Chapter 3 #3
There’s a beat of silence while we study each other, looking for weakness in each other’s poise, and my whole body becomes one hot pulse of blood.
‘Why don’t you take off your underwear and I’ll show you exactly where I’m thinking of putting it?’ I murmur.
‘I’m not wearing any,’ she states boldly, though her voice has a raspy quality to it now, as though she’s struggling to get her words out.
Judging by her high colour and the size of her pupils, she’s just as turned on by this as I am.
‘You said I only have to wear knickers to the office,’ she adds, when I frown at her in mock consternation, ‘and we’re not in the office right now.’
Ah, so we’re still playing that game, are we?
Well, that’s fine by me.
‘Show me,’ I order roughly.
She doesn’t hesitate, but does exactly as I demand, lifting her skirt to prove she’s not lying to me.
My breath rattles in my throat as I take in the enticing sight of her naked lower body. She’s standing with her feet slightly apart and I catch a glint of wet arousal between her thighs.
Okay, this woman is seriously fucking with my self-control.
It’s not like me to be swayed by this kind of provocation, but the desire and the self-assurance I see in her eyes has driven me right to the edge. For a few moments I seriously consider using those toys on her, and then burying myself inside her.
I want it so much my whole body is vibrating with the stress of holding myself back.
But I can’t. I have to stay in control of this.
‘When you’re with me you should consider yourself still at work,’ I say roughly, taking a deliberate step away from her and folding my arms – to show her that I’m not about to hand her what she wants and also to give myself a chance to get my raging need for her under control.
‘And since you’ve deliberately chosen to misinterpret my rule about underwear I’m going to have to punish you by confiscating your toys. ’
She stares at me with a small frown pinching her brow, as if she’s not sure she’s heard me correctly.
Without another word I hold up the butt plug and make a big show of dropping it into the pocket of my trousers. ‘It should stay nice and warm in there,’ I say.
She blinks at me, then opens her mouth, perhaps to ask whether that’s a promise that I’ll use it on her some time in the future, but then she closes it again. Maybe she’s scared I’ll say no. At least this way she can pretend there’s still a game at play.
She lets go of the hem of her skirt and it and glides down to cover her thighs again.
Part of me grieves for the loss of the alluring sight of her beautiful naked body and the pleasure we could have given each other, but the other part knows this is the right thing to do. If I give in to this now, I’m toast.
‘Make sure you take good care of that,’ she mutters. Her voice sounds rough and uneven. ‘It’s one of my favourites.’
‘I will,’ I reply calmly, though I feel anything but. ‘As long as you bring my phone into the office on Monday morning. I expect to see it sitting on my desk – the phone that is, Maya, not you – when I get in first thing.’
‘Or what?’ she demands in a husky voice.
‘Or I’ll have to start legal proceedings towards you for theft of company property.’
I take a deliberate step towards her, then regret it when the heady scent of her hits my senses.
‘I don’t fuck around, Maya,’ I murmur, only just managing to hang on to my composure – but I need to, I have to. ‘As you’ll come to realise. Business is business.’
She visibly swallows. ‘Fine – but you don’t know what you’re missing,’ is all she says in response, and with a cool nod of her head she stalks past me and out of the room.
I hear her quick footsteps in the hall, then the creak of the front door opening and the slam of it closing as she leaves.
I breathe out and collapse onto one of the nearby kitchen chairs, every muscle in my body throbbing with pent-up frustration.
Thank God she left when she did, because I’m not sure I’d have been able to maintain my rapidly failing grip on control if she’d stayed much longer.
I’ve never met anyone with such self-possession or so much gumption, and it’s fucking dazzling.
Whenever she’s around I feel things I’ve never experienced before.
Things that make my heart race and my brain fizz with a compelling desire to get to know more about her.
To find out what’s really going on in that inventive head of hers.
But, as much as I want to act on the fierce attraction between us, I know I can’t do it.
Not when I’m so painfully aware of the potential damage it could do to my business relationship with Maxim.
If he thinks for a second that I’ve taken advantage of his daughter in any way, especially after he made it very clear how he’d feel about that, I can kiss his beneficence and therefore, quite possibly, my company’s future goodbye.
So I’m going to have to keep Maya at arm’s length. Because if I give in to this dangerous fascination I’m developing for her it could fucking destroy me.