Chapter 10
Iswallowed my embarrassment and pushed back tears. “You can leave but I’m staying. This is my home.”
I wrenched out of his grasp and marched down the hall to my door.
It was bad enough he had found out which neighborhood I lived in. It was worse when he saw my building. But to have him walk me to my door?
There was no way I could say it only looked run-down in the dark.
No, he had seen where I was living and now knew exactly the kind of person I was and the kind of life I came from. There was no pretending that I was from some stable, middle-class family in the suburbs somewhere or that I came from people having anything of value.
That was the problem with trying to pull yourself from the gutter.
It meant you started in the gutter, and most people would never see past that once they knew.
The funny part was that this place, this absolute shit hole, was so much better than where I grew up. At least here, I got to sleep in my own bed. Even if the mattress was on the floor, it was mine. I didn’t have to share my shower. Sure, the water was usually cold, some of the tiles were broken, and the pipes made horrendous sounds, but it was my own place.
With as much formality as I could muster, I kept my back to him as I faced my apartment door. “Thank you for the escort, but I can handle it from here.”
He grabbed my shoulders and spun me around, pinning me to the door. “I’m serious. This isn’t the place for you. It’s disgusting and beneath you. Five Points is safer.”
His words cut me deep. He had no idea how bad this really was or how much worse off I could have been, how much worse off I had been.
When I moved here, I was proud of the find. No, it wasn’t ideal, but it was mine.
He may have had a point about the supermax prison being safer, but this was still my home, and I had some pride left.
“Of course it is. Five Points has a full staff of guards and thicker walls.” I smiled. “If you don’t mind, it has been a long day.”
I needed him to leave before I opened the door. I didn’t want him to see my threadbare couch next to my old mattress on the floor in a corner. No TV, no lamp, just the couch, mattress, and the sad little kitchenette in my sad little studio that was barely three hundred square feet including the bathroom.
“Do you enjoy living here? Is that it? The drug paraphernalia on the ground, the dried blood splatter on the walls, half the roach population of the city living on the carpet and in the walls?”
He stepped closer, and the tension that had been practically crackling between us since he caught me in his private bathroom again seemed to heat the cold air around me.
My mouth went dry, my heart thundered in my ears.
He leaned a little closer, towering over me like he did when he intimidated suspects and even other attorneys.
Intimidation wasn’t what I felt.
My breath caught in my throat, and my blood started to warm in the frigid air as I remembered the kiss he’d forced on me earlier.
To my shame, I wanted another taste.
But it didn’t matter what I wanted. It could not happen again. Ever.
Not just because it was extremely unprofessional but because I wouldn’t be able to survive his look of disgust turning into pity the more deeply he looked into my life.
Even if I offered myself to him right here, even if he wanted me, a man of his position would never be caught dead fucking a woman in this place, not on my old mattress that sagged in some places or on my sofa that had springs sticking out in one corner.
I couldn’t stand it if his poorly hidden, heated looks of lust—or his professional look of impressed surprise and pride as he reviewed my work—changed to pity.
The shame would kill me.
“Well, Eddie?” I hadn’t realized he was waiting for an answer.
“No, my fondness for the roaches is not why I stay.”
“Then what is it?”
“I can afford it.” I sighed, giving the only answer I could without having to explain more of my situation. “My apartment is my own. I don’t share, and the roaches tend to eat the salesmen and religious missionaries trying to save people in the building.”
His lips turned up a little at the corner, the only sign I would get that he found the humor in my joke.
“Is that so?” His eyes drifted from mine down to my lips, and for a moment, I thought he was going to kiss me again.
If he kissed me again, I would never be able to recover the little bit of my dignity that was still intact.
I shrugged out of his coat, folded it lengthwise, and held it out to him. “Yes. Now, if you will excuse me, Mr. Astrid, it’s late, and I have a boss that is demanding and will require my best work in the morning.”
Refusing to take the coat, he said, “Harrison.”
“What?”
He lowered his face closer to mine, his gaze focused on my lips. “My name is Harrison. Use it.”
As the weight of his intense scrutiny sent butterflies fluttering in my stomach, I licked my lips but remained silent.
He lifted a hand to my jaw and tilted my head back. “I said use it. Now.”
My cheeks warmed. “You need to leave. Now.”
His thumb rubbed over my bottom lip. “Not until I hear this pretty mouth say my name.”
Thank God I was already leaning against my door. Holy hell, who talked like that? Forget his reputation as a ruthless and extremely intelligent attorney, the man had an absolutely dirty-as-fuck mouth.
And to my everlasting humiliation—it did it for me.
“If I say your name will you leave?”
He wrapped his hand around my throat just below my jaw before leaning in to whisper in my ear. “I’d rather hear you scream it the moment I thrust my cock inside of you.”
A tremor ran down my spine. “You can’t talk to me like that. Inside or outside of the office. It isn’t right.”
He chuckled. “Nothing about what I’m thinking at this moment is right. In fact it is all kinds of dirty, nasty wrong.”
I grabbed the doorknob behind me to keep from dropping to my knees and reaching for his belt buckle in the hope of hearing him call me his good girl right before he shoved his cock down my throat.
This needed to stop.
“Good night, Harrison. I will see you tomorrow.”
Bracing a forearm over my head, he leaned in and rasped, “Good girl.”
I closed my eyes, forced to lock my knees and squeeze my thighs together.
My voice was strained and high-pitched, showing my panic. “Please. I’m trying to be professional. I need this job. Thank you for the ride but please, I need you to take your coat and go.”
His fingers brushed back a curl from my forehead. “I will give you tonight, but this isn’t over, Eddie.”
I tried again to hand him his coat.
Ignoring the gesture he said, “You better be wearing either that coat or your own tomorrow morning when you walk into my office.”
Before I could object, he leaned down and kissed me on the forehead. “I’m waiting here until you lock your door.”
Knowing there was no point in arguing, I turned, opened the door as slightly as I could to slide inside without letting him see the interior.
Leaning against the closed door, I tried to decipher what had just happened.
“Lock the door, Eddie.”
I jumped at the sound of his command. Then I jumped to obey it.
Twisting the deadbolt in place, then engaging the chain.
I pressed my ear to the door to listen for his steps as he hopefully walked away. Instead I heard him on the phone.
“Get me Captain Raydar. This is District Attorney Astrid, badge number 75324. I need two uniform cars at…”
His voice receded as he walked down the hall.
I collapsed against the door.
It had to be all in my head. There was no way a man like him, brilliant, handsome, driven, and rich beyond any reason, would want me. There was simply no way a man like that viewed me as anything more than someone to do his busy work.
Men like him required women who were more than just women. They were investments. A woman on his arm would need to be able to help his career. She would need to know the right people, how to make small talk, and make connections that would serve him. She would have to be stunning and properly dressed for all occasions and give him heirs as beautiful and brilliant as he was. She would have to come with her own trust fund and a name that would open doors.
I came with an inferiority complex and a garbage bag full of Goodwill clothes. The most I could offer Harrison Astrid was filing his paperwork. He didn’t want me. He needed more than I could ever offer.
I closed my eyes and gave myself the reality check I needed.
He and I were not attracted to one another.
We weren’t. We couldn’t be, we were barely the same species.
This began as just a case of mistaken identity, when he thought I was a prostitute who’d visited the wrong offices late at night.
He hadn’t known I was his paralegal the first time we met.
The second time we interacted… was just a fluke.
It had to be.
He thought I was offering, which I was not. My body only responded the way it did because it had been so long since I had been with someone that I was touch-starved.
That was it. It was all just a misunderstanding that was aided by the need for human contact. It was a product of inconvenient chemicals and bad timing. Hormones and circumstance were not something worth risking my career over.
A loud knock came from the door behind me. I prayed it wasn’t him. It was so difficult to maintain my professionalism. I didn’t know if I could do it again.