Chapter 3
My knees know this carpet now.
That’s my first thought as I sit down Wednesday morning.
It’s been over a week, and the arrangement has me biting my lip every time I walk past Bren’s door.
I pull the Haverford file toward me, and I’m definitely not thinking about the spot under his desk that my knees recognize.
I’m thinking about loan schedules, which are a disaster.
I spread them across my desk in neat stacks and cross-reference them against the property appraisals. Ten minutes in, the problem is clear. Whoever organized this before me used a filing system that can only be described as “vibes.”
I find the original closing documents and rebuild the folder from scratch. By the time I’m done, the timeline tracks and the summary sheet matches what’s inside.
Satisfaction simmers in my gut as I lean back and admire my work. It’s good. Damn good.
Eight days ago, I was on my knees in Bren’s office with his cock in my mouth.
Now I’m color-coding loan schedules and proud of myself for it.
The two-roles thing is getting easier to manage, which probably says something unflattering about my ability to compartmentalize, but here we are.
Every day he summons me, and the woman who just rebuilt the Haverford file turns into the sluttiest version of herself.
I’m just over here, living my best life.
The arrangement has settled into a rhythm.
Every morning, he walks past my desk, gives me a professional “hello,” and my stomach flips.
I smile sweetly and pretend I’m not already wet.
I answer phones, prep files, handle his calendar.
At some point, the intercom buzzes or he appears in my cubicle with a perfectly innocent request, and twenty minutes later, I’m bent over his desk getting spanked or on my knees with his cock in my mouth.
He even pressed me against the wall and fucked me with his hand over my mouth one time.
Afterward, there’s a protein bar and water.
I always end up in his lap, and I’m starting to suspect that’s more for him than me.
I’ve also never been more on top of my work, which is its own kind of unsettling. But the really unexpected part? I actually like the job itself.
I prep his afternoon calendar and draft responses to three emails sitting in his inbox.
I know his style: direct with no fluff, but there’s always a line at the end that reads like a real person and not just business.
He never asked me to draft his emails, but I started doing it, and he didn’t tell me to stop.
In Bren language, that means I got it right.
My phone rings, and I walk a confused vendor through an invoice discrepancy. At 11:30, I open the Wexler attachment Bren is sending to a partner at noon and catch a typo—$4,800,000 on a deal that should read $48,000,000. I fix it and email him the correct file.
This is the part of temp life that sucks. Sometimes you land somewhere, and you’re genuinely good at it. I could love this job. The actual work, not just the fringe benefits of fucking my boss. If this weren’t a three-month placement, I’d fight to keep this job.
But it’s temporary, so I shove the thought away.
My intercom buzzes.
“Lily.”
“Yes, Bren?”
“Push my 11:00 to 2:30.”
“On it.”
Two sentences with zero personal undertones shouldn’t make me press my thighs together. My pulse takes longer than the rescheduling does to slow down.
When Rachel leans against my cubicle wall, she’s holding a takeout bag in one hand and grinning. “I got street tacos from that place I was telling you about down the street. Want some?”
“Yes, please. Save me from my turkey sandwich.”
We end up at the table by the window in the break room—the one that has unofficially become ours over the past week.
Rachel is exactly the kind of person I gravitate toward and then carefully keep at arm’s length.
She’s a junior analyst who’s been at the firm for two years and describes herself as the youngest person in this office other than me by at least a decade.
She puts hot sauce on everything, including her salad yesterday.
At least the street tacos go well with hot sauce this time.
I like her. That’s also a problem. I’m not supposed to be making friends that I could see myself being sad to leave.
“So you’re here for another two and a half months?” Rachel asks, mirroring my thoughts, and drizzles more hot sauce on her taco, like it could possibly need it.
“Three months. Give or take.” I shrug and flash her a grin. “Just long enough for you to get attached, and then I vanish like a ghost.”
She laughs. “That sounds like a terrible deal for me.” She tilts her head. “Raleigh was the one before this, right?”
“Raleigh, then Atlanta. Before that, an unpleasant winter in DC that we do not discuss.” I take a sip of water.
“How long in Raleigh?”
“Three months.”
“And Atlanta?”
“Four.”
I can tell she is doing the math in her head. Yeah, I move around a lot.
“I’ve been told I’m charming in small doses,” I offer, filling the quiet.
She laughs and launches into the Kevin banana bread saga.
Kevin, one of the senior analysts, hit reply-all bragging about his late grandmother’s prize-winning recipe, then went home and grabbed the cumin jar instead of the cinnamon jar.
He brought a loaf in the next day, beaming.
Half the office spit it into napkins. By 3 p.m., Kevin was wandering around offering seconds, mystified that nobody had touched a second piece.
No one had the heart to tell him for weeks.
An hour after lunch, I need more coffee. Right when I’m about to walk into the break room, I hear Rachel, talking to the office manager, Dana, in low murmurs. I catch the tail end of their conversation.
“...his wife. Almost eight years ago now.”
“Aneurysm, right? Out of nowhere.”
“Bren hasn’t been the same since. Something in him just...shut down.”
The conversation dies the moment Dana glances over her shoulder and clocks me in the doorway. Her expression shifts into something bright and professional so fast I almost admire the pivot.
“Lily! How’s the Haverford file coming along?”
“Almost done. Should have the updated binder on Bren’s desk by three.” I keep my voice light and pour my coffee, getting out of there quickly.
The hallway is quiet as I walk back to my desk, and the information settles in my gut. He lost his wife almost eight years ago. He was, what, mid-thirties? I don’t know his actual age, but he can’t be more than 45.
A younger, softer version of him is in my head now, going home at the end of a workday to a wife he loved deeply. The picture won’t leave. Neither will the squeeze in my chest.
At 3:47, the intercom buzzes.
“Lily.”
His deep voice sends a rush of wetness between my legs. The information I learned in the break room isn’t fazing my inner slut.
“Yes, Bren?”
“The Haverford binder is excellent. You reorganized the entire file structure.”
“The old system was giving me hives.” I keep my tone light. “I hope that’s okay.”
“More than okay. Good girl.”
I flush and pray my face isn’t giving me away because Rachel is three feet away at the filing cabinet next to my cubicle. The wetness between my thighs has decided the panic is the best part.
“Thank you, Bren. Happy to help.” My tone is professional.
The intercom clicks off. I exhale and reach for my coffee.
Rachel looks at me and tilts her head. Oh god, did she hear that?
“He seems impressed with you,” she says.
“I reorganized a binder. The bar is low.” I reach for the stack of client intake forms on my desk and start flipping through them like they’re the most urgent thing in my life. “Hey, do you know if these need to go to Dana or straight to filing?”
Rachel glances at the forms. “Filing. Dana already signed off on those last week.” She closes the cabinet. “See you tomorrow.”
“See you.”
She heads down the hall, and my pulse races. Fuck, that was too close.
I set down the intake forms I don’t need and take a long sip of coffee, willing my hands to stop shaking. Secrets are thrilling, and almost getting caught is hotter. I hate that I love the combination.
At 4:42, my phone rings. Heather, the paralegal on the Pemberton matter that has been a slow-moving disaster since I started here. The call is going to take twenty minutes and require me to be lucid.
“Lily Carter.”
“Lily, hi, it’s Heather. I have updated documents on Pemberton. I need to walk you through some changes before five.”
“Of course. Let me pull it up.”
I unlock my screen and navigate to the Pemberton folder. While she’s pulling her notes, I scan the floor. Rachel is gone. Dana is on her own call with her back to me, and Kevin is working with his head down. The pod near mine is empty.
Bren is walking down the hallway toward me, no jacket, with his sleeves rolled up. His expression is professional. The heat in his eyes is not.
I straighten in my chair and angle the receiver away from my mouth. Before I can speak, he holds up one finger to quiet me. He moves into my cubicle and kneels. No one would see him if they glanced this way.
Holy hell.
Heather is talking. “Okay, so the first revision is on page four, paragraph two—“
The words don’t make sentences in my head, because Bren’s hand settles on my knee.
”—they want to add indemnity language we’ll need to push back on. I’ll email the redline in ten minutes—”
His palm climbs my inner thigh slowly, dragging my skirt with it. My breath hitches, and I cough to cover it.
“Sorry, swallowed wrong. Keep going.”
She keeps going. He keeps going. His hands push my knees apart, and his warm exhale lands on my inner thigh—the only sound he makes. He traces the wet patch on my panties before hooking one finger into the elastic and pulling them aside.
I bite my lip and pray I can stay silent. This is so messed up, and I don’t care.
He drags his fingers through my slick folds, and I brace my free hand against the desk and stay silent. Dana is fifteen feet away. What’s happening under my desk would get me fired in eleven seconds, which only makes it hotter.
He circles my clit with the perfect pressure that turns my legs to liquid.
“Heather, hold on one second, I’m going to put you on a brief mute.”
I press mute. My eyes are on my monitor, and I let him touch me.
He pushes two fingers inside me and finger fucks me, curling them as pleasure ripples through my body. My inner walls clamp around him, and I almost whimper, but I’m able to hold it in.
His fingers withdraw, and he rubs my clit again until my thighs are shaking. When he starts alternating, plunging his fingers inside me, and then removing them to circle my clit, I have to bite my lip to stop my moans.
I risk glancing down at him, and the intensity in his eyes mesmerizes me for a moment. And then I notice the slight smirk. He has no intention of letting me come.
Fuck.
I unmute Heather. “Sorry, the redline—yes, send it over, I’ll have it on his desk by 5:15.”
“Perfect, you’re a lifesaver. Same time tomorrow for the next round?”
“Sounds good. Talk to you then.”
I hang up. He withdraws his hand and pulls my panties back into place. The cotton is soaked, and the bastard gives it a little rub without enough pressure to do anything.
He smooths my skirt down my thighs and pats my knee lightly and whispers, “Is it okay for me to stand?”
Oh.
A quick glance confirms it is, and I nod. He straightens up, smiles at me, and walks down the hallway. His pace is exactly the same as it was on the way over.
I sit at my desk, unable to move for a full minute.
My clit pulses as my thighs tremble. The usual running commentary in my head is completely silent. I think he broke my brain.
The 5:15 deadline pulls me back. I print Heather’s redline and slip the markup into Bren’s inbox tray. It takes me five minutes because my hands are shaking. I get it done at 5:13.
Once my pulse has returned to baseline, I brave going past Dana. I smile at her like I have absolutely nothing happening in my panties.
In the bathroom, cold water on my wrists and neck does nothing. The face in the mirror looks like an HR liability.
What’s left of the workday refuses to pass. I get through the last hour very aware of how wet I still am. He thoroughly wound me up and abandoned me.
He stays in his office, but his door is open.
By 6, the office is quiet. I slide the Haverford binder into Bren’s inbox tray, gather my things, and walk past his office without saying goodbye. He doesn’t call out to me.
The elevator doors slide open, and I step inside, grateful for the silence. My thighs press together as I remember “good girl” on the speakerphone. He had his finger inside me at my own desk, and he didn’t say anything to me when I walked past his office.
As the elevator drops, I think about him losing his wife.
The version of him I’ve been carrying around in my head and the man I’ve been kneeling for is a stranger.
I’m aching and cranky. I don’t know if I want to slap him or be back on my knees for him at 9 a.m. tomorrow. I don’t know which would feel better.