Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 102781 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102781 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 514(@200wpm)___ 411(@250wpm)___ 343(@300wpm)
I leaned in to whisper near her ear. “I was feeling better, so I thought I’d join you after all.”
She spun around so fast she wobbled and nearly fell off her chair. “Bennett?”
The woman next to her raised a brow. “Bennett? As in the hot guy from the office?”
I extended my hand. “One and the same. Bennett Fox. Nice to meet you. I’m guessing you’re Madison?”
“I am.” Madison looked back and forth between the two of us. “Well, this is a nice surprise. I didn’t realize Bennett was joining us tonight.”
Annalise looked frazzled. “I didn’t either.”
Madison smirked and looked to me for a response. I went with the truth.
“She’s been avoiding me for two days. I also have a pair of her underwear in my pocket I thought she might like back.”
Her friend laughed and leaned in to kiss Annalise on the cheek. “I like him. I’m going to go find my date. You two play nice.”
I slipped into Madison’s seat beside Annalise, keeping my hand on her back. “So you talk about how hot I am with your friend?”
“Don’t let your head swell any bigger. It was the only compliment I gave you.”
I leaned in. “Really? Even after the other night?”
Her cheeks turned pink. God, why did I love that about her so much? “I like your dress.”
“You don’t even know what it looks like. I’m sitting.”
I ran my knuckles along the exposed skin of her back. “It lets me touch your skin without having to sneak my hand up your skirt. So it’s one of my favorites already. Seeing the front will just be icing on the cake.”
Her cheeks darkened. God, I wanted to fuck her in broad daylight so I could watch every color her skin turned. I bet it was better than fall foliage.
“What are you doing here, Bennett?”
I took the glass of wine in front of her and drank from it. “Margo invited me. You told me that yourself the other day at lunch, remember?”
“Yes. But you didn’t mention you were coming.”
I held her eyes. “I would have, if you’d returned my call.”
She looked away.
Matteo noticed me for the first time and made a big fuss about my arrival. He set me up with a flight of different wines from this year’s harvest and stuck around talking for a while, until Margo pulled him away with a big smile—claiming to need his help with the icemaker upstairs.
Annalise traced the rim of her glass with her finger. “We don’t even have an icemaker.”
I chuckled. “Seems like I’m not the only one who thinks we need a few minutes alone to talk. Your friend disappeared the minute I got here, and your mom is trying to give us some privacy.”
She lifted her glass to her lips. “Maybe your presence just repels people.”
I smiled. “Maybe. But what does my presence do for you?”
Annalise swiveled her chair to face me. She looked around—I assumed to see how private our conversation would be—then leaned closer.
“I had a really good time the other night.”
I’d used that opening line enough times to know where this conversation was going. “But…” I said for her.
“But…we work together. Or actually, we’re pretty much competitors working in the same company.”
I leaned in to whisper in her ear, even though I knew no one could hear us. I just wanted an opportunity to get closer.
“Are you afraid I’ll fuck your trade secrets out of you?”
She mimicked my move and leaned in to whisper in mine. “No. Are you?”
I chuckled. I probably should’ve been afraid. Because I was pretty sure I’d show her whatever she wanted in order to get her to come home with me tonight.
“Look, I’m gonna put all my cards on the table. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about being inside of you for two days. You’re still getting over the asshole. I’m not looking for anything serious. We have an expiration date in our future whether we like it or not—one of us is getting shipped off to Texas. We can either spend the next month or so being frustrated and pissing each other off at the office, or we can spend that time being pissed off at Foster, Burnett and Wren for putting us in this situation while taking our frustrations out on each other in a productive manner at night. I vote for the latter.”
She sucked in her bottom lip while she kicked it around for a minute. “So during the day, if a client we’re both pitching gave me some inside information on the direction they wanted to go, and then you found out I didn’t share that with you…you wouldn’t be pissed?”
“Hell yes, I’d be pissed. But that’s the beauty of our situation. I’d be pissed as shit that you got an advantage over me. So the next morning, you might have a little trouble walking from me taking out that frustration on you. Let’s face it, it would give me an excuse to paddle that ass I’ve been dreaming about paddling since the first day I saw you. But I’m competitive, not an asshole. So you can bet I’d make it work for you, too.”