Chapter 7 Richard #2
“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“I don’t care. You shouldn’t be driving.” He walked right over her objections. “I have a huge house, plenty of guest rooms, and an excellent security system. We can get some work done, if you insist.”
“I have an apartment.” She frowned at him.
“I don’t care.” He brushed his knuckles down her cheek. She was okay.
It might take him a little while to really believe it, though.
“Richard, it’s a bad idea.” And he didn’t wonder what she meant.
“Do you remember what I said about no harm, no foul?” This close he could count the flecks of gold in her eyes.
“Yes. We work together and it would be inappropriate.” Her nostrils flared and her gaze never left his. She was as aware of him as he was of her.
“I changed my mind.” And he leaned in closer, nose barely brushing hers. He kept his actions slow and deliberate. If she wanted to push him away, he’d go. Her soft sigh brushed his cheek and he smiled—he knew capitulation when he heard it and closed the remaining distance to press his lips to hers.
He’d meant to only sample her lips, a sweet, chaste kiss—a promise for later.
She’d been shot. But the electric contact lit a chemical reaction and, when her mouth parted beneath his, he deepened the kiss, seeking and gaining entry with his tongue.
Her palm came into contact with his chest, but instead of pushing him away, she curled her fingers into his shirt and dragged him closer.
Then her tongue dueled furiously with his.
The world fell away and lust rushed in to fill all the places heated by his anger. He gripped the bed to keep from exploring her curves. With regret, he broke the kiss slowly and was pleased to find her breathing as ragged as his own. “We have a problem,” he told her, but he didn’t care one whit.
“I think so.” She swallowed and her gaze clashed with his. Red flushed her cheeks and her eyes were bright. “It goes against all the rules.”
“You know what I’ve learned over the years?” He traced the slick line of her mouth with his gaze.
“What?”
“When the rules don’t work, change them.” His heart jackhammered against his ribs, but he narrowed the divide between them, then whispered. “Are you willing to negotiate a rule change with me?”
She bit her lower lip and the innocence in the action stabbed at him.
This self-possessed, composed, wildly competent and intelligent woman bit her lip like a girl far less sure of her confidence.
Stunned by her reaction, he eased back. Her lashes swept down and then up again. “This is dangerous territory.”
Understanding her reluctance and caution, he nodded.
He’d shared it, and whether it was the security detail following him, the gunshots fired at them, seeing the blood trickling down her arm or some leftover unresolved remnant from his near fatal car crash a few months before, Richard didn’t want to keep playing it safe.
Not anymore.
“So was creek dogging,” he pointed out.
The corner of her mouth twitched. “Are you warning me that kissing you will be a lot like creek dogging?”
“Doing insanely foolish things for the thrill of it?” he replied, and kissed the sassy corner of her mouth. “Hell yes.”
Interestingly enough, she refused to argue with him while Armand’s security drove them to her apartment until they were both inside and their escort outside.
“This is ridiculous.” She touched the sling on her arm.
“It’s a scratch. I can stay here and be in the office first thing Monday morning—or even tomorrow morning. ”
“No.” He disagreed and found it extremely easy to tell her so.
Glancing around her apartment was enlightening and he fought the urge to explore.
It was small, but comfortable. The two-bedroom was in a twenty story building just fifteen minutes from his office.
He wanted to kick himself for how often they ended the work day more than an hour away from her apartment, yet she’d never complained. “You want me to go pack for you?”
“Richard, I don’t need to come and stay at your house.
It’s a thoughtful offer, but I’m good. Really.
” She set her purse down on the white oak, Queen Anne table.
The number of dings and scratches in the wood cried out it was an old family piece and likely hauled for sentimental value.
It matched nothing else in the room full of muted earth tones brightened by jewel tone accents and neat, orderly simplicity.
A Kindle sat on the arm of the sofa, and books were scattered on the shelves.
His palms itched to go and see what types of books she liked to read.
He had the ridiculous urge to know everything about her.
“You’ve still got the adrenaline going from the attack and probably a little bit of shock—not to mention the local anesthetic they used before they stitched you up.
Tomorrow will be more uncomfortable. At my place, I can look after you, make sure you take your meds and you can sit and soak up the sun.
It’s a win-win.” He sidled over to her and grinned.
“Turnabout’s fair play. You’ve been looking after me since your first day in the office and I know you weren’t fooled about how tired I was. ”
“That’s different,” she argued. Instead of going toward her bedroom, she headed for her tiny kitchen. Despite the slender length of it, a large window filled the space with light. Popping the fridge open, she extracted a bottle of water.
Richard reached over and unscrewed the top for her.
“No, it’s not. The only difference is you didn’t know me, you walked into a hellacious job and you didn’t complain—not once—about the amount of work it took to catch me back up.
In the office at seven and not out again until ten or eleven at night.
I don’t think you’ve had a day off since you started. ”
“But I got to watch you play golf and eviscerate a douchebag.” She grinned and took a drink of her water.
He’d acted purely on impulse the day he’d picked her up for that game.
She hadn’t needed to be there, but she’d tagged along and walked the entire course, standing in the sun and been pawed by the “actor” brother-in-law.
No, he hadn’t needed her there. He’d wanted her there.
“Yeah, that just tells me I owe you more.” He blew out a breath. “Honey, you can keep fighting me on this and I’ll stand here and argue with you, but I’m an attorney. I can argue all night.”
“Okay, one you can’t just walk into a hospital room, tell me I am staying with you for the weekend, follow me home and continue the argument. I’m your assistant, not your girlfriend.” A struggle played across her expression.
“I know, but you’re my friend Kate. I like my friend and I want to take care of her. Can you let me do that?”
Their gazes clashed. He understood the difficulty—hell, he wrestled with his own issues.
A part of him thought she would be better off far away from him—but the selfish part of him didn’t want to send her away.
Armand had him under watch, apparently whether he liked it or not, so the safer place was with him.
After all, isn’t that what I told Armand when he was so determined to push Anna away for her own good?
“You don’t fight fair.” She set the bottle down and rested back against the counter. Her statement of the obvious suggested she wavered, but she’d hardly given up.
“I fight to win.” A truth he had long since come to accept about himself. “I’m going to go pack a bag for you. What do you want?”
“I can’t sleep with you Richard.” Her quiet words stopped him. “We would be crossing a line we can’t take back.”
Leaning on the doorframe to her kitchen, he stared at her levelly. “I know. You work for me. Sleeping with me has not been, is not, and never will be a condition of that employment. But I know we’re a little bit more than employer and employee—and I know you feel it too.”
“It doesn’t matter what I feel or don’t.” She ran her tongue over her upper lip and shook her head. “It doesn’t change the facts.”
“It can,” he said softly, because what he said in the next few minutes could very well change the direction they went.
He really wanted to control the steering of that particular course.
Maybe they’d only had a few weeks to get to know each other, but what he knew of her he liked and dammit—he wanted more.
“We make rules, we negotiate them, and we don’t break anything or change until we’re both ready. ”
“Life is not a negotiation. Not always.” Not a rejection.
“It can be, if you want it bad enough.” His had been.
He didn’t like the life he’d grown up in—one stained by his father’s dishonesty and double dealings—so he’d changed his life by changing the rules.
“But this? Right now? This isn’t about taking you home to my bed, stripping off your clothes and kissing you until we can’t see straight.
See, I know that’s a potential outcome and it’s an attractive one.
But that’s not what I’m asking you for or what I am trying to accomplish. Tonight.”
Blowing out a long breath, she gave him a skeptical look. “What are you asking?”
“You. Me. My house. The weekend. Tonight through Monday morning at eight a.m. We’re not an attorney and his assistant.
It’s not about the office or the job—just you and me.
Richard and Kate. Spending a weekend together, getting to know each other and letting me look after you so I don’t worry that you’re okay.
” It sounded damn good to him. They could always renegotiate later.
“Can I get that in writing?” The smile curving her mouth teased him. “Specific terms and definitions.”
“Contracts favor the one who writes them.” He glanced around her kitchen and spotted a legal pad.
He grabbed it and a pen, carried them over and set them next to her.
A phone number was in the upper right hand corner of the pad.
He recognized it instantly. Armand’s private number at the tower.
He paused. Then, remembered Anna, how fondly the women spoke of each other.
He wouldn’t be surprised if they too had formed a deeper employer/employee relationship.
Though, he doubted contract terms were involved in their friendship.
Tearing off the top sheet and laying it aside, he held up the pen. “Dictate the terms.”
“You’re serious?” She studied him, disbelief and—dare he hope?—a hint of enchantment in her eyes.
“Deadly.” He nodded once and waited, pen poised over the paper. “Terms, woman. Name the terms.”
“Fine. The following contract and terms, to be hereinafter known as ‘The Contract’ will be between Kate Braddock and Richard Prentiss, hereinafter known as ‘The Parties’ with regard to the next—” she paused to look at the clock on her stove, “—sixty-eight hours. Expiring at zero-eight hundred, Pacific standard time, Monday.”
He grinned at the “hereinafters” and the definition of “the parties.” Adding Monday’s date to it, he glanced up. “Someone’s been paying attention.”
“After the seventy-four we’ve written, reviewed or amended in the last four weeks, I should hope so.”
“Seventy-four? Are you sure?”
“The consortium contracts—we had to write out individual ones for each negotiation and each company licensing Spherecast software.” The amused impatience in her tone drew another grin from him.
“True. All right, point to you. Next, terms?” He tapped the legal pad.
“Impossible man,” she muttered.
He wrote down Richard must be impossible.
“That is not a term.” Her mouth formed an “o” and he had to bite his tongue to keep from kissing her.
“You said it, it goes in, and I don’t have a problem with that stipulation.” Hell, he rather enjoyed imagining how many ways he could be impossible.
“Fine.” Straightening, she tapped the top of the legal pad.
“The parties will sleep in separate bedrooms, shower in separate bathrooms. They will refrain from intimate contact, with a minimum of six—no, make that twelve—inches of distance between them at all times. Conversations may include friendly banter, but must avoid overt sexual advances and at no point will I sleep with you.”
Richard grinned and read his way through the contract. Damn if she didn’t give him a lot of wiggle room, particularly with the first item. “I have no problems signing this.”
“For a contract to be valid, it has to have three things.” She stopped his signature with a finger on the back of his hand. “An offer, an acceptance…”
“…and consideration.” The woman’s mind never quit. “I think your brain is the sexiest thing I’ve ever known.”
“That falls under sexual advances,” she countered, but she was smiling. Yes, he had her. The last knot in his gut relaxed. She was brilliant, but when it came to cutthroat negotiations, he was better and he knew how to close this deal.
“The offer is my house and care for the weekend. The acceptance is you spending the weekend with me under my care.” He added that to the contract.
“And the consideration?”
The sizzle in his blood turned up at the arch challenge in her voice. “I don’t suppose you’d let me take it out in trade?”
“Nope.” But she laughed again.
“Consideration is just quid pro quo. I want to get to know you better and this arrangement lets me do it—and it gives you a chance to get to know me.”
“I do know you,” she murmured, and the soft whisper of her voice stroked him. “Pretty well, I think.”
“Then how about it gives you a fair opportunity to change your mind about pursuing an off hours relationship—no harm, no foul if you decide against it.” He wanted her like he wanted air. Getting her to his place for the weekend, that was a win, but he played for stakes in the longer game.
“And this is fun and enticing as hell, but saying yes? That’s the thing chaos is made of.” She still wasn’t saying no.
“So, all we need is consideration. That’s not a yes or a no.”
Retreating a step, Kate rubbed her hand against the back of her neck and he could see the exhaustion weighing on her. She ended his internal debate with another exasperated sigh. “The hell with it. Put it on there. I’m tired and you’re right—you have a great pool.”
Scrawling his signature, he turned the pad around and handed her the pen. “Now that wasn’t so hard was it?”
“Said every spider to every fly ever, but game on, Mr. Prentiss. You have the next sixty-eight hours of my life.”
And I’ll make every single one count.