Working Under My Boss
The office is silent.
Not silent, exactly—his pen scratches across a page, the low hum of the AC breathes through the vents, the phone buzzes once before he kills the sound with a sharp flick of his thumb but quiet in the way a predator makes the woods quiet. Like every noise is waiting for him to move first.
I keep my eyes glued to the screen in front of me, pretending that the numbers and emails mean anything, pretending that my heart isn’t beating hard enough to make my blouse shift against my chest. It’s ridiculous. I’m ridiculous.
Because what happened in his dining room wasn’t supposed to follow us here. This is supposed to be business. Files and schedules and coffee runs. Not… not the ghost of his hands bruising my hips every time I shift in this stupid office chair.
I hear him sigh. It’s low, deliberate. Heavy enough to drag my gaze up before I can stop myself.
Dean leans back in his chair, suit jacket stretched across his broad shoulders, the knot of his tie loose enough to expose the sharp cut of his throat. His eyes aren’t on the contracts spread out in front of him. They’re on me.
I shift in my seat, heat rising uninvited. “Do you need something?” My voice is thinner than I’d like, all brittle edges.
The corner of his mouth curves like I’ve just told him a secret I didn’t mean to. He drums his fingers against the desk, slow and steady, like he’s marking time.
“You’ve been typing the same sentence for five minutes.”
My stomach drops. I glance at the screen—he’s right. The same words, copied and pasted in panic, like my body betrayed me the second he looked at me.
“I was… proofreading.” Weak. I hate how weak it sounds.
His smirk sharpens, a predator’s smile hidden in a businessman’s mouth. “Sure you were, Brooklyn.”
The way he says my name makes me cross my legs under the desk, heat spiking where it shouldn’t.
I drop my gaze again, nails digging crescents into my palm. I swore I wouldn’t make another man my universe. I swore I wouldn’t lose myself.
So why do I already feel like I orbit him?
The clock ticks loudly enough to make me want to smash it. Each second stretches like he’s pulling the thread tighter, like he knows I’m fraying with every glance he pretends not to give me.
I scroll. I type. I backspace.
I pretend.
Dean doesn’t.
He moves with this quiet command that makes the entire room rearrange itself around him.
Standing to pour another coffee even though his is still half full, with the press of his hand flat on the desk as he leans over some document I know he already read twice.
The sound of his shoes across the hardwood floor—too slow, too deliberate—as if he wants me to track every step.
I keep my eyes on the screen, but I feel him.
I feel him watching.
I feel him waiting.
“Read that last line back to me,” he says suddenly, voice sharp enough to slice through the silence.
My throat closes. “What?”
“Read it.”
I glance down at the contract. Words blur. My palms sweat against the keys. I clear my throat and force them out; every syllable trembles: “…all pending client files must be submitted before the close of business Friday.”
His head tilts. “You sound nervous.”
“I’m not.” Too quick, too defensive.
The corner of his mouth lifts as if I just played right into his hand. He says nothing, just lingers in the space between us, letting my lie hang in the air like smoke.
I shift in my chair, crossing and uncrossing my legs, desperate for something that feels like control. It’s useless. The heat rolling off him, the weight of his stare—it pins me harder than any ropes ever could.
“You’re flushed,” he murmurs finally, voice low enough that it doesn’t feel professional at all.
“It’s hot in here.”
“Is it?” He leans against the desk, one hand braced near my laptop, the other sliding into his pocket. He’s close enough that I catch the faintest trace of his cologne, sharp and clean and infuriatingly male. “Because I’m perfectly comfortable.”
My pulse stutters, betraying me.
“Maybe you should take your jacket off.” The words are out before I can stop them, reckless, sharp.
His smirk spreads slow. Predatory. Dangerous.
“Careful, Brooklyn.” His voice drops, just for me. “You sound like you’re daring me.”
The screen in front of me might as well be blank now. All I see is him. All I feel is the thrum between my thighs, the ache that no amount of typing or pretending can erase.
But I don’t look away. Not this time.
He doesn’t move away. Doesn’t blink. Just stands there like he owns the air I’m breathing, like my lungs only work because he allows it.
“You’re staring,” I whisper, the words escaping before I can catch them.
Dean leans down, mouth grazing my ear without touching. “I’m working.”
“On what?”
“You.”
The word knocks the breath out of me. My fingers freeze on the keys, a half-written sentence blinking on the screen like a heartbeat.
His hand ghosts over the edge of my chair, not quite touching, but the threat of it is enough to make my body light up. “Keep typing,” he orders softly. “Don’t stop, no matter what.”
My throat goes dry. “Dean—”
“Mr Walker” His correction is sharp, hungry. “You’re at work. Remember?”
Heat floods my chest. I force my hands to move again, tapping out words I can’t even see, every keystroke trembling as he circles behind me. I feel his presence at my back, the way his shadow stretches long across the desk.
“You’ll finish this contract,” he murmurs, “while I test how obedient you really are.”
A shiver racks through me. I type harder, faster, desperately to hide how my body betrays me.
Then his hand is on my shoulder—firm, anchoring — and the other brushes a line down my spine, slow enough to steal the breath from my lungs. I arch without meaning to, a tiny movement, but his low chuckle tells me he caught it.
“You’re shaking,” he says. “Do you know what that tells me?”
“That I hate you,” I manage, though it comes out broken.
“No, baby girl.” His lips are at my hairline now, his voice a brand on my skin. “It tells me you want more.”
My fingers falter over the keys, letters scattering nonsense across the screen. He sees it. He doesn’t care. He thrives on it.
“You have two choices.” His breath is hot on my neck, his tone steady, dangerous. “Finish the document like a good little assistant… or I take this game further than you’re ready for.”
The cursor blinks at me, merciless. My chest heaves. I don’t know which choice terrifies me more.
The letters blur. I can’t even remember what contract I’m supposed to be formatting, but my fingers keep moving, clumsy over the keyboard.
“That’s it,” Dean murmurs, still behind me, still too close. “Keep pretending you’re in control.”
My jaw tightens. “I am in control.”
He laughs—low, sharp, like he’s cutting the air between us with it. His hand slides higher on my spine, pressing just enough that I straighten in my chair. “If you were Brooklyn, you wouldn’t be typing gibberish.”
I glance at the screen—sentences half-formed, words misspelled beyond recognition. My stomach drops. He’s right.
“Don’t stop,” he warns. “Don’t even think about stopping.”
The pressure in his voice makes my pulse slam against my throat. My hands shook violently as I furiously typed, desperate to prove him wrong, and the letters became a jumbled mess.
He leans closer, lips brushing the shell of my ear. “You’re a mess. And still, you obey me.”
Heat coils low in my stomach, sharp and humiliating. “You’re sick,” I whisper.
His laugh rumbles, darker this time. “And you’re still in this chair, letting me.”
The keys clatter louder under my shaking fingers. Every mistake echoes. Every misspelling is another thread he pulls tighter around my throat.
“Do you know what happens,” Dean asks, his tone lazy, dangerous, “when an assistant cannot deliver clean work?”
My chest caves. “You fire them?”
“No,” he says, the word dragging across my skin like teeth. “I discipline them.”
My fingers stutter, almost still.
“Keep typing.” His command snaps like a whip. “Or I’ll show you what that looks like right now.”
The cursor blinks, the page fills with broken sentences, and I realise I’ve never been more terrified or more alive.
The clatter of keys is the only sound in the office, frantic and uneven, my words dissolving into nonsense the more his presence presses into me.
Dean doesn’t move away. His body is heat and shadow at my back, his breath grazing the hollow beneath my ear like he’s studying the way I twitch when it touches me.
“Don’t you dare stop,” he whispers, voice threaded with quiet threat. “Hands on the keyboard, baby girl.”
The nickname makes my stomach clench, my thighs squeeze tight under the desk. My fingers stumble, hitting rrttttt across the page.
“Sloppy.” His hand comes down lightly on my shoulder—warm, heavy, claiming. His thumb traces the line of my collarbone, slow and deliberate, until goosebumps chase over my skin. “You’re supposed to be working, not trembling.”
“I—I am working.” My voice breaks on the lie.
“No.” He bends closer, his lips brushing the crown of my head now, words seeping into me like poison. “You’re unravelling.”
The heat of his palm drags over my arm, slow enough that every fine hair stands on end. His fingers ghost down to my wrist, then guide it firmly back to the keys when I falter.
“Type,” he orders, barely above a whisper.
I obey, each keystroke jagged and clumsy, sweat beading at the back of my neck.
He leans lower, his mouth near my jaw, and murmurs, “What will you do when I slip my hand higher, right here—” his palm presses into my thigh beneath the desk, inch by deliberate inch “—and you can’t even spell your own name?”
The keyboard rattles as I slam random letters, heart a drumbeat against my ribs.
“Pathetic,” he taunts, voice molten against my ear. “You’ll never win this game. I can make you fall apart with one finger, and still you’ll type for me.”