21. Olivia
Chapter 21
Olivia
T he stares were beginning to grate on me.
This was only the second time that Damien’s sister could take Noah on a weekday, and from the whispers and glances toward my desk as I tried desperately to focus, it was clear that others had taken notice of my prolonged absences.
With my only other friend here, Sophie, working in Human Resources instead of project management like me, I couldn’t even ask what had gotten around and what hadn’t. She had no idea of the office gossip on floor five, and now, neither did I.
But it revolved around me. That much was obvious.
I slipped my phone from my bag and pulled up my texts with Damien. The log from this morning seemed so mundane, so normal for two people living together, that it was almost a small shock to my system to have them in front of my face again.
Do we still have eggs?
Yes, but Noah would like to clarify that we’re out of cheese.
Cheese. Got it. What’s the chicken nugget situation?
Dame, we have a never-ending supply of chicken nuggets.
Have you seen how many Noah can eat? He set a record the other night while you were working out. Twenty-two in a single meal. My son is a fucking machine.
I pressed the little box that brought up my keyboard and sighed. I could message him. I could tell him what was going on, but he was already dealing with so much that I wasn’t sure I wanted to add another layer to that — especially when I knew damn well that he would only want to help.
But I also needed someone to talk to, and Sophie was in a meeting until three.
Me: If I tell you about how shitty my day is going, do you promise not to make it your number one priority to try to fix it?
Almost immediately, the three little dancing bubbles popped up.
Dame: That depends on if it’s something I’m capable of fixing. If I can, I will.
I set my phone down on my desk in frustration, burying my face in my hands. I just wanted to complain, just wanted to vent and feel heard, and although I appreciated his willingness to solve my problems, he had enough on his plate right now.
My phone buzzed.
Dame: Is it your coworkers again?
I groaned quietly into my palms.
Dame: Tell me what’s going on or I’ll come down there myself.
Me: It’s not my coworkers.
A lie, but hopefully it was enough to get him out of it and keep him from intervening.
Dame: Come up to my office then and we can just chat about whatever it is.
Fuck. I couldn’t do that, not when this many eyes were on me, not when our… situation was likely the cause of it. He had to know that. He had to be testing me.
Me: I can’t do that.
Dame: Because it’s your coworkers.
Me: You’re the worst.
Dame: You didn’t think that last night.
My cheeks heated as I read back the message again, and again, and again. I definitely, absolutely, did not think that last night. I thought everything but that.
Dame: Tell me what’s going on.
Me: Fine.
Emma, one of the chosen interns two desks down from me, snickered under her breath as she averted her gaze from me. I wanted to throw my fucking wireless mouse at her face.
Me: They keep looking at me. And people keep fucking whispering and snickering and just staring at me. It’s worse than it was last week.
Me: I think they know something’s going on. Idk if something slipped up in HR or if Sophie didn’t shut her mouth, or maybe they’re just speculating.
Damien’s three little bubbles popped up again but disappeared a moment later.
Me: Maybe I shouldn’t have let you drive me to work.
Me: I can just take the bus or something. It’s not that big of a deal once a week.
Me: Hello?
I stared at the lack of bubbles for far too long before putting my phone down in frustration. Either he was on a call, or he was making my situation far worse.
I tried to focus again on the PowerPoint I’d been trying to assemble. It was bare bones, just loaded with information but without any graphics or images — just plain white pages that made my eyes burn to look at. I’d at least separated everything out into their individual slides, but I almost wished I was at home instead with Noah’s shows playing in the background and a beeping oven telling me it was time to take out the Goddamn chicken nuggets. At least then I could actually get some work done instead of feeling like a caged animal in the zoo, only there for Emma’s and Matt’s and Polly’s and everyone else’s entertainment.
A hand came down on the backrest of my chair, and I nearly jumped out of my seat.
Turning halfway around in my now unmovable chair, Damien’s hard-set jaw and full suit came into view, and all I wanted to do was strangle him.
“You can’t just come down here,” I hissed, my face heating, burning, scolding . I couldn’t deny that his presence was a welcome relief, but oh my God, I wanted to kill him. Everyone was staring now — not just those who had been in the loop before. And I couldn’t blame them. The fucking owner and CEO was in our small office, looming over an employee, looking far too attractive for his own good.
“I believe, Olivia, that I own this entire building and can go wherever I please,” he grinned. “How’s the project coming along?”
Being honest, telling him it was going terribly, would only raise questions with the people around me. No one in their right mind would tell the highest-up person in this company that their work was going terribly. But I didn’t want to lie to him, either.
“Is this it?” he asked, glancing at my computer screen, one eyebrow raising at the white and black PowerPoint slide.
“Please don’t do this,” I breathed, keeping my voice low enough in the hopes that only he could hear me. “Just get me out of here.”
He rolled his eyes and pushed himself up off my chair. “Looks great,” he lied, but he sounded believable enough. “Hillary in accounting needs to see you. I was nearby anyway so I figured I’d grab you for her.”
Who the fuck is Hillary in accounting? “Uh, okay,” I mumbled. I pushed back in my chair and stood, smoothing out my black pencil skirt where it had wrinkled from sitting down for hours.
“Bring your things,” he added.
“To accounting?” I could feel the stares lingering on me as I held his gaze, the hairs on the back of my neck prickling.
He nodded.
————
The fucking elevator went right past the floor for accounting.
“Prick,” I mumbled, fidgeting with the sleeves of my cardigan as the elevator climbed and climbed.
One arm slid around my front, pulling me back against his hardened chest. “You wanted out. I got you out, princess. Be thankful ,” he purred. Something sharp grated against the top of my ear, and in the metallic reflection of us from the doors, his eyes met mine, his teeth gently holding onto my ear.
“They’ll ask more questions now,” I sighed.
“They won’t.” The elevator dinged and he released me immediately, putting a breath of healthy distance between us before the doors slid open to his floor. “I was drafting an email to your manager on my way down. If your coworkers think that their jobs are secure just because they got selected for a presentation, then they’re far too naive.”
He stepped around me and motioned for me to follow, crossing the threshold out into the long corridor that branched the private offices. “Damien, you can’t just fire them.”
“I’m not firing them, princess,” he said quietly, his guard not as high in the empty hallway. “It’ll be a warning. A warning they should have received last week when you didn’t want me to intervene.”
“Because I don’t want you bringing more attention to the problem. It’ll just make it worse.”
“Not if they’ll be written up for it happening again,” he grinned.
He pushed the door to his office open, the natural light flooding my senses. It was so much nicer in here than it was in our small office downstairs — all we had was fluorescent lighting and dying plants, but that’s where the first-year hires in project management ended up.
“You can work in here for the rest of the day,” he said. “I’ve got a meeting in half an hour, and I’ll be in and out for the rest of the afternoon. Might as well get a good amount of use.”
As much as I hated him for intervening, I fucking loved his office. And I could actually get work done in here.
I shot him an annoyed smirk as I dropped my bag onto the sofa and shucked my cardigan. The natural light made it warm enough that I didn’t even need it — it was a normal temperature in here instead of the freezing one my manager was set to keep the thermostat at.
I flopped down onto the plush cushions as he watched, sprawling across the sofa and lying down in the sun. “I guess marrying the CEO has its perks,” I grinned.
A little chuckle left him as he took a step toward me, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Is that why you married me, then? Not so you could feel okay about losing your virginity to someone you barely knew?”
Asshole. I tucked my lower lip between my teeth and pulled my legs up onto the couch, my pencil skirt rising just an inch, the slit in the back parting. “Don’t act like you didn’t marry me just to fulfill some wild fantasy of stealing a woman’s virginity.”
He snorted as he stepped around the glass coffee table, his wristwatch glinting as he entered the rays of the sun. “I’ve done that before,” he said, slipping one hand from his pocket and placing it on my bent, stockings-covered knee. “But that wasn’t it. Want to try again, Liv?”
His fingers made circles on the sheer tights, forcing goosebumps to erupt across my skin and my lower gut to coil. Fuck. “You were so drunk and horny that you’d have done anything to see me naked?”
“I saw all of you in that bathroom before we met Elvis,” he drawled, the tips of his digits digging in and forcing my legs to part just a little bit more. “One more guess.”
At the front of his slacks, just between his hip bones, something hard pressed against his zipper. My heartbeat thundered in my ears.
His fingers dipped lower across my inner thigh, exploring, feeling, traveling down, down, down, until they slipped beneath my skirt, until they rested against the fleshiest part of my leg, until they fisted the fragile material. Runs sprang to life across my tights, and he pulled, splintering the fabric more. “Come on, princess. Use your words.”
Cool air hit the warmest part of me as the tights gave way, ripping entirely along the center seam. “You…” I swallowed, struggling to find the right words as he pushed my legs further apart, his eyes locked on me as his hand explored. “You wanted to fuck me and I wouldn’t let you unless we were married.”
His fingers ghosted across my already damp lips, forcing a whimper from me as a shiver crawled up my spine, and his eyes widened. “Jesus, Liv,” he laughed, the lids of his eyes lowering as he leaned over me, one hand resting on the arm of the sofa and the other slipping against my clit. “No underwear? At work ?”
I gasped at the sensation. “I was in a rush?—”
“No, you weren’t. Don’t fucking lie,” he smirked. One finger slipped inside of me, his thumb coming to rest against the bundle of nerves, and oh my God , he was going to kill me like this. “Tell me, princess. Do you like the way it feels without them? Do you like the way the seam rubs against you?”
Another finger, and a little more pressure. My back arched up off the cushions, my face heating once again.
“You went to bed last night full of my cum,” he rasped, slowly lowering himself until he was on his knees, forcing me to open even more. “Were you hoping it would leak out while you sat at your desk? Were you hoping it would coat your fucking tights?”
His fingers curled, hitting that spot inside of me that made my head swim. “Damien,” I moaned, reaching for him, snaking my hand around the back of his neck. He looked so fucking perfect in the sunlight, little specks of gray reflecting in his hair, his blue eyes shining.
“If I didn’t have a Goddamn meeting…” he breathed, sinking another finger into me, stretching me just enough that I lost every brain cell left.
“Don’t go to it,” I begged. I dug my nails into the back of his neck, tried to pull him closer. “Fuck me instead. Please.”
Something akin to a growl reverberated through him as he pushed my skirt up my thighs until it settled around my hips, revealing every bit of damage he’d done to my unsalvageable tights, revealing the cords of my dampness that connected my upper thighs.
“As much as I’d love to, I don’t have the time.”
His mouth descended on me, his tongue replacing the work of his thumb. I could barely breathe, could barely move , and in an instant I could feel my release beginning to build like a finish line I didn’t want to cross. I didn’t want to stop .
“Fuck, you’re close,” he grunted, the words obscured from his mouthful of me . “Good fucking thing, too. Ethan’s on his way up, and I didn’t lock the door.”
God fucking dammit, he knew what he was doing, what he was saying. Just the idea of his friend, his lawyer, walking in expecting to find Damien behind his desk and instead finding him with his mouth between my spread legs and my pussy on display, sent me spiraling at top speed toward my release.
I broke in an instant, a painful screech daring to rip through my vocal cords, but Damien’s hand covered my mouth at the last possible second and dampened the sound. Pleasure invaded my system, spreading through my veins like wildfire, breaking me, mending me, devouring me. He kept going far past when it was too sensitive, making me squirm, making me sob for him to stop, and only then did his tongue leave me.
His fingers stayed, though. They dragged me through every aftershock.
Half drunk on pleasure and the sight of glistening wetness coating his lips and chin, words fell from me that I didn’t think through. “I can’t believe I get to have this for the rest of my fucking life.”
He picked himself up from the floor and leaned across my spread legs to kiss me, his fingers slowly slipping out of me. “Only if you stay married to me,” he joked, his breathy chuckle fanning out across my lips.
“Absolutely not,” I laughed. But with my mind too full of him and not enough hesitation, sneaking thoughts drifted in. Would it be so bad to stay married to him? Do I even want this to end?
I shifted my hips up toward him, just narrowly missing a collision with his slacks before he pushed me back down onto the sofa. “Do not stain my suit right before a Goddamn meeting, princess.” His voice was harsh, but his half-lidded eyes and wide smile told me he wouldn’t have given two shits if I had.
He kissed me again, and again, and again, his hips preventing my legs from closing or my skirt from moving back into position. He kissed me as long as he possibly could, sharing the taste of me, holding me, only making me want more from him, longer with him, everything with him. I needed to get a fucking hold of myself, but I didn’t want to. I wanted this. I wanted this for as long as he would give it to me.
But a robotic voice from across the room sounded, and both of us paused. “Board meeting in five minutes. Board meeting in five minutes.”
“I have to go,” he sighed, pushing himself up off me and dragging my skirt back into position. “I’ll be back in an hour or so.”
I pouted but let him retreat, the realization fully sinking in that Ethan likely wasn’t on his way up and he’d just said that to get a rise out of me. The door was unlocked though — that much had been true. But I doubted anyone in their right mind would barge in unannounced to Damien’s office.
He offered me a hand, and I took it, letting him pull me back up into a seated position. “HR,” he said.
What? I looked up at him, my gaze quizzical, my brows furrowing.
“I married you because I wanted to have you without breaking mine or HR’s rules.” He straightened his suit jacket before leaning down to press a final kiss against my lips, my mind still spinning. “Among all the other reasons.”