Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 66330 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 332(@200wpm)___ 265(@250wpm)___ 221(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66330 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 332(@200wpm)___ 265(@250wpm)___ 221(@300wpm)
Maureen sighed and tilted her head, assessing the look on my face. “Not on purpose. But you’re intimidating, Con. I was scared to death of you the first few years I worked here.”
“You were not,” I said, affronted.
“Yes, I was. And it wasn’t until I realized that you’re not a complete asshole that I was able to really do my job well.”
I paused, digesting this.
“Come on, Con.” Maureen finally lowered herself into one of the chairs around my conference table, a hand carefully—and strategically—placed on her stomach that had risen like bread dough over the last few months. “I’ll feel so much better if I have Lily and a temp covering you.”
“Christ,” I muttered. “Why don’t you just come out and tell me I’ll ruin your baby’s first months of life if you don’t get your way?”
Maureen smiled, knowing she had me. “I was saving it for the grand finale, but if I need to say it now…”
“No.” I shook my head, frustration gnawing in my gut. I was pissed, but not at Maureen. She was genuinely doing what she thought was best for me. It was Lily who deserved my wrath. And she’d get it.
But first, she was going to get her way.
Maureen went back to her desk to work things out with HR regarding Lily’s new position. I stewed at my desk, coming up with a plan. I couldn’t do anything until Maureen was out on maternity leave, but once she was, I’d deal with Lily. She might have been able to manipulate Maureen into forcing my hand, but once Maureen was out of the way, she’d have no one to hide behind.
I saw the desk being carried in and placed beside Maureen’s. I saw IT set up the computer and printer. But I still wasn’t prepared when I walked in on Tuesday morning and saw Lily sitting behind it all. I stopped dead, her physical presence hitting me like a blow. She was wearing a dress, but not one of the gauzy college-girl ones she’d tried to dress up with a blazer. This one was black and fitted, nipped in at the waist with a belt, and then swirling to a stop just above her knees. Perfectly appropriate for the office, and yet somehow seductive. She looked older than her twenty-three years in it, and I wondered if that was her goal.
“Good morning!” She leapt up when she saw me standing there. If she noticed my knuckles turning white around the handle of my briefcase, she didn’t let on. “Can I get you some coffee?”
I breathed in slowly, released it. “Executive assistants don’t get coffee.”
“No?” Lily tilted her head so that the long golden sheets of hair slid off her shoulder.
“No,” I said levelly. “I get my own. I think you’ll find I’m fairly self-sufficient.” And I was going to get more self-sufficient. I wasn’t going to ask Lily to do a damn thing that brought her even a step closer.
She stepped closer anyway and blinked her wide, beautiful eyes. “Then what do I do?”
Was I imagining the coy note in her voice? I honestly couldn’t fucking tell anymore. It didn’t matter whether it was real or imagined though, lust was still slamming into me as I considered all the things she could do. With effort, I shoved the thoughts away and managed to say, “Keep my calendar straight and transfer my calls, and consider your job done.”
I walked stiffly into my office, wishing for the first time that my door had a lock and that that two-thirds of the interior walls weren’t fucking transparent. If I could have gotten some privacy, I’d have jerked off to the memory of her lips forming the question what do I do? And put her out of my mind.
Instead, I had to talk one client off a ledge over a perceived slight on set with my dick straining painfully against my pants. I stared at the back of Lily’s blonde head and lost my train of thought more than once. Now I was the one pissing off my client.
“You’re not even listening!” she yelled and hung up.
I couldn’t argue that. She was an important client, but somehow, I couldn’t remember a word she said. I didn’t know whether to call up the director and tell him to give her a bigger trailer or the other actor’s agent and rip him a new one. I slammed the phone down, frustration and something darker thrumming through me. I narrowed my eyes as Lily laughed at something Maureen had said. I couldn’t hear her through the glass, but I imagined the throaty sound of it. Thought of her profile picture again, those long, bare legs, the curve of her ass.
Three and a half more weeks, I told myself. Then Maureen would be out on maternity leave and Lily would be out on that perfect ass. After what she’d pulled, I’d take away everything. The job. The condo. I’d have to find a way to deal with Halley, but that seemed easy compared to the excruciating torture of being in close proximity with the one person I wanted that I couldn’t have.