by Nikki Sloane
“Oh my goodness, he’s crazy about you,” my mother whispered in the kitchen while I scooped ice cream on top of the brownies she was plating. “Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it.”
My hand slipped on the ice cream scooper and went right into the tub, but thankfully went unnoticed by her. I carried the dishes out onto the cement slab patio I’d spent countless hours decorating with colored chalk in my youth, where now my father and boyfriend were discussing politics.
Logan leaned back in his seat and had one arm slung over the back of my empty chair, as if waiting for me. So casual and comfortable, like we’d been together forever.
Yeah, I was so completely in love with him.
When it was time to say goodbye, I was certain my mother was too. She hugged him for an awkwardly long time, but he played it cool. He took my father’s offered handshake, the leftover brownies from my mother, and led me down the front steps to his car.
“I like them,” he said, sincere, as he pulled out of the subdivision.
“Good. They certainly like you. And I . . .” I said, unable to contain it, “I love you.”
His hand tightened on the steering wheel. “You what?”
There was no reaction other than his flat voice. Oh, no. What had I done?
When I didn’t repeat it, he yanked the steering wheel hard and to the right, so he could turn off the road into the nearest parking lot, and pull in to one of the vacant spots. He threw the gearshift into park and gave me a hard look, his face like stone. I couldn’t breathe. My heart stopped beating. I should have kept my stupid mouth shut.
Hands seized my face, gripping it and pulling me in so he could slam his lips on mine. I wanted to melt into the kiss. I wanted the gearshift gone from in between us. There was the sound of his seatbelt unbuckling. The hands trapping my face tightened further, asking for more.
I was more than willing, but . . .
“Logan,” I mumbled against his frantic lips, “we can’t have sex in the parking lot of a Seven-Eleven.”
“I don’t remember suggesting that.”
“You have to stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Kissing me. Touching me, or I’m going to need to have sex with you. Not want, but need.”
It was twilight outside, and a mischievous smile flashed across his face, made sexier by the soft light. Like he was thinking about continuing just to see if I’d make good on my threat. But instead he eased up, giving me a gentle, tender kiss.
“All right.” His voice was reluctant. “I will stop kissing you now, but I want you to know you started this . . . and I plan on finishing it soon.”
It took forever to find a parking space at my place, only increasing the anticipation. He took my keys from me and unlocked my door when I fumbled. I hadn’t expected to come back to my place tonight. We were due to meet his friends for drinks, and I assumed after that I’d spend the night at his place. So I hadn’t cleaned. He tripped over a pair of heels I’d left in the pathway to the living area.
“Sorry, I didn’t think I was going to have company,” I said, taking my keys back from him. There was a pile of clothes on the couch, and he blinked at it. I think it bothered him. I scooped them up and hurried to the closet.
“What are you doing?”
“Cleaning up.” I heaved the clothes onto my bed.
“I don’t care about that. I don’t care about anything right now,” he said, his eyes pinning mine, “except hearing you say it again.”
All motion ceased and my breath caught, but I was still able to speak. “I love you, Logan.”
He was devastatingly beautiful when his eyes filled with love, but they clouded with concern a moment later. “You mean a lot to me, but I’m not sure I’m ready to say that back. Not just yet.”
Twelve years echoed in my mind. He was bound to be cautious with his heart. “You’ll say it when you’re ready. I’m okay with that.” I gave him a soft smile, one I hoped conveyed that I understood.
He crossed the room toward me, and I attempted to meet him in the middle, but he lifted me up and carried me backward into the closet, ducking his head under the shelf once we were inside. I hadn’t thought through dumping the pile of clothes here on my bed. Now I was on my back on top of them. We both took a moment to push them out of our way and clear space, sending pants and skirts tumbling to the floor. I had a feeling we were going to need every inch of my teenage-sized bed.
Usually I liked being undressed by him, but we both shed our clothes until I was left only in my panties and he was completely naked and on top of me. I wrapped my hands around his warm shoulders, and he pressed the length of himself against me at the same moment he pressed his lips to mine.
We were only a heartbeat away from having sex. He nudged me again, teasing my body through the thin cotton of my panties, and he slipped his tongue into my mouth. I don’t think foreplay was on the agenda, and . . . good. I wanted him terribly. I wanted to tell him I loved him while he was moving inside me. My hand drifted down and pulled my panties to the side, guiding him.
God, I loved the sensation when he entered me for the first time, and he fit so perfectly now. It made me mad that he hadn’t pursued me sooner. We’d potentially missed out on two years of this. But lord knew I couldn’t be mad at him, not when he eased in and out of me, going deep and then pulling almost all the way out, only to plunge back inside.
“I’m never going to get enough of this,” he whispered, his head burrowed in the crook of my neck. “Never going to get enough of you.”
My eyes fell closed and hot tears stung there, but I held them back. I didn’t care that the sides of the bed were scraping against the closet, or that he sent my knee banging into the wall with every thrust. Listening to him, feeling him inside me, connecting with the man I loved. That was what mattered.
I couldn’t get enough of kissing him or having my hands on him. I raked one through his hair while his lips skimmed my collarbone. Abruptly he pulled out and stepped back off the bed, and frantic hands yanked my panties down my legs. It was impressive how swiftly he could move. His weight returned to the bed, but he curled beside me, placing my leg over his legs. I was lying on my back and him on his side when he entered me again, his intense eyes watching my expression.
“Oh my god,” I whispered. At this angle, he could easily dip his head to lick my breast, which he did. I was right on the edge of an orgasm. The scent of his cologne was all around me, and his hands. . . oh god, his hands. They held me tightly to him.
“I love you.” It came from me quiet, but full of emotion.
“Then come for me,” he whispered. We’d returned to our games of asking for permission.
“Come with me,” I begged.
The weight of our feelings pressed down and hurled us together toward oblivion. For the first time he went before I did, and it triggered my orgasm. His pleasure filled me with pleasure and became mine. Lying beside him was bliss. I didn’t want to leave this perfect moment.
He seemed content to stay as he was too. That is, until his phone, still in the pocket of his pants on the floor, chirped with a text message. Lips trailed over my shoulder.
“We should put clothes on or we’re going to be late.”
“I’m always late,” I muttered. The greedy selfishness inside me whined. Couldn’t we just have a few more quiet minutes together?
“I noticed. I can help with that, you know.”
“Oh, really, boss?”
“Yeah.” He propped himself up on an elbow, and his eyes were inky in the shadows of my dimly lit closet. “I can set all your clocks ten minutes fast, or you can start staying at my place more often. This bed isn’t good for us long-term.”
Long-term. I understood what he was implying. “I like option number two.”
After drinks with his friends, I crashed at his place, but I woke up alone. Logan had his longest run before the marathon planned for this morning, which meant he’d be gone for a while. The alarm cl
ock had buzzed long ago, and he’d risen, moving silently to the closet to get dressed, and then out the door.
I sat up now, evaluating the room critically. I went into the meticulously organized closet with suits on the left and casual clothes on the right. My haphazard closet must have made him crazy.
After a shower, I cinched the towel tight under my arms, sat with my legs tucked beneath me on the bed, and texted Payton. She called me right back, and we discussed me throwing out the “L” word and Logan’s reaction. She was happy for me. She liked Logan.
Once the call was over, I sat on the bed, staring out the window. How were we going to keep pretending we were strangers at the office? And more importantly, why?
The front door opened and shut, followed by his labored breathing and heavy footsteps inside the kitchen. I’d lost all track of time.
My towel was abandoned on the bed when I made my way into the kitchen, stark naked, excited to see sweat rolling down his golden-tan chest. He had the fridge door open when I stepped into the room.
“Are you going to fuck me in the shower, or are you too tired?” I teased.
“Sorry,” the smug voice from behind the fridge door replied, “but I’m married now.” Then the younger Stone brother rose up into view, and Nick’s mouth hit the floor at the sight of my naked flesh.
chapter
NINETEEN
Like a fucking idiot, I was paralyzed in shock. Should I dart back into the bedroom? I searched for something to cover up with, thinking that would be faster. There was nothing, because Logan put everything away, everything in its place.
As soon as it registered that I was sans clothes, Nick’s eyes went to the ceiling.
“I didn’t see anything,” he blurted out, although his already flushed face now turned purple. Sweat poured down his forehead and bare chest, and it actually dripped on the floor around him. I scrambled into the bedroom and grabbed my clothes from last night. Logan hadn’t mentioned they were training together today.
“I’m sorry,” I yelled from the bedroom, “I thought you were Logan.” Oh god, kill me now. “Where is he?”
“He wanted a longer cool-down. He should be up in a minute.”
Now that I was dressed in jeans and a shirt, I wasn’t sure what to do. Keep hiding from awkwardness in the bedroom until Logan arrived? I tucked my hair behind an ear and forced myself to go out into the living room.
“How was your honeymoon?” I asked, acting like nothing had happened. “Jamaica, right?”
Nick looked happy to pretend too. “Yeah. It was good. Have you ever been?”
The door swung open and interrupted my normal, clean brain with dirty, impure thoughts. Weren’t people supposed to look like crap after they’d just run twenty miles? That did not apply to him.
I watched in fascination as the brothers said nothing to each other and yet moved as an orchestrated pair. Nick handed a Gatorade bottle to Logan while he retrieved a large bag of pretzels out of a cabinet and pulled it open. They drank and ate quickly, stopping only to wipe sweat off with paper towels or open a banana.
When they were finished hydrating and fueling, the iPhones came out of armbands and they critiqued their individual pacing. I felt like I was on Mars. The discussion concluded and Nick grabbed a water bottle from the fridge.
“I’m heading out, I know you’ve got stuff to do,” Nick said. “Evie mentioned she’d like to fuck you in the shower.”
Logan’s gaze snapped to me and my face burst into flames.
“Great, thanks for that, Nick,” I said.
“No problem.” He flashed an enormous smile and went out the door.
Logan continued to stare at me with a puzzled expression.
“I thought he was you,” I explained. “You failed to mention you weren’t running solo and he might pop in.”
“You told him you wanted to fuck in the shower?”
“Yeah. And I was naked when I did it.”
He scowled and gave a dark, possessive look. “Did you forget what I look like?”
“He was behind the refrigerator door. Like I said, I thought it was you.”
He blinked and calmed. A slow smile tweaked across his lips. “I really should recover some more before we get in there.”
“It was a joke, I’ve already showered, boss.”
“That’s disappointing, Ms. Russell, but you’re a dirty girl. You’ll probably need another shower before too long.”
The corner of my mouth turned up.
Later, he drove me back to my place, and when he parked, he ran his fingers absentmindedly over my knee.
“Tomorrow I need to be in the office early,” he said.
“Oh?” After that dinner, we didn’t really talk about work outside of the office. “Why do you need to be in early?”
“I have a meeting with Jon.” The VP of sales, his boss’s boss. Jon was rarely in the Chicago office, so whatever it was, had to be serious. My face must have shown my concern. “It’s no big deal,” he said.
Then, why bring it up? He leaned in and kissed me, voiding thought out.
“See you tomorrow,” he uttered, a half-smile lurking beneath his lips.
No big deal. He’d lied to me. At ten-thirty the designers assembled in the conference room for a meeting Logan had scheduled only an hour prior. He didn’t sit in the back with his laptop, he stood up front with his boss, Will, the creative director, and Jon. The VP of sales was tall, southern, and always seemed like he’d rather be somewhere else. We only saw him when something had gone wrong, like losing a client. All of the designers went on the defensive when they laid eyes on him, and lowered themselves to sit with straight backs.
Will was in his late fifties. He oversaw all the departments including PR and broadcast, and those departments were far more demanding than ours, so we didn’t see him much either. Logan’s face was empty. His gaze paused on me, and then went to the room.
“Thank you for being flexible with your schedules,” he said. “By now you might have heard that our company acquired Paradigm Creative, and you’re wondering how this will affect our department.”
What? Paradigm Creative was a competing agency. They were smaller than we were, but there was sure to be a full design staff there. A spark of panic ignited in my stomach. Was Jon here to break the bad news that our department was being replaced?
“We’re bringing on most of PC’s design team,” Logan continued, “to help with the new workload, and there’s going to be a change in structure within our department. A supervisor position will be created from each of the locations, and those new supervisors will report to me.”
His eyes flicked my direction for a second. So miniscule no one else probably noticed it.
Holy shit.
A deal this big had been in the works for a while. Logan had known someone in our department was getting promoted, and with that single look, he told me everything. This was why he’d wanted to keep our relationship a secret. Why he’d hesitated when talking about my promotion to senior designer. He had bigger plans for me.
I was the person he’d confessed was the best in the department, but doing something like this was going to make waves. Big fucking ones. If anyone heard we were dating, they would assume I’d slept my way to it, making both Logan and me look bad.
My mind raced with the revelations. Suddenly the meeting was over. Logan was already checking email on his phone and out the door before I shuffled up out of my seat and back to my cube. I had to talk to him. My hands closed around my phone, only to have it chirp with a text message from him.
Spiro’s was eight blocks from the office. It was a hike for mediocre Greek food, and I assumed he’d chosen it exactly for this reason. Our co-workers were unlikely to wander in and see us together. He’d gotten a table in the back, and stood when I came toward him, his suit jacket removed and hanging on the back of his chair. We hadn’t set any kind of boundaries for meetings like this, so close to the office and in the middle of the day.
“Hi,” he said. “How’s your day going?”
I sat in the chair he’d pulled out for me. “It’s been interesting. Keeping things quiet about us makes a bit more sense now.”
“I’ll interview anyone who applies.” A coy smile lurked on his face when he sat down beside me. “But, yeah, I already have someone in mind for the position.”
“I’ve only been there a few years, and I’m young.”
He looked startled. “You don’t want it?”
“You know I do.” It would be easier if I didn’t, but I was far too driven to pass up the opportunity.
“It’s not really about age. It’s a confidence and respect thing. They respect you, and we both know you’d be great at it.”
I had no idea if I was speaking with my boss or my boyfriend, and it made me dizzy.
“So, are you going to stop by my office later and apply?”
I felt a similar coy smile overtake me. “Yes, sir.”
A switch flipped, and I knew exactly whom I was talking to. His gaze filled with so much desire, it left me breathless. Beneath the table, his hand closed around my knee.
Keeping work and our relationship separate was difficult, but I did my best. We talked about his upcoming marathon. How Payton had seemed kind of down the last time I’d spoken to her. Something was up, and I worried I might have become one of those neglectful friends who drops everything when she has a boyfriend.
The waiter brought the check and jarred me from my thoughts.
“I’m going to have to get back soon,” I said, noting the clock on the back wall. Not that I wanted to go. I wanted to stay right where I was. In fact, I wanted his hand to move higher on my thigh. Instead, it tensed.
“Go to the bathroom, now.” His voice was urgent enough I didn’t question it. I snatched up my purse and went straight back into the restroom, ducking into the first stall.
My thumbs typed furiously on the screen of my phone.
Had she seen us? I waited for him to detail more. But nothing came, so I asked what I should do.
