13. Skye
Skye
I ’m halfway out the door when I stop and rip open my suitcase like a woman on the verge of making a very bad—or very good—decision.
The black dress pants? No. Too stiff. The cream blouse with the high collar?
Hell no. I shove both aside and reach for the silk wrap dress I told myself I wouldn’t bring.
Add the red lace bra and matching thong.
Fold in my favorite black heels, the ones that do something filthy to my legs when I walk. Perfume, lipstick, backup lipstick.
If I’m going to sit across from Reece Blackwood on a private jet for two and a half hours, I’m not doing it in “corporate casual.” I’m doing it in silence so loud he can’t ignore it.
The car picks me up exactly on time, because of course it does. The drive to the private hangar is fast and smooth, but my pulse still refuses to settle. When I step out into the sunlit tarmac, I spot him immediately.
He’s standing at the bottom of the jet stairs, talking to someone with a clipboard and wearing a fitted navy suit like it was tailored to ruin me.
Jacket still on. Tie tight. Sunglasses on.
I hate that I notice the way his hair is just slightly mussed, like he dragged his hand through it before walking out the door.
I hate that I notice how good his ass looks in those pants.
I hate that I’m about two seconds from walking right up to him and demanding he put me out of my misery.
He looks up as I approach and I feel my chest tighten because he’s not smiling. But his gaze does one slow sweep from the top of my head to the hem of my dress peeking out beneath my trench coat. It lingers.
“Good morning, Miss Rhodes,” he says. “Glad to see you made it on time.”
I meet his eyes. “Barely.”
He gestures to the stairs like a gentleman. “After you.”
The jet interior is exactly what you’d expect from a man like Reece—muted luxury, buttery soft leather recliner seats, and sleek espresso wood accents.
He nods at the flight attendant, who offers me a drink.
I wave her off and settle into the seat across from him, doing everything within my power to keep my focus out the window until we are finally in the air.
Once we reach cruising altitude, Reece opens his tablet and starts reviewing documents like it’s any other workday.
I pretend to do the same, but all I can think about is how quiet it is.
How intimate. How I’m sitting a few feet from my current sex fantasy and trying not to think about his mouth.
About how he kissed me like he was starving and I was the only thing left on the menu.
He picks up his phone, a silenced call coming in that he answers in his Bluetooth earpiece.
“Hey, Silva.”
I shift my gaze back to my own tablet, switching between Pinterest and the notes for our client meeting later.
And then, because the universe clearly has a sick sense of humor, he stands and shrugs off his jacket, then sets it on the seat beside him.
If only that’s where it stopped. But no, he laughs into the phone and reaches up to loosen his tie.
His hands are steady. Intentional. He slides the fabric free and drops it onto the table. Then he starts to roll up his sleeves… One measured fold at a time. Exposing his thick, veiny forearms so tan and cut I forget how to breathe for a second.
Oh my God, I’m actually going to combust.
I glance around, looking for anything I can use to subtly fan myself but there’s nothing. He doesn’t look up. Not at first. Just unbuttons his other cuff and rolls like he’s preparing to do something filthy instead of reviewing a merger doc.
I must make a sound because his eyes flick up, right to mine. And of course, my face suddenly feels like it’s on fire. A slow, devious grin tugs at the corner of his mouth like he knows exactly what I’ve been sitting over here fantasizing about.
I look away, unable to withstand the tension any longer and thankfully, my phone buzzes with an alert. But when I look down, it’s his name on the screen. I glance back up at him, his eyes staring into mine as I gently swipe my finger across the screen.
Reece: Keep staring at me like that and I ’ ll bend you over this table between us mid-flight.
My breath catches in my throat. He’s still watching me, calm as hell while he talks business with his CFO.
I smile to myself, not wanting to give him the only satisfaction in this little game.
Me: Why’d you stop there? Might as well unbutton a few buttons while you’re at it.
He smirks but doesn’t reply. Just reaches down to adjust himself.
Good.
The table might be wide, but it’s not enough. Not when I can see the tension in his jaw, the curve of his wrist as he grips the edge of his tablet, the dark heat in his eyes when I cross my legs and the hem of my coat parts just slightly.
We don’t speak. We don’t have to. There’s a language in this silence… each glance a sentence, each breath a paragraph. And when our legs brush under the table, he doesn’t move. Neither do I.
I go back to pretending I’m reading the agenda when he ends the call and leans forward slightly, elbows on the table. “We’re meeting the client at seven. Restaurant’s a few blocks from the hotel. They like to keep it off-site, more casual.”
“Got it.” I nod, feeling suddenly too warm in my coat.
He glances at the clock on the wall behind me. “We’ll land around five. Gives you time to settle in.”
We land fifteen minutes early. I don’t say another word as we deplane and slide into the waiting car.
The hotel suite is… something else.
It’s the kind of room I’d expect to see in a movie about a woman having a wildly inappropriate affair with a billionaire.
Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Boston skyline, a marble bathroom stocked with full-size La Mer, and a king-sized bed with sheets that look like they’ve never known a wrinkle. Even the air feels expensive.
I wheel my bag inside, shut the door, and lock it behind me with a click. There’s a moment where I just stand there, hand still on the doorknob, unsure of what I’m waiting for. A sign? A reason not to follow through on what I already know I’m going to do?
But I don’t need a sign. I already brought the damn dress.
I cross the room and unzip my suitcase, pulling it out like I’m unsheathing a weapon.
The black silk slip is soft as sin, dangerously low in the back, and tight enough across the hips to make sitting feel like an invitation.
It’s not the kind of thing you wear to talk about market integration and vertical alignment.
It’s the kind of thing you wear when you want a man to lose his mind.
I step into it anyway, slide on the dress, and let it hug every curve I’ve spent years trying to hide behind sarcasm and safety. Tonight, I don’t want to be safe. I want to be wanted.
I fix my makeup, lining my lips with a soft brick-red that looks like trouble. My hair’s already curled from this morning, but I tease it just enough to give it that perfectly undone look that says I ’ m not trying too hard, I just woke up sexy.
By the time I slip into my nude heels and glance at the clock, it’s six forty. Twenty minutes before we’re supposed to meet the clients. Plenty of time. I grab my clutch, spritz perfume over the curve of my collarbone, and do one last turn in the full-length mirror.
The reflection that looks back at me isn’t nervous.
I know how I look in this dress. I know the looks I’ll get when I remove my blazer after the client meeting.
And that’s exactly what I intend to do, but not before I let Reece get a glimpse of me in it before so he can sit through the entire meeting knowing exactly what’s underneath my professional exterior.
When the knock comes, I don’t jump. I walk across the suite and open the door like I’ve done it a hundred times before.
Reece stands on the other side, dressed in a dark-gray suit that looks tailored to every inch of his long, lean frame. His shirt is open at the collar now, no tie. His jacket’s unbuttoned, his hands in his pockets, and for a moment, we both just… stare.
His eyes drag over me unflinching, from my freshly painted toes up the length of my bare legs, pausing at my hips, my waist, my chest. But when his eyes meet mine, they go dark.
“You’re not wearing that to a client meeting.”
I tilt my head. “Excuse me?”
“Change. Hurry up.” He glances at his watch and nods toward my still-open door.
“I’m not changing; I have a blazer.” I lean inside the door to grab the blazer and slide it up my arms, buttoning it so that it conceals just how devastating I look in this dress.
He rubs his jaw roughly, his eyes focused on me again. “Fine,” he grunts, “but leave that jacket on.”
“Or what?”
“Or you’re going to get me arrested,” he barks, frustration written all over his face.
I smile. It’s sharp, unapologetic. “You started it, remember?”
His eyes narrow slightly, like he’s trying to decide if I’m a challenge or a reward.
Then he steps back just enough to let me out.
We don’t speak as we walk down the hall, but he places his hand lightly on my lower back when the elevator doors open, guiding me in with a touch that lasts too long to be polite.
The ride is silent. Tense. He doesn’t look at me and I don’t look at him. But the air between us is thick with everything we’ve only just started to say with our bodies, our glances, the reckless things we texted mid-flight like there wouldn’t be consequences.
When the elevator doors part, the hotel driver is already waiting. Reece slides in beside me, and even though we’re not touching, I can feel him—his presence, his heat, the brush of his arm just shy of mine.
But I feel him look at me once, just a flicker, the weight of his gaze dragging down my thighs, but I don’t dare return it. Because if I do, I might lean in. I might press my hand to his knee and slide it up, just to see what kind of self-control this man really has.