9. Taylor
CHAPTER 9
Taylor
“ T hanks again for letting this interview drag on into dinner. I’d be lying if I said I regret taking up so much of your time.”
“No apologies necessary, honestly.” I squeeze Miguel’s hand tighter before releasing it. “I am just so grateful we could connect and really dive in to what it would be like for you to work in a new environment. And frankly, I am about two years late with bringing on another lawyer.”
The conversation has flowed easily over the last several hours. Both of us diving in to our backgrounds, what drove us to pursue law, and the big pie in the sky dreams we had going into and coming out of law school.
“Listen.” His face grows serious. “I meant what I said earlier about pursuing this opportunity. I know that we’re connected”—he motions between us—“with Hector and Becca, but I also don’t want any favors. You know what’s best for your company and if it’s not someone like me, I’d rather you not risk it just because I’m desperate to get out of my situation.”
“This is me.” I nod toward my building as we draw closer. “I appreciate that, but I’ve got a good feeling about things, about this.” We pause briefly on the sidewalk. “I’ll give you a call tomorrow. Let’s start talking numbers, specifics, or demands. Whatever it takes.”
He can’t hide the smile on his face as he slowly backs away from my building. “You got it. Have a good night.”
A wave of relief washes over me, the first step in taking control of my life falling into place. For the first time in years, I don’t want to hide behind work, using it as an excuse for why Noah never wanted to make plans with me. Something that I thought nobody could see through until Austin called me out on it. Guilt rushes over me remembering how pissed off it made me when he said things like that. As if him saying it out loud was what made it true, instead of the fact that he was right about all of it.
“Good evening, Miss Harrington.” Hank, my doorman, swings open the large glass door to my building. “There was a gentleman here looking for you. He just left. You might be able to catch him.” He points toward the large window.
“Who?” I glance outside, squinting as if that will help me against the darkness. I’m not about to run after a strange man who knows where I live.
“He didn’t say his name, just left when I told him you were out. I thought it might have been a new boyfriend because the expression on his face told me he didn’t like hearing that.”
“I’m sorry, what?” I turn back toward Hank. “What’d he look like?” My stomach drops, an image of Noah showing up unannounced to ask for a second chance. But Hank knows him; he started working here about two years ago.
“Tall and fit, looked like one of those guys you see running down by the lakefront early in the morning.”
“Custom suit?”
“Mm-hmm. Expensive-looking watch too.”
“I think I know who it was.” I squeeze his elbow as I walk around him. “Thanks for letting me know. I hope you have a good night.”
“So not a new boyfriend, then?”
The clicking of my heels on the marble pauses as I glance over my shoulder at a smiling Hank. “No, just my business partner.”
“You sure about that?” He gives me a suspicious smile. “Nah, I’m just teasing.” He jokes, laughing to himself as he walks back to his post.
His comment about Austin’s expression confuses me. I pull out my phone, scrolling through my contacts, and select his name. It rings several times before going to voicemail. I decide against leaving one, knowing if there is something he needs, he’ll give me a call back; otherwise, I’m sure he’ll stop by my office to discuss it tomorrow.
By the time I’m behind my own apartment door, showered and in my pajamas, it’s all I can do to crawl into bed and fall asleep.
“ W hat are you listening to?”
“Huh?” I pull my earbud from my ear as a curious smile plays across Austin’s lips.
“I said, what are you listening to?” He walks toward my desk slowly, his hands coming to rest flatly on top of it as he leans forward to look at my phone screen. “You were dancing in your chair.”
“Oh, it’s just a song Miguel told me about.” I watch his eyes shift from my screen up to meet mine.
“Miguel?”
“The lawyer I interviewed yesterday, you know Hector’s brother? We got on the subject of music because he played in a band during law school called The Legal Briefs.” I snort through my laughter. “And they actually wore briefs onstage when they performed.”
“Miguel. Right.” He pushes off from my desk. “How’d that go? Do you feel like he’s a good fit?”
“Great.” I tell him about Miguel’s experience with his firm and why he’s looking to leave. “I’d want him to start tomorrow if he could, but I know he wants to give his firm ample time so it will probably be at least a month before he’s onboarded. And no, it’s not just because I feel awful for him, considering everything he’s been through in the last year. He’s an incredibly talented lawyer.”
Austin nods. “Good. You seem like you get along with him well so that will be beneficial in regard to your professional relationship, I’m sure.”
My brows knit together, his tone instantly irking me. “Yeah, it will be beneficial,” I respond, telling myself to let it go, but of course I don’t. “What do you mean our professional relationship? What other kind of relationship would we have?”
“Friendly,” he responds without hesitation, “since his brother is engaged to your best friend. I figure that will probably extend outside of the office.”
“Oh, yeah. I mean, we’ve never hung out together outside of work before so I guess I hadn’t considered that.” I feel guilty at the thought he was insinuating something else.
“Never?”
“I guess not never. I met him once or twice before at a?—”
“Were you with him last night?”
His question takes me by surprise, my mouth hanging open for an extra second.
“I was yes—the interview went long so we went to dinner to continue talking about things. How’d you know that?” His eyes shift away from mine, and I suddenly remember Hank telling me someone stopped by. “Oh yeah, you came by last night?”
He doesn’t look at me. “It was nothing important.”
Neither of us say anything for several seconds but he doesn’t leave. He pushes one of my legal awards that sits atop a table a few centimeters to the left, eyeing it to make sure it’s even with the others, the tension in the air failing to dissipate.
“Is it a problem that I had dinner with Miguel to continue the interview?”
“Depends. Was it a dinner?” He stops fidgeting with items on my shelf and turns back toward me. “Or was it a dinner ?”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Don’t play coy, Taylor; we both know what I’m asking.”
“No, we don’t,” I huff. “What are you asking? If I slept with him?”
“No.” I see a flash of anger in his eyes like he’s appalled at even the suggestion. “I was asking if there’s something more between the two of you.”
“Why? Because if there is, I can’t hire him?”
“Is there?” His question hangs heavy between us. I can’t read the expression on his face. Anger? Resentment? Jealousy flashes across my brain but I push it aside.
“How’d your second date with Mia go?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
My heart thuds in my chest.
Nothing. It has nothing to do with this conversation; it’s born purely out of jealousy that I’m clearly projecting right now.
“Nothing. I’m not dating Miguel nor will I. We both know that would not only be unethical, but it would clearly violate any sort of professional boundaries.” He stares back at me as if he’s contemplating my response, his heavy-lidded stare making me nervous. My voice drops an octave as I say, “I wouldn’t date anyone I work with. You know that.”
We both know what I’m referring to. The night we met. The night our lips hovered so close. The night I felt his hard body pressed against me.
His movements toward me are slow, his hand extending as he reaches my desk. I’m holding my breath, half expecting him to reach down and pull me to my feet and into his arms, but he doesn’t. Instead, he grabs my phone and turns to sit on the love seat in my office.
“Excuse me?”
“Just checking my social media celebrity,” he mutters as he taps my screen.
“Hey.” I jump out of my chair, taking the few steps toward him. “Give me back my phone.”
“Sit,” he commands, not amused at my attempt to grab my phone back.
“Seriously, Austin.” My tone changes as I reach across him for the phone again. “Stop taking my phone.” I make contact, attempting to yank the phone from his hand, stumbling in the process.
Before I can stop myself, I’m falling right over his lap, my ass in the air, one hand on the floor, the other on the cushion.
“Oh my God.” I push against the cushion, lifting myself up partially and looking up toward Austin. “Help me, you ass!” Embarrassment flushes my cheeks. I can feel them growing hotter by the second. I huff, struggling to gain footing, but a second later that’s the least of my concerns. I feel Austin harden against my belly, and his hand rears back just out of my peripheral before coming down hard on my ass, sending an echo through the room followed by silence.
I’m frozen in complete shock, unsure what to do or say.
That did not just happen.
I turn my head, my eyes meeting his. I expect him to have a matching expression, surprise at what he just did—but he doesn’t. His eyes are dark, his hand still pressed firmly against my backside.
“The phone,” he commands, his other hand outstretched toward mine.
I’m still frozen in shock, or maybe it’s anger at this point, but it doesn’t matter because the excitement that is pulsing through me is all I can focus on. My thighs squeeze together of their own accord and I flinch, hoping he doesn’t feel the shift in my body, but I’m certain he does. His hand, burning through my skirt, flexes slightly. Keeping my eyes on him, I slowly lift the phone, handing it back to him.
“Imagine”—a devilish grin tugs at the corner of his lips—“if your followers could see you bent over my knee like this,” he suggests. “What would they say?”
I push against the couch harder, pulling myself from his lap and smoothing out my blouse and skirt, the sexual frustration I’ve been fighting for months perched precariously close at the edge of my sanity.
“I don’t care what they say, Austin,” I huff, making no attempt to cover my irritation. “It was a stupid idea when I was stupidly depressed, and I’m not now, so can we just move on from it?”
“Look at that,” he mutters, his attention on the screen and not me. “Looks like even with your sabotage attempt, you still managed to get the likes and celebrity comment.” He tosses the phone onto the cushion nearest me, not bothering to look at me as he pushes himself up off the love seat.
“Is that what this is about?” I pick up the phone. “The fact I added a little something extra to the challenge?” I cross my arms over my chest, tilting my chin up and out to try and call his bluff. “Or is this about something else entirely? Because I’m starting to feel like that might be the case.”
He pauses on his way out of my office, his back stiffening before slowly turning back to face me. “Like what, Taylor? What’s it starting to feel like?”
My lower belly clenches, the low tenor of his voice setting my nerves on edge. I’m not sure what I hoped to accomplish by calling attention to his behavior… That’s a lie. I know exactly what I wanted. Him, losing control, finally admitting that it’s me, it’s always been me.
But then what?
I swallow down the answer, knowing damn well that a rebound with Austin isn’t going to fix anything. It would only complicate and confuse me even more. Even if it would finally scratch that itch I can’t seem to satisfy.
“Like you’re mad at me.” My tone softens. “Like I did something wrong.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong.” He sighs, his hands running through his hair in that frustrated fashion. “I just wanted to have fun with you with the account is all. I thought we were having fun with it and I overstepped… I-I’m sorry I got involved; I shouldn’t have.”
“Oh.” My shoulders sag. “Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were having fun. I thought you were just teasing me about it and I got embarrassed.”
“Embarrassed why?”
I shrug, not wanting to admit the real reason. “Because it’s kind of insane that I secretly recorded you and put it on the internet for other women to gawk at,” I blurt out and it makes him chuckle.
“Well, for what it’s worth, I’m not embarrassed by it. Flattered, not embarrassed.”
“All the ladies fawning over you had to be a nice ego boost.” I smile. “Not that you aren’t used to that already.”
“It’s not just me they’re focused on. Read some of those comments—they’re invested.”
I keep my eyes on his for a second while I open my screen again. I flick through the comments on the latest video.
I wish my man looked at me that way and you’re not even dating him :(
Talk about needing a cigarette after that eye-fucking!
My face flushes. I raise my head just enough to catch his gaze which is burning a hole through me. I look back down, attempting to read a few more, but my vision blurs when he starts to walk toward me. He comes to stand next to where I’m half sitting, half leaning against the edge of my desk.
“Personally,” he adds, reaching his hand across me to touch the screen slightly as he points toward one comment in particular, “I like this one.”
My entire body is alight with electricity. I blink several times until the comment finally comes into focus.
Have you two ever kissed? I’m convinced if you did, the entire internet would melt.
My knees grow weak. I read the comment several more times, not wanting to look over at Austin even though I can feel him staring. Finally, I muster the courage, turning my face just slightly.
“They’re not going to like the answer.”
“No, they’re not,” he says, his gaze settling on my lips.
“Should we post it?”
I don’t know why I say it. The second I do, I want to take it back. Not because I don’t want to kiss him but because I haven’t been able to get the thought of kissing him out of my head since the moment I met him. And the guilt—the guilt has eaten at me for years every single time I looked at Noah and felt a tinge of disappointment that it wasn’t Austin smiling back at me.
My heart beats against my ribs so loud I’m convinced he can hear it. I open my mouth to say I’m joking when he beats me to it.
“That’s very generous of you to want to share our first kiss with the world.”
“Our first kiss?” I repeat back, still questioning why I’m tiptoeing around this subject with him, so close to the line when I should be running away from it. “As in, there would be a second?” I tease, completely out of my depths.
“Taylor.” He says my name in that low voice, the one that has my fingers curling so tight against the edge of my desk my nails feel as if their digging into the wood. “Do you want me to kiss you?”
“That’s not what I said.” The words come out in a defensive rush.
His gaze dips again. “Yet you aren’t saying no.” His voice is even lower, his head tilting slightly as his body draws a centimeter closer.
“Fine, this is me…” My words drift off, my body on edge as I involuntarily lean in closer. “Saying no.”
He doesn’t even attempt to look into my eyes, his gaze frozen on my lips as his hand comes across my body, up to my neck. My eyelids flutter and my lips part like I’m desperately on edge, because I am. Just when he’s about to close the distance, he chuckles softly, pulling back.
“Those are just empty words, Tay. Your body is saying something completely different.” He pushes away from my desk, moving to stand directly in front of me. His words are barely above a whisper as he reaches around me, picking up my phone from the desk.
I watch in confusion as he opens the camera, then walks over to the bookshelf adjacent to us and places the phone on it, facing us. But this time when he comes back to stand in front of me, he doesn’t stop. One hand snakes around my waist confidently, settling against my lower back as the other slides up my neck and into my hair.
“Gotta give the people what they want, right?”
He doesn’t give me time to respond. His lips are on mine a second later and I’m suspended, wondering if I’m dreaming right now. Until he moves his lips against mine and the warm, wet sensation of his tongue demands entrance.
Instantly, my body takes over, my hands reaching out to tangle in his hair, all thoughts of if we should be doing this shoved so far back into the recesses of my mind I couldn’t stop myself if I tried.
The kiss isn’t frenzied. His hand stays against my back, the other tightening its grip on my neck ever so slightly as he tilts his head, sliding his tongue deeper into my mouth.
My thighs spread slightly, his hips easing between them. I’m a second away from moaning, the warmth of him so close to my center I can feel it radiating out of his body when the ding of the elevator brings me back to reality.
My eyes fly open, settling on my open office door. We have about ten seconds before someone walks off the elevator and past my office. There’s no way they won’t see us.
“Someone’s coming.” I push against Austin’s chest, attempting to slide off my desk at the same time. I barely get a few inches from him when his hand darts out and grabs my wrist.
He looks unfazed by the revelation, his eyes still heavy and dark as his chest rises and falls with each rapid breath. His head turns slightly to the side when the sound of footsteps interrupts us.
“Hey, thought I might find you down here, boss.” Adam, one of our head financial advisors, pops his head into my office, clearly unaware of what he interrupted. “I wanted to discuss a few things on th?—”
“I’m busy. I’ll be at my office in a moment.” Austin’s tone is clipped, his gaze returning to mine, but I avert my eyes, too afraid I’m going to melt into a puddle on the floor if I look at him right now.
I sneak a glance at Adam, his expression faltering a touch at Austin’s gruff response. He looks from me to him, then back to me. My face is burning with embarrassment as I think of Adam putting the pieces together regarding what he just walked in on.
“Sure, yeah, sorry. I’ll meet you up there,” he finally says before slowly turning and walking back out of the office. Austin is on his heels, walking toward the door. I expect him to follow him out, ride the elevator with him so they can discuss whatever it is Adam came to talk to him about, but he stops when his hand reaches the door handle. Instead, he closes the door, turning back toward me with a look of determination in his eyes.
“I wasn’t done yet.” He grabs my waist with one hand, sliding me back into place in front of him, my desk behind me. This time he pushes me back onto the desk so I’m fully sitting, stepping back between my thighs and pulling me hard against him.
“Ohh,” I gasp when I feel his hard length pressing against my panties, his hand grabbing a handful of my ass as the other is back to pulling me toward him.
This time, the kiss is frenzied. His fingers of one hand tangle in my hair, the others digging into my flesh through my skirt while his tongue laps at mine. My body surrenders to his touch, as if I could deny him.
He slows his movements, sucking my tongue into his mouth before nipping one of my lips. It sends a shock of electricity straight between my thighs, the throbbing only intensifying. It’s only when he finally pulls back that I realize my nails are digging into his ribs like I’m hanging on for dear life.
I’ve never been kissed like this. I don’t think I even realized I could be kissed like this. So deeply, so thoroughly that my toes literally curl inside my shoes and my nipples are seconds away from tearing through my silk blouse.
“That should do it,” he practically moans into my mouth, leaning in to plant one more deliciously sloppy kiss before running his thumb lazily over my lips. “Mmm.” He drags his top teeth over his bottom lip slowly before a lazy, content smile slides into place.
Then he turns and walks slowly out of my office, whistling an upbeat tune like he didn’t just tongue-fuck the shit of my mouth, leaving me breathless and on the edge.
My breaths come out in pants, my knees wobbly and unsteady. When I finally regain my composure and slide off my desk, I almost fall to the floor, stumbling forward to grab the edge of my bookshelf.
That’s when I look up and see it, my reflection in my phone. In the heat of the moment, completely lost in the wicked things Austin’s tongue was doing to me, I forgot that he was recording it.
I forgot that it was all for show.
I grab my phone, exiting out of the camera and walking over to sink down into my chair. I close my eyes, letting the memory replay over and over in my head before my rational brain takes over.
And while I know that both of us will agree in a few days that this was just a stupid mistake, it doesn’t change the fact that now I know the chemistry Austin and I had… the chemistry we felt five years ago… hasn’t gone away.