1. Meghan
ONE
Meghan
ONE YEAR LATER
I place his black coffee with half a sugar on the right hand side of his desk, just above his keyboard.
Making sure it’s in the position he likes before I brush a flake of pastry into my palm from the edge of the gleaming surface.
I straighten the papers for the meetings he has this morning before checking my grandmother’s wristwatch and then double check everything is in its rightful place.
He doesn’t get mad or shout at me, he just likes things how he likes them and it’s my job to make sure they’re right.
Stepping back from the desk, I observe my handy work, pushing an errant strand of hair back into place. My natural blonde hair, which typically falls in beachy curls to my waist, is pulled back into a high ponytail. For work, my hair is always up to keep it out of my face .
He should be in any minute now, so I smooth my hands down my thighs as I make my way back to my desk.
Time to get to work.
Sitting at my desk, I rub my temples, moaning under my breath as the dull pain of a headache looms in the back of my eyes.
Every morning like clockwork, my mind starts playing a montage of Mr. Jackson. It always starts with him fully clothed, going through the variety of suits he wears.
My favorite is the light gray one, with a matching waistcoat and royal blue tie. It accentuates his eyes and when he takes his jacket off, you can see his bulging biceps and tapered waist to perfection. Seeing him every day is one of the many perks of my job.
The innocent daydreaming quickly morphs into riskier scenes. Him with his sculpted chest bare. Then him in just his boxers. Before he’s completely naked and hovering above me. I’ve never even seen this man naked before, but a girl can fantasize.
I need to concentrate if I’m going to get this report completed on time—I’m not great with numbers at the best of times, let alone with x-rated scenes running through my mind.
Pushing my glasses up my nose, I sit up straighter and stare at the screen in front of me, willing myself to get back into the zone.
The numbers jumble on the spreadsheet once again, and as I close my eyes in an attempt to clear my vision, another scene of sweaty, entangled bodies flashes through my mind.
Just the thought of him, naked and losing control, has me shifting in my seat and rubbing my thighs together to ease the ache.
Shit, pull yourself together, Meghan. You’re supposed to be working .
Coffee... I need coffee. Letting out a sigh of frustration at my wandering mind, I push my chair back from my desk and make my way toward the office kitchen. My desk is on the thirtieth floor of the building and is tucked around a corner, out of sight.
It’s quiet at this time of the morning, with most of the associates not getting in until eight am. The offices for Jackson and Partners are open plan, clean, white, and bright spaces. I’ve always thought it was almost clinical, but you definitely get the whole Suits vibe from it.
In the middle of the floor, there’s a bullpen of desks surrounded by four walls.
One wall houses meeting rooms, another gives a floor to ceiling view of Manhattan, a third wall only has the entrance to the large kitchen area.
The last wall has a bookshelf running the length of it, filled with all kinds of law books.
Since working here, my respect for attorneys and paralegals, with all the work that they have to put into a single case has increased tenfold.
My mind wanders back to the man I’ve been daydreaming about as it often does. Cooper Jackson would never look at me the way I fantasize he would, with passion in his eyes and a need to own me. He most definitely wouldn’t get me naked and bless my ears with the sounds of his groans.
I’ve never slept with him and neither of us has crossed the professional line that was drawn when I took the job.
If we ever did decide to step over it, I know it would be fantastic based on the way he carries himself, the sexy huskiness of his voice and the dominance he oozes, even in his work life.
I know being with him would be the best time of my life.
Or maybe I’ve read too many romance books. The hopeless romantic in me likes to get lost in romance novels with my book boyfriends.
It’s why my favorite area in my apartment is the second hand royal blue loveseat in the reading corner I created, next to the window. I can get lost for hours in a fictional world of romance that I have never had the pleasure to experience in real life.
A conversation I’ve had many times, in one way or another, with my best friend Alex, comes to mind as I walk to the kitchen. Most recently, I’d been recounting my day to her and when it featured heavily on how Mr. Jackson was dressed and the smell of his cologne, she called me out.
“Come on, Meghan. I’ve sat here for the past fifteen minutes and listened to you rattle on about what he wore, ate, how he smelt, and how he looked at you today.
You say you want him out of your system, but when I give you advice on what to do, you tell me you can’t.
You could easily seduce him and then you could move on,” she teases me.
“It’s not that easy. I’ve worked for him for nearly a year. I swore to myself when I accepted the job that he would be nothing more than my boss,” I state, attempting to put some sense of finality into my tone.
“And how’s that working out for you?” She laughs.
“Last time I checked, you haven’t been laid since you started working for him and whenever I try and get you to even go on a date with someone else, you come up with an endless list of excuses as to why you can’t.
.. I don’t buy any of them, by the way.”
“It’s fine. My lack of dating has nothing to do with him. I’m just not ready to date anyone,” I murmur, my earlier determination gone.
“I say this for your own good...” Alex grabs my hand, pulling my attention to her as she continues. “If you aren’t going to make a move with him, you need to move on and get laid. It’s not healthy for you to be obsessing over a guy because he made your panties wet one time.”
“It wasn’t one time, and it’s not just him making my panties wet.
It’s the looks he gives me when I walk into his office, it’s the hunger I feel for him and think I see reciprocated in his gaze.
It’s the way the air is pulled out of the room whenever he’s near.
It’s… I can’t fully explain it, but he has a hold over me. ”
“I’ll say it one last time... Make. A. Move,” Alex affirms.
Pulling myself back into the present, I repeat over and over in my mind that, as much as I want to experience all of him, I just can’t .
Too much is at stake.
Based on the sparks that zap through my body when he’s near or we accidentally touch, I have no doubt that he would have me screaming his name, forgetting anyone that came before and comparing every man that comes after.
He exudes power and dominance. Whereas, I tend to be shy until I get to know someone—or I’ve had a few drinks. Alex likes to say fun Meghan comes out to play after about five tequila shots.
Because of my past experiences, I tend to hide away and not draw too much attention to myself, especially when we have certain clients in the office.
Today I’m dressed in a pair of loose black pants, probably a size too big for me, a flowing black blouse, again a size too big, and my trusty cream cable knit cardigan—because it keeps me warm on cold December days.
The cardigan may have seen better days, with the color slightly off and worn-looking, but it’s one of my winter wardrobe staples.
Without a scrap of makeup on my face, my peaches and cream skin glows from the moisturizer and face oil I applied this morning.
I don’t tend to make much of an effort for the office and so I wear some variant of this look every day.
It's appropriate business attire, especially when I don’t want to draw attention to myself.
I much prefer to be inconspicuous and remain in the shadows, although it doesn’t always seem to work— hello creepy clients, who are old enough to be my dad .
The only person whose attention I want, I would never get, even if I changed the way I dressed for work.
In the kitchen, I rinse out my mug before making a cup of coffee from the machine, turning around to lean against the counter fiddling with my simple chain necklace while it brews.
The kitchen is another modern room, with all the appliances you could possibly need.
It also has a variety of breakfast items that are brought in fresh every morning.
I go to the pastries that are calling my name and help myself to a croissant before grabbing my coffee and making my way back to my desk.
My steps falter as I walk around the corner and spot Mr. Elijah Jackson, Cooper’s dad, leaning against my desk.
Oh God, I should've checked the calendar before I made my coffee.
“Good morning, Mr. Jackson. How are you?” I ask, pasting a smile on my face as I go to walk behind the desk to put a barrier between us.
Mr. Jackson Sr. is an older man in his late fifties.
He still has a thick head of hair, although it’s graying on the sides, but his dull blue eyes hold many secrets I have no desire to unravel.
Although he’s retired from the firm, he still owns several businesses and, as he puts it, likes to keep his fingers in many pies.
Balancing my coffee and croissant in one hand, I pull my cardigan tight around myself to afford a bit of protection from his leering gaze. I do my best to skirt around him, avoiding his usually grabby hands.
I wish I’d worn heels .
My sensible black pumps have him towering over me, and I don’t like the way he seems to relish this.