Chapter 10
One year later.
Diane Carter grips the edge of her desk with both hands, squeezing so hard her knuckles go completely white.
Her gaze drops to the right, landing on her wristwatch where it rests on the polished wood—anything to distract herself from the chaos her body has become in just a few minutes.
It's barely past seven in the morning. She's been at Whitestone maybe thirty minutes, and all of this has caught her completely off guard.
Diane came in early because today is an important day.
She's spent two months analyzing the financial data of a medical supply company looking to inject several million dollars into accelerated growth and expansion.
Lumina Medical Supply wants to break into the European market, and they've asked the business development department to guide them through the process.
It wouldn't be a problem if she weren't competing directly against three other consulting firms—the biggest ones after hers.
Lumina has decided they won't settle for a single proposal.
They want several on their table before choosing who to sign with. Bastards.
The truth is she's fairly confident it'll go well.
She's done excellent work alongside Grayson Murphy from finance, and together with Clara they've put together a strong proposal for the marketing department.
But she needs everything perfect, flawless, which is why yesterday, the second the last team meeting wrapped, she announced she'd be in the office first thing to make sure everything was in order.
Apparently someone else had the same idea.
"Damn it," Diane gasps, biting her own fist when she feels that warm tongue sink into her.
"Stop making noise or someone will come to see what's going on," a husky voice says, muffled.
Diane lets her head fall back at the soft pressure against her entrance, then the intrusion of fingers pushing inside her.
The tongue and the agonizing rhythm of a flawless thrust—that's exactly what tells the head of the business development department she has very little time left before she comes.
She bites her fist again, harder this time, because she's being fucked so well she wishes she were somewhere else, somewhere she could let her throat make all the noise it wanted.
Her core clenches hard and she can't stop her back from arching. She'll spend the morning sore, she knows that, but she'd take it a thousand times over losing that mouth between her legs.
When the spasms subside and Diane comes back to herself, she opens her eyes, slightly dizzy. The last slow strokes of a tongue move against her until they stop abruptly, leaving her feeling abandoned.
"Are you okay?" Diane hears the voice from a distance, even though she knows the mouth is right in front of her.
She nods and takes a deep breath. It gets harder every time to recover from these encounters, whatever form they take—she always ends up completely undone.
Two hands close warm around her waist and help her to her feet, steadying her, and though she manages it, she's not entirely sure she can walk.
But before she can process what she needs to do, those lips that a minute ago were wrecking her sanity press against hers and kiss her with intensity.
The tongue moves with confidence inside her mouth and she can taste herself immediately, which makes her moan—this time without being able to control it.
"Go to the bathroom and clean up. Change your underwear." Diane looks into those eyes that seem innocent but really aren't. "I tore them getting them off you."
Diane lifts a sculpted eyebrow and clicks her tongue as she turns toward the small bathroom.
Fortunately she keeps a change of clothes in the office where she spends most of her life—especially lately, since these encounters began, she's made sure never to run out of underwear in her drawer.
She knows she's making a mistake. If anyone caught her splayed across her desk being fucked from behind by someone who, on top of everything, works for her, she wouldn't just end up out on the street—which is the least of her concerns—everyone would know exactly why, and for someone like her, that carries more weight than anything else.
"The conference room is ready," she hears when she comes out with fresh underwear on, her hair fixed, and her posture impeccable.
"Asher Rodriguez is coming with the company's vice president, two lawyers, and someone from their finance department.
Each of them will have a printed copy of the proposal.
Yours is this one"—she hands her a blue folder—"and it's also in your email. "
Diane flips quickly through the pages, brow furrowed.
"How efficient," she replies without looking up, and far from a compliment, it lands like an insult.
"Don't get used to it. I'm not your secretary."
Cassidy turns to leave, but fingers close around her arm and she stops.
Diane moves closer and runs the pad of her right thumb along the underside of Cassidy's lower lip—swollen—trying to wipe away the faint traces of pink.
"If you're going to come by my office at this hour, you can't wear lipstick." Her voice is cold, a reprimand, and Cassidy's only answer is to raise an eyebrow.
"It wasn't in my plans," she says, repeating a phrase that's become familiar between them. She pulls a tissue from her pants pocket and carefully wipes her mouth.
They look at each other, and there's a lot they could say. But they decided a long time ago not to.
Five months have passed since they fucked for the first time.
Cassidy had finished her time as an intern at Whitestone, and Clara Fitzgerald had been very clear that she wanted her in her department.
A month after the girl signed her contract with HR, her boss appointed her official liaison between marketing and business development—a role that was necessary but hadn't existed, because Diane refused to deal with anyone she had no interest in whatsoever.
This time was no different, but Clara imposed her judgment, and Cassidy had no problem being the one to take it on.
In all that time she'd worked for both of them and had adapted perfectly to the Cobra's cold looks, her icy answers, and her fire-wrapped stares.
In return she had Clara, who'd be her direct supervisor and with whom she kept a closer but still very professional relationship.
It was one night during a particularly brutal week that Cassidy and Diane had worked until midnight.
James Thompson had done a mediocre analysis that one of the partners approved and that the client received like a punch to the gut.
So there they were, the two of them, trying to fix the mess when an argument broke out because Cassidy couldn't take one more cutting remark.
"You can't always be right," she snapped, on her feet now, fed up with Diane shooting down every one of her proposals in that clipped tone, calling them garbage. "You may know this company better than anyone and you may have years of experience, but that doesn't make you the owner of the truth."
Diane's face twisted with irritation and she checked her watch to confirm she didn't have time for this kind of scene.
"Watch your mouth, Collins." She lifted her chin and stepped closer. "Don't think Samuel Barnes is going to protect you forever."
Cassidy had heard the insinuation more than once, because Diane was convinced she was sleeping with her college mentor. She'd let the comments slide, thinking Diane would eventually stop, but that night she decided she wasn't going to keep tolerating it.
"Maybe you're speaking from personal experience," she fired back without a trace of fear. "Everyone in this company wonders how someone like you is untouchable. Maybe you're the one warming some partner's bed."
Diane took a step toward her, expression twisted, lips pressed tight with rage. Her neck flushed red and her ears burned, which meant her anger was enormous.
"You're fired." She jabbed a finger at her, shaking with fury. "Get out of here right now."
Cassidy answered with an involuntary laugh. She was exhausted. She'd spent months working as if she were going to inherit Whitestone someday, following Clara's lead, putting up with Diane's crap, and fixing everyone else's mistakes. At that point in the night, she didn't care about anything.
"You're not my boss," Cassidy shot back. "Remember that."
Then she turned to walk out, and Diane wasn't about to let her turn her back or leave her standing there mid-sentence, so she grabbed her by the arm and spun her around.
"What the hell is your problem?" Cassidy snapped, her face tight, and when her eyes locked onto Diane's, she saw something new. Something different.
The woman in front of her had gone eerily calm all at once, but her eyes burned with a heat Cassidy recognized from the nights she'd gone out wanting to lose herself in a stranger's body. There was lust in her expression, an urgency that seemed impossible to stop.
Neither of them can remember now who made the first move.
What they do have burned into memory are the gasps, the hot skin, the neck glistening with sweat.
The restless, nervous hands. That absurd fight to possess without being touched, until they ended up pressed against the wall, one fucking the other while they kissed and couldn't stop.
"Don't do this again," Diane murmured once she'd straightened her clothes.
"It wasn't in my plans," Cassidy replied without hesitation, holding her eyes.
They sat back down at the same table and kept working as if nothing had happened. Two days later, both of them got an email from management congratulating them on the new proposal, announcing that the client was pleased and would sign on for another year.
More than a month passed before the scene repeated—a night alone in the office, an argument, a spectacular fuck, and a "Don't do this again," "It wasn't in my plans"—until one day they simply stopped saying it. First the arguments stopped coming, and then they just went straight to the passion.
It happens when they feel like it, always at the office, as if doing it anywhere else would carry a commitment neither of them wants to take on.
They're discreet, and no one could suspect what goes on between them, because Diane Carter is still the same bitch she's always been, and it's impossible that a girl like Cassidy would ever be willing to kiss those fire-lined lips.
"Clara gets in at eight." The blonde is the one who breaks the silence. "She wanted to do one last review with you."
"We've already reviewed it," Diane hisses, barely moving her lips. She hates repeating something she's done a dozen times over.
Cassidy ignores it.
"The CEO arrives at nine, so you should both be in the room a little before that." She runs a hand through her loose hair. "Good luck."
"I don't believe in luck."
"Sometimes you have to believe in something." The girl tilts her head and watches her.
I'd rather believe in you.
"Tell Baker to be ready," Diane says, meaning Tanya, who works more closely with her now that Cassidy took on her role.
"I'm not your secretary." Cassidy turns to go and feels Diane's fingers close around her arm again. This time the movement comes with a gentle tug that pulls her flush against her boss's body.
"Watch that mouth, Collins," Diane whispers in the same contemptuous tone she uses on the subordinates she considers useless—except she doesn't kiss them.
Cassidy's lips part and take the warm tongue of the woman she's been sleeping with for months, that insufferable viper half the company detests but that she knows how to tame on certain nights and, for a reason she still hasn't put a name to, loves.
"Close the door on your way out," Diane commands, cold as ever, and turns to pick up her wristwatch, put it on, and get back to work. Playtime is over.