Hidden Desires (Dangerous Desires #2)

CHAPTER 1 – MY SECRET IDENTITY

Eliza

But of course, no one at the law firm knows anything about the real me.

The security guy waves me through without a word.

He’s learned, after many months of smiling, that my conversational skills are reserved exclusively for work.

I flash him a half-smile anyway—a habit of courtesy my mother boiled into me, like potatoes, until I couldn’t tell if it was sustenance or just starch.

Upstairs, I’m the first to reach the fifth floor.

Gibson Grant’s paralegals are paid slightly above poverty wages in exchange for quietly running the world, or at least keeping the world of litigation from flying off its axis.

I like the silence, the sense that my hands are already touching the gears before anyone else in the building’s even found their second sock.

“Morning, Eliza.” This one’s Rhonda—mid-forties, nails lacquered in an old-fashioned French, every word delivered in bullet points.

“Morning. Your docket’s on your desk and the revised Kincaid summary is in your inbox,” I say, because it’s already been there for seven minutes.

She makes a show of surprise, then swans off toward the break room, probably to test whether the coffee can melt another K-Cup machine before lunch.

The day’s first battle: the conference room at 9:30, where James Grant (senior partner, local legend, and my friend Marnie’s boyfriend) expects a flawless digest of three months’ discovery in under thirty seconds.

I have not only the digest but the sub-digests, and color-coded post-its for when his temper flares and he needs a fact check within two heartbeats.

I sit at the far end of the walnut table, laptop open, the epitome of helpful invisibility.

Mr. Grant, already half-scowling, scans the documents I pass him. His blue eyes flick to mine. “You highlighted the new affidavits?”

“Yellow, as requested,” I reply, adding, “The ones contradicting last week’s statements are tabbed red.”

He nods imperceptibly. It’s either grudging approval or a prelude to homicide. I file both responses away for future use.

“Fine,” he says in a tight voice. “Thanks, I’ll take it from here.”

I nod and step out, wondering if I should have asked about his new baby.

After all, my friend Marnie is dating him …

as well as Gibson Grant’s other senior partner, Brent Gibson.

Yes, it’s exactly what it sounds like. Marnie was once a lowly paralegal here, just like me, and somehow, she got entangled with not one man, but two.

Not only that, but Brent Gibson and James Grant are the co-heads of Gibson Grant itself.

Suffice to say, it was a huge scandal. It ended up with my friend quitting her job here for obvious reasons, but Marnie didn’t go away.

Instead, she moved into a huge penthouse apartment, and now has a baby by her two boyfriends.

Who’s the biological father? No one knows.

But it doesn’t matter because my buddy is as happy as a clam with her newborn son, and even happier still with two alpha males to service her each night.

Yes, our two senior partners are engaged in a menage a trois with my pretty friend, and it’s for the better, to be honest. Mr. Gibson and Mr. Grant used to be ruthless perfectionists at work, and they still are.

But there’s a slight edge of softness now, and I attribute that to the gentle, feminine influence of my friend.

But there’s work to be done. At around ten, the associates arrive, trailing whispers and cologne, and the room turns into a knife fight over timelines.

I type and type, catching the overlapping cross-talk, threading sense out of their combined mania.

When they start talking about the Carlsen brief, my own pulse kicks up a gear—I worked on that one at midnight, and it’s a disaster nobody else has noticed yet.

A particularly snide associate, Gillian, interrupts. “Eliza, didn’t you flag the jurisdiction issue in Carlsen?”

“Yes. There’s a memo in the shared folder, subfiled under 'Jurisdiction—Potential FUBAR.' I can forward it.”

Gillian narrows her evil green eyes, and the associates all smirk while looking at me as if I’ve performed a party trick. I pretend not to notice, but allow myself a nanosecond of smugness. It’s my emotional equivalent of a smoke break.

Around noon, I gather my notes, file them in the order I’ll need for the next disaster, and duck out to the restroom. I’m alone. The mirror is pitiless, but I lean in anyway, checking for rogue mascara, lipstick on teeth, or the faintest crack in my mask of unshakable composure.

Nothing. The bun’s still bulletproof, the blouse’s top button unmoved.

At my desk, the rest of the paralegals are relaxing already.

One is eating from a thermos with a baby spoon.

Another is scrolling through Instagram, pausing to show a meme about depositions to a friend.

They all nod at me, but nobody asks about my weekend.

My non-life is an open secret: I do not drink, I do not brunch, and I do not confide in anyone with a yoga mat or a gluten allergy.

Lunch is a hastily scarfed sandwich, and there’s a reason why because by 1:07, my inbox is a war zone.

I answer every message with a reply that’s brief but informative.

I triple-check every attachment, cc every chain, and scan every PDF for booby traps.

I’m the only one who notices that the toner is running out, so I change it before the printer can have a tantrum.

There is a faint dusting of black powder on my hands, so I wipe them on a Clorox wipe and continue on.

That’s me: the perfect, brilliant Eliza Shaw, who gets everything done, no complaining.

But at 4:45, the office energy shifts. I recognize it immediately.

The other paralegals start checking the clock, and Kayley, a pretty girl who has a date practically every night, reapplies lipstick.

There’s a low, conspiratorial chatter near the break room—happy hour plans being hatched like plotlines on a trashy TV show.

I already know how this will play out: a last-minute invite, a polite declination, and a double-check that nobody takes offense.

It happens at 4:52. The other paralegals—three of them, grinning—hover at my cubicle. “Eliza, do you want to come out with us? O’Malley’s is doing trivia night.”

They look at me like I’m the human equivalent of a mathlete: useful, but not entirely real. Sometimes I wonder why they even bother to invite me, but it’s obvious why. I help them so much with their work that they feel they have to invite me, just to be polite.

I smile, warm but distant. “Thanks, but I told my parents I’d help with something tonight. Rain check?”

“Another time, for sure,” says one with a knowing smirk. We all know that I never go to firm happy hours, and they wander away, already relieved.

I allow myself a breath. I organize my desk, line up my pens like soldiers, and slip my laptop into the battered blue canvas bag I’ve carried since high school.

I log out of the system, and stand, pushing in my desk chair.

The office has emptied with a suddenness that would be tragic if you didn’t know how fake the camaraderie was.

I wait until the elevator dings, then walk out, posture still perfect.

But in the lobby, where nobody’s watching, I pop open my phone and let my mouth stretch into an actual grin.

There’s a new message waiting: the username is an inside joke, and the emoji at the end is almost obscene.

My thumb hovers over the reply button, just for a second.

Then I tuck the phone away, allow my bun to loosen half a centimeter, and walk out the glass doors into the dusk, the good girl in her armor of professionalism. But inside, somewhere under the starched layers, my pulse is already racing for what comes next.

My parents’ house sits on a cul-de-sac in St. Cloud, just outside Minneapolis proper.

Every driveway is a lineup of sedans, every porch engineered for the exact amount of seasonal decor to imply Normal Family Inside.

I park behind Dad’s aging Taurus, slip off my heels the instant I’m inside the mudroom, and trade the professional glide for a softer, slippered shuffle.

The kitchen is alive with the warble of a local radio host and the scent of steamed broccoli.

My mom Nancy, queen of casseroles, despiser of silence, is orchestrating dinner with one hand on the oven timer and the other speed-dialing relatives about nothing.

She has the build and energy of a sparrow on Adderall.

She clocks my arrival by the sound of the screen door, then calls out, “Eliza! I’m so glad you’re home, honey. Did you eat yet?”

“No, but I can wait,” I call back, stowing my bag beneath the mail organizer. “Need help?”

“Just pour yourself some iced tea, hun,” she says, as if that’s the extent of her ambitions for my adult independence.

I set the table, methodically spacing the silverware, arranging napkins with a fastidiousness I catch from the inside but am powerless to stop.

Dad is stationed in the living room, body formed to the contours of his La-Z-Boy, TV remote in a permanent nest of cheez-dust and golf tees.

He’s watching something loud and brainless, letting it fill the space where conversation might otherwise try to take root.

At 6:30 sharp, Mom calls us to eat. The dinner is a Greatest Hits compilation: chicken breast, salad, some jiggly dessert involving marshmallows and canned pineapple. The three of us sit, exchanging the usual pleasantries. My role here is as prescribed as my job, just with a higher sugar content.

“So, how was work?” Mom asks, spearing a cherry tomato with surgical precision.

“Good. The firm has a big class-action going, so everyone’s a little frantic.” I arrange the words to sound busy but not overwhelmed, as if being a paralegal is the sort of thing that never stains your soul or makes you wish you could climb out of your own skin.