“That’s all right. You don’t have to get creative.” Reese sniffled and wiped her cheek dry. She was done. She was pulled together. “I am the one who broke things off. He isn’t for me. Really. And I’m not the one for him, even if we did have some hot chemistry. You know that one-night stand feeling? So good while it lasts, but the second it’s over you just know it wouldn’t work?”
“Nope. Don’t know that feeling. I never do one-night stands; they last at least a week.”
“Well, it was pretty obvious once I thought about it. He wrote he could never feel like an equal partner with someone who wasn’t a natural blonde and had less than a master’s degree, preferably in a scientific field. A PhD, like he has would be even better.”
“Wow. He wrote that? Where?”
“Doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have said anything. We’ll have to talk later. I have a meeting.”
Clem’s face flushed, bright pink splotches darkening her neck and face. “Don’t you dare belittle yourself.”
“You’re right.” Reese took a deep breath, nodding. “I won’t belittle myself because he has standards that don’t fit me. But, I really do have to haul ass to this meeting. Meet me later for happy hour? We’ll celebrate being single like there’s no tomorrow.”
“I’m in. See you.” Clem gave her a peck on the cheek, a wave of her fruity shampoo filling the air. For some weird reason it made her think of how different Kenneth smelled.
She shook it off. Meeting, now. Drinks, later. Cuddling her pillows much later.
Her phone buzzed in her hand with an incoming message. She checked. They were notifications for her blog. Another one came in. And another one.
There wasn’t time for this. The phone went back into her phone in her purse and she woke up her laptop in order to power down. She would take it with her for the presentation, and then get out of the building immediately afterwards.
Except, the screen blipped and went black. Her heart plummeted. No reason to panic, there was still her desktop computer, and it appeared to be fine. She scrolled through her documents, searching for the presentation. The easiest solution would be to copy it on a USB key and use the meeting room Wacom screen.
And…all her documents were locked. It didn’t make sense. No one should be able to access the files that she created unless they had her password. Not even the help desk—
No. He wouldn’t.
Her blood began to boil. He was messing with her.
Melanie stormed from her office, blazing a trail through the maze on her way to the meeting room. She must have sensed Reese’s fear, because she suddenly veered for her cubicle. “Ready to present the project numbers?”
Hands trembling, Reese cleared her throat. “There seems to be a slight problem.”
“What sort of problem?” Melanie asked in a voice that could make seasoned criminals nervous.
“The file is blocked. I can’t access it.”
One eyebrow shot up.
“Why don’t I make a quick call?” Reese asked, breathless. “Have someone from the help desk take a look. I’m sure it won’t take a minute.”
“I hope so. We’ll start on something else. Come in as soon as you can.”
The second Melanie turned her back, Reese punched in the number on her desk phone. He would either fix her files and computer, or she would make him suffer. Unlike Clem, that sweetheart, she had no lack of imagination of what she would do to make Kenneth pay.
Nipple clamps, leather whips, running amok through his apartment, and opening his mint condition, in-package figurine toys from the original Star Wars movies. Oh yes. She would tie him up in a corner and not only open his toys, but she would play with them with chocolate coated hands, too.
Kenneth’s smooth voice flowed to her ear. “This is Kenneth, may I help you?”
“My laptop is dead. My files are locked. You did this. You infected my files and I have a presentation. Fix it. Fix it now.”
“Of course. I’ll be right there.”
She huffed into her phone, furious. Not a second later, he strode god-like into the office. If a god wore faded suit tops with elbow patches and a knitted tie, that is.
Good grief.
Had he learned nothing? She ached to relieve him of his clothes which he obviously picked up from the back of his closet with his eyes closed.
No. She would not be relieving him of his clothes. He was playing a petty game to harass her and make her look bad.
Through her blog, she received dozens of letters a week, many asking for help in relationships. She had developed methods that others only distantly dreamed of for dealing with small-minded, petulant, self-centered man-boys. Petty? She was intimately acquainted with petty.
She could play his game. But you didn’t fight fire with fire if you wanted to win. You snuffed it out.
“Kenneth,” she said, “you do realize I have a presentation for the head of accounting, half a dozen department managers, and the CEO himself starting in five minutes? I’d hate to have to take you in there with me to explain why I can’t access my files late on a Friday afternoon. It would be like throwing the lamb to the hungry wolves.”
18
Kenneth
Kenneth paused for the barest second at Reese’s comment. He considered the implications and dismissed them in the blink of the eye.
Yeah, the CEO would be mad to know he was tinkering with the internal com system, but in the grand scheme of things, this only proved his point that security was less than optimal.
He had to take a second to gather his thoughts. Reese was more beautiful wielding a laptop like a club than she had been on his doorstep offering him a bottle of wine. She was more striking with her electronics than Venus rising wet and naked from the sea. He stumbled mentally on wet and naked.
Synaptic transmission fired through his neurons. He remembered why he was there.
“I know,” he said, speaking in a rush, “which is why I’ll only take five minutes of your time. Did you get the requests from the blog readers? Have the gamers reached out to you?”
“No,” she said slowly. “The gamers have not reached out.”
“But did you get requests for coaching? Have the emails come? I posted a message to my gaming community—as promised originally. As part of the deal.”
“Nope. Nada. Nothing.”
Her phone buzzed in her bag with an incoming message. They froze, silent for a heartbeat. Frowning, she glanced at him and then back to her bag, but shook her head. “In addition to the presentation, I have an invitation to go for drinks. I’d like to be drinking peacefully with my girl-friend as soon as possible. I’m sure you can relate.”
“I hate to interrupt, but I’m going to anyway,” piped a voice. Clem popped her head over the partition and nodded vigorously. “Tonight is drinks and babes, but no blondes or PhD graduates.”
Blondes and PhD graduates. An inkling of possible understanding came to him. If his hypothesis was correct—
“This is all about the worksheets, isn’t it?” he asked Reese.
Hot pink spots glowed on her cheeks.
Another head popped up. The motherly coworker without a sense of personal space. “Everything all right here, Reese? Do you need us to do anything? Intervention, referee calls?”
“No, we’re fine, Barb,” Reese said.
Clem puffed her breath, skeptical. More heads were rising out from the depths of the cubicles, surveying.
“You’re right,” Reese said. “I read the worksheets and did some soul-searching. I’m not the one for you. I’m calling it off now instead of later to save us both a lot of heartbreak. But I didn’t think you would stoop to infecting my files, endangering my position here.”
“Reese, if it comes to that I’ll take the fall and make sure the blame goes to me.”
“You—” She froze. “You would do that for me?”
“And more. Anything I have to do. Listen to me.” He took her hand. “I’m holding your documents h
ostage only because I didn’t know how to ask you to hear me out. I’ve come to say, I want to take a leap of faith. With you.”
Kenneth’s voice caught in his throat as he said the words leap of faith. He could face an auditorium of five hundred and not blink. But this close to Reese and his gut clenched, his mouth dried up, and every nerve buzzed painfully. She was breathtaking.
If he could convince her that this relationship was not doomed from the start, and even if it was, to hell with it; that Reese and he had a chance together. The answers to his worksheets were wrong—fluff and filler he hoped would help him get on track.
Perhaps he wasn’t the expert on chemistry, but he understood wiring and electricity, and he recognized amazing when he saw it.
He was taking his leap of faith now. If he didn’t, he would always regret it.
Her reams of advice ran through his head. Stand tall, shoulders back, be proud, meet challenges head on. Her gaze went to his chest, and it occurred to him suddenly that she had also given instructions on ties and suit jackets.
Wear them? Yeah. Something like that. He cleared his throat, standing proud.
“Reese, it’s too soon to make a clean break. We might not seem like the perfect match on paper, but I believe we have chance. If we both make that leap for the other person, we meet halfway. Maybe that’s where we will find common ground.”
Her desk phone rang. She made a strangled little cry and answered. “Hi, Melanie. It shouldn’t be but a minute or two more. The help desk guy is here looking at it. Yes. Very quick. See you soon.”
19
Reese
In some ways he was right. There is no destined to fail, there are no crystal balls telling fortunes, and there is no magic formula for the perfect couple. There are only people working through this world together.
But where would that leave her when he decided she wasn’t smart enough or didn’t enjoy his sci-fi movies enough in a few months’ time? While she stood on the sidelines of his amazing career and hers sputtered and died?
He threatened this job—her work was numbers. Cold. Hard. Black, white, and red. Completely lifeless. But it was her income.
“Are my files unlocked?” she asked. “I have to go.”
“They are free. I had them timed.”
She stood and hurried from her desk. Clem and Barb trailed after her, attracting more coworkers.
Kenneth caught her hand before she reached the hall.
“I just wanted to give you this.” He handed her a card. “It’s yours. I trust it with you now and for always, to keep it close to your heart. I’ll never forget.”
“What?” she asked, glancing down.
“My V card, of course. And by V card, I mean my Vulcan Fan Club membership card from when I was—” he paused to cough. A group of half a dozen ladies stood by, not even pretending to not be listening. “Seventeen years old.”
They chuckled. Obviously picturing Kenneth at seventeen and being a part of the Vulcan fan-boy society was entirely too easy.
“I trust you not to throw it away or forget how you came by it. I trust you blindly, foolishly, perhaps.”
“Kenneth, I don’t know what to say.” She swayed in place, torn.
Leap of faith or clean break?
For someone who wanted to give advice for a living, Reese had no idea what to do with herself. Her emotions were a smoking train wreck she couldn’t help staring at.
“And you need to check your emails,” Kenneth said. “I think you’ll be pleased with what you see.”
Then he was going. He was going.
He was gone.
Laptop clutched to her chest, she hurried to the meeting room at the end of the hall. It was gray-walled and supplied with a cold black table and chairs, like all the other meeting rooms. She said hello and slipped in, but they ignored her. They were discussing another project, voices a cacophony of disagreements while she connected her laptop to the beamer and found her presentation.
They were still arguing.
Her phone buzzed in her purse. Hiding it below the table, she swiped the screen to check. An email. No—twenty new emails. Another arrived as she stared at the screen.
A river of requests for her coaching lessons. Self-described geeks, nerds, gaming guys, single dudes, a single dad, loners, and above all—nice guys hoping to meet someone special they could spend their lives with.
They heard she had helped one of their own find an exciting new relationship and they were begging for her to coach them, too.
With this many clients, she could hand in her notice at Orbis Tech. This was her dream career handed to her on a platter by Kenneth. After she had left him without a word in the middle of the night, he saved her dream and upheld his end of their bargain for teaching him how to seduce a woman. Which he had done exceptionally well.
She really was an idiot.
“All right, are you ready, Reese?” Melanie hissed, clearly annoyed with the other managers. The CEO sat stony-faced and fearsome at the head of the table.
Reese gulped. Several managers rolled their eyes or slumped in their seats, already bored. This was her life. Her lifeless life of cold numbers and colder people.
Clearing her throat, she clicked on her presentation. “You know…this thing really speaks for itself. I have to go, there’s a situation in the tech development department.”
She walked out of the room as her presentation scrolled along to utter silence.
In the hall, her accounting coworkers were still whispering and milling about. Clem hushed them, and they all looked at her expectantly.
“I think I made a mistake,” Reese said.
“I’m sure that cute boy has potential,” Barb said, winking. “Bad ties are a sure-fire sign of a big heart.”
“You think a blonde with a PhD might not be his thing after all?” Clem asked.
“Not if I have anything to say about it.” Reese marched for the elevator. The girls cheered her on until the doors slid shut and she was alone.
Very alone.
The Development floor was nothing like the accounting department. There were ping-pong tables and games in the corners. No partitions, but plenty of comfy chairs and a hammock.
Kenneth was smack in the middle of the floor, putting on his coat. He paused for a second at the sight of her and then pulled it on with a snap.
He stared in silence as she wended between the desks, pod chairs, poofs, and tech developers wrapped in their introvert worlds. He didn’t move. He didn’t smile.
When she realized how much she missed it, her chest constricted, putting her heart in a vice.
Reese paused in front of his wide desk, hands clammy and cold.
He still didn’t greet her.
“I put the presentation on and came down here.” Her voice was thin as winter sunlight. Her heart hammered, squeezing up to her throat. She couldn’t find the words, and he was standing there like a stranger, as if they had never been together. Swallowing against the paper dryness in her mouth, she struggled to speak. “Kenneth, I—”
In two long steps, he caught her in his arms.
His mouth came down on hers, cutting off her words. His lips moved, flooding her with warmth. They breathed together. Her knees loosened, and starbursts filled up her chest.
The fear and doubt that plagued her since reading his worksheets transformed into a foggy haze and then vanished. There were no guarantees, but she wouldn’t trade this kiss now to save herself possible heartache later.
In the distance, the elevator pinged, followed clapping. Then more, louder clapping. She shook herself free for a moment.
The ladies had followed her down in the second elevator, applauding along with the tech team. Someone whooped. Probably Clem.
Kenneth twirled her around in the air, her head spinning before he sat her down. “Leap of faith?” he asked.
She grinned. “Yeah. Leap of faith. We might go up in flames, hating each other’s taste in movies, but we always have sex
to fall back on.”
His eyes went wide, and he loosened his collar and knitted tie. “I was going to say we could find new movies to watch, but I’m fine with more sex if that’s what you prefer.”
“We should get out of here. Find someplace with fewer people.”
He nodded in agreement and took her hands in his, interlacing their fingers. The warmth made her shiver. Through the clapping and cheers of the two departments, they headed for the elevator.
Kenneth squeezed her hand. “I’m glad you changed your mind. You wouldn’t believe how happy I am.”
“And you,” she said, voice low so he alone would hear. “You wouldn’t believe how urgently I need you.”
Epilogue
Reese panted and cried out as Kenneth moved behind her.
“Come on, harder!” she said. “You have to really work…” Her voice trailed off as lights danced in her eyes. She blinked and glanced over her shoulder.
Kenneth was sweating, tendons in his neck popping. “Is this right?” His hands moved down her back. He yanked the strings to her corset again, and suddenly she couldn’t breathe.
“No, not that tight. Just a little bit…less.”
She tried to take a deep breath, but the costume held her ribs like a medieval torture device. The moment he loosened the ties, she gulped in air.
“Let me see,” he said. The sleeves of Kenneth’s chemise flowed over his wrists, and he flicked them back as she faced him. “Oh, your breasts, Reese. I can’t, I—”
She checked her chest only to see her breasts overflowing from the satin cloth. “Wow. Is that right?”
“It’s not wrong, if you’re asking my opinion.”
“I mean, is it supposed to so wanton?”
Kenneth smiled wryly, appraising her from arm’s length. “The costume is called Renaissance maiden, for off the shoulder seduction. I would say it fits the bill.”
He was still in his jeans, but he wore a loose linen shirt. It hung slightly open at his chest, showing off his masculine upper body quite well. “You know, if you’re going for historical accuracy, a Ren Faire is not exactly known for being authentic. Far from it.”
Seduction in a Suit: An Office Romance Collection Page 40
