try to pull her down on him, didn’t try to set the pace. Maybe another day she’d let him fuck her mouth the way he no doubt wanted, but for now, she relished in the fact that he let her taste him, lick him, breathe in his scent and take in more.

  And she did it wearing nothing but a bra and panty set.

  Oh, and fuck-me heels.

  Kat felt like an all-new woman, all right.

  His fingers cradled the back of her head as she dragged her lips and hand over his cock. His shoulders rounded, and he bent over her like the feeling she coaxed from him burned.

  “God, Kat,” he groaned. “Good. Fuck, you’re beautiful.”

  If it weren’t for the fact that her own body felt sensitized, that her panties were already soaked and she’d only given him her mouth, she might have rolled her eyes. A lady was always beautiful on her knees.

  And he still made her believe it.

  The hands at her head tightened. “Enough.” A guttural order. He tugged her free of him, reached down and grabbed a fistful of that coat. She stood with his help, dragged a thumb over her lower lip to catch the traces of his own arousal.

  He watched her do it with eyes that burned brilliant gold.

  “How the hell,” he asked hoarsely, “are you so sexy?”

  She grinned. “Trade secret?”

  “Fuck,” he replied, and tugged her by the coat to his desk. He stood, his cock jutting hard from the open zipper of his slacks. He didn’t lower them.

  The look, erotic as hell, stole her breath. Her cohesive thoughts.

  She wanted him. She always did, but this? This was different.

  Wordlessly, he stripped the coat from her arms, left
her standing alone and bare but for her lace bra and panties.

  And those heels.

  She’d obviously made a good choice. He knelt behind her. Ran his hands over the strappy orange ribbons. Over her ankles. His mouth pressed into the inner back side of her thigh.

  She shivered. “Adam, wait, I wanted—”

  “Be quiet,” he ordered, and that, too, ghosted across the same spot. His teeth bit.

  She gasped.

  “It’s my turn.”

  Adam nudged her feet apart. One hand slid up her right hip, the other skimmed gently up her calf. Dipped into the sensitive hollow at the back of her knee.

  Kat’s breath fractured. “Adam,” she managed, just this side of begging.

  Again, he nipped her, this time at the soft flesh of her ass. She squeaked.

  He laughed against her skin. Licked the spot he’d nipped, and then placed slow, wet, open-mouthed kisses up her spine. Kat shuddered.

  He splayed one large hand between her shoulder blades.

  Bent her over.

  “Hands on the desk,” he instructed. She obeyed, biting her lower lip. She couldn’t see him, couldn’t tell what face he made, but the sheer hunger in his voice curled right between her legs and dug in.

  She wanted him. Needed him.

  Now.

  “Adam, please.”

  A hand curved over her ass. “Please what, sweetheart?”

  To her embarrassment, her hips tilted, offering more of her to his fondling. He chuckled deep in his chest.

  “Delightful though this is,” he said reprovingly, “I don’t hear you. Please what, Kat?”

  She groaned in sheer frustration, in tangled need.

  “Say it.”

  She didn’t want to. She’d said it last night, but it was dark. They were both feeling it. She could hide her face.

  Now she felt exposed, laid out for him like a naughty secretary.

  Oh, God. The visual sent another wave of raw arousal through her. Her sex tightened.

  The hand at her ass eased away. “If you’re not going to tell me, I can’t—”

  “If you don’t fuck me right now, Adam Laramie,” she said, fast and needy and too breathy, “I will never, ever forgive you.”