Chapter 5
Jordan
After I say the words, Natalie goes silent for the first time since she stepped into my office.
Her fingers curl around the edge of my desk. Her lips part. Those blue eyes lock on mine, wide and bright and full of every thought she is trying to keep from me.
She fails.
She always fails.
That is one of the things that has been tearing through my discipline since the day I hired her.
I keep my hands braced on the desk, one on each side of her hips, because touching her too soon will make this harder. Touching her at all is already a mistake.
I am going to do it anyway.
“You have questions,” I say.
“I have several concerns.”
“Name one.”
She swallows. “You are very close.”
“I know.”
“And very big.”
“I know that too.”
Her cheeks turn pink. “You really don’t have to sound so certain about it.”
I nearly give her a smile.
She notices before I can bury it, and her face lights with the smallest flash of victory.
I like that look on her too much.
Four years in uniform taught me restraint. It taught me how to hold position with sand in my mouth, sweat in my eyes, and orders burning through the radio. It taught me how to breathe when every instinct in my body wanted movement.
None of that helps with Natalie Mullen pressed against my desk, talking too fast because she is nervous, looking at my mouth like she wants it, and pretending both of us are here for a lesson in public performance.
I lift one hand from the desk. “Give me your hand.”
Her gaze drops to my mouth again before snapping back to my eyes.
I wait.
She gives me her hand.
Small in my grip, warm and soft. Her pulse kicks hard against my thumb when I turn her wrist and press there.
“You are shaking,” I say.
“I am experiencing anticipation.”
“That is a prettier word for it.”
She narrows her eyes. “I am trying to maintain my composure.”
“You are doing better than Wesley.”
Her mouth twitches before she can stop it.
There she is.
I want that look on her all weekend. I want Lydia to see it. I want Wesley to see it. I want every person who trained this woman to swallow hurt to watch her smile like she has a man at her back who will burn the room down before letting anyone hurt her again.
I slide my thumb once over her pulse. Her breath catches.
“First rule,” I say. “When I touch you, you don’t freeze.”
“I didn’t freeze.”
“You did.”
“I was surprised.”
“The rehearsal dinner is in three days. You’ll be surprised there too.”
Her chin lifts. “Maybe you should stop surprising me.”
“No.”
Her blush deepens, and my cock gets harder because she likes it. She likes the bluntness. The orders. The way I stand close enough to steal her air and still make her choose whether to lean in.
She is innocent. I know it in the way she watches me, in the way curiosity fights with nerves across her face, in the way her body reacts before she understands the reaction.
I should be gentler with that.
I will be as gentle as I can.
That is the best I can promise.
I release her wrist and set my hand at her waist.
The same place I touched her in front of Lydia and Wesley.
Natalie takes one sharp breath.
“Breathe,” I say.
“I am.”
“No.”
She sucks in air, then glares at me when she realizes I am right. “You are aware that being my boss does not include authority over my breathing, right?”
“It does today.”
“That cannot be legal.”
“I’ll have legal look into it.”
Her lips press together, fighting a smile.
I shift my hand, spreading my fingers over the curve of her waist. She goes still for a second, then forces herself to relax under my palm.
That trust hits harder than the trembling.
“When I touch you,” I say, “you lean into me.”
“I can do that.”
“Show me.”
Her eyes widen. “Right now?”
“Yes.”
She hesitates for one breath, then inches closer. Barely enough to count. Enough for me to feel the soft give of her body against mine.
My control pulls tight.
“More,” I say.
Her hands lift and settle on my chest.
Same place as this morning.
My jaw locks.
The memory comes back with teeth. Natalie in my office, flustered and soft, her palms on my bare skin, her eyes dropping to the towel at my hips like looking away might kill her. I have spent all day trying to forget the way she felt against me.
Now her fingers curl into my shirt, and my body decides discipline is a rumor invented by better men.
“If you touch me like that at the wedding,” I say, voice rough, “I will have a problem.”
Her gaze drops.
Straight to the front of my trousers.
Heat flares in her face.
I catch her chin and bring her eyes back to mine. “Look at me.”
“I was not looking.”
“You were.”
“I was briefly observing.”
A laugh nearly escapes me. I turn it into a breath.
“You have been doing a lot of that today.”
“That feels unfair to mention.”
“You need to know what you do to me.”
Her fingers tighten in my shirt. “What do I do to you?”
I move closer.
Her thighs press against the edge of the desk, and the space between us disappears.
“This.”
I take her hand and guide it down until her palm rests over the hard ridge behind my zipper.
She gasps.
Her whole body jolts, but she does not pull away.
My blood turns molten.
“That is what you do to me,” I say against her ear. “Every time you blush. Every time you look at my mouth. Every time you walk into my office looking like that and pretending you have no idea I want to push that dress up your thighs.”
“Jordan,” she whispers.
My name breaks in her mouth.
I let go of her hand before I lose the last thread of sense I have left.
She keeps her palm there for half a second longer.
Then she snatches it back, eyes wide. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m not.”
Her lips part.
That is enough.
I kiss her.
I mean to take it slow. I tell myself that even as my mouth covers hers. One kiss. Enough to teach her how to answer me in public. Enough to stop her from looking shocked when I put my mouth on hers in front of her family.
Then she makes a soft, needy sound against my lips, and the word mine burns through me so fast I have no time to bury it.
I cup the back of her neck and deepen the kiss.
She opens for me, clumsy for one second and hungry the next, and every ounce of restraint I own starts to come apart in my hands.
Her fingers grip my shirt. Her body melts toward mine.
She follows the pressure of my mouth like she trusts me to lead her somewhere she has wanted to go and never dared to name.
I lift her onto the desk.
She gasps into my mouth.
I step between her thighs and pull her closer, letting her feel the hard line of me against the soft heat of her body. Her dress rides up. My hand finds bare skin above her knee, and she trembles so hard I break the kiss to look at her.
“Tell me if you want me to stop.”
Her eyes are dazed. Her mouth is swollen from mine.
“I don’t.”
The words come out quiet, but they land like a match in gasoline.
I kiss her again, rougher this time. Her hands slide over my shoulders and into my hair. She tugs at it, and the sound that leaves my throat is closer to a growl than anything civilized.
I have held lines under fire. I have waited through nights when every shadow could mean death. I have trained my body to obey before desire, hunger, rage, or fear.
None of that compares to keeping myself from burying deep inside Natalie Mullen on my desk while she shakes in my arms and kisses me like she has been starving for this too.
I tear my mouth from hers and drag air into my lungs.
She follows me for half an inch, chasing the kiss before she realizes it.
That nearly ends me.
My hand tightens on her thigh. “Careful.”
Her eyes flutter open. “Me?”
“Yes, you.”
“I’m just sitting here.”
“You are making this difficult.”
A tiny smile curves her mouth, shy and breathless and too pleased with herself for my safety.
“Am I?”
I lower my forehead to hers because if I keep looking at that smile, I will forget every reason to stop.
“Yes.”
Her fingers stay in my hair. “This feels like advanced practice.”
“It is.”
“Do I pass?”
I slide my thumb along her lower lip. Her breath catches, and her pupils widen.
“Barely.”
“Barely?”
“You keep looking at me like you want more.”
Her blush burns hotter. “And that’s bad?”
“It is dangerous.”
“For whom?”
For me.
For every rule I have used to keep my life clean.
For the distance between boss and secretary.
For the promise I made myself after Sabrina.
For the last decent piece of restraint standing between my hands and her innocence.
I do not say any of that.
Instead, I kiss the corner of her mouth once, because I am a bastard and she tastes too good to leave completely.
“When I take you, Natalie, it will be real.”
Her breath stops.
I lift my head.
She stares at me, lips parted, hands still in my hair, thighs spread around me on my desk. She looks flushed and soft, her mouth swollen from mine, her body still leaning toward me like it has not realized I stopped.
Mine.
I step back before the word makes me do something irreversible.
She blinks as if the room has moved without warning.
I reach down and pull her dress carefully back over her thighs. The gesture costs me. Every inch of skin I cover feels like a personal insult.
Her cheeks go pink again. “Thank you.”
“Do not thank me for stopping.”
“Why?”
“Because I do not want to.”
Her mouth opens, then closes.
Good. I have finally stunned her quiet.
I help her down from the desk, keeping my hands at her waist until her feet are steady. She sways anyway.
My hand flexes.
“Natalie.”
“I’m fine.”
“You are a bad liar.”
“But I am an excellent secretary.”
“Yes.”
The praise hits her again. I see it in her face, and the urge to pull her back against me turns sharp enough to hurt.
I release her and step away.
“Lesson one is over.”
She smooths her dress with hands that are not steady. “And did I improve?”
I look at her mouth, her hair coming loose, and the desk where I almost took her.
“Yes.”
Her smile is small and dangerous. “Good.”
That single word from her mouth makes me want to start all over.
I turn toward the door before I do.
“Go home, Miss Mullen.”
Her eyebrows lift. “That’s it?”
I look back at her.
“Before I change my mind.”
Her eyes widen.
Then she gathers what is left of herself, lifts her chin, and walks to the door on legs that are not as steady as she wants them to be.
I let her reach the handle before I speak.
“Natalie.”
She turns.
“Tomorrow, we practice in public.”
Her throat moves. “Public?”
“Dinner.”
“With people?”
“With me.”
That blush comes back, soft and bright.
I open the door for her.
She slips out, and I close it behind her before I drag her back in.
My office smells like her now.
My desk is a problem.
My cock is still hard enough to make sitting down a punishment.
I stand there for three full breaths, hands at my sides, jaw locked so tight it aches.
Then I turn toward the private bathroom.
The shower is cold when I step under it. It does not help.
Nothing helps.
I brace one hand against the tile and wrap the other around my cock, already hard, already aching, already ruined by the memory of Natalie on my desk with her dress bunched high and her mouth swollen from mine.
I should stop.
I do not.
I see her blue eyes. Feel her soft thighs around my hips. Hear the broken way she said my name when her hand rested over me and she finally understood what she does to my body.
My control snaps.
I come hard with her name caught in my throat, and I do not let it out. If I hear myself say it like that, I will know exactly how far gone I am.
The water runs cold over my shoulders while my breathing slows.
It still does not help.
Tomorrow, I take her to dinner.
This weekend, I take her to that wedding.
And soon, when I take Natalie Mullen for real, she will know exactly who she belongs to.