14
We’ve been sharing our office for a month when Ethan doesn’t show up one morning. He’s been working on his own since I finished training him. Now it’s 10:00 a.m. and no sign of him. The office is quieter without the hum of both of our computers running. Without our voices blending as we dictate.
I wonder where he is. Should I go ask Dr. Washburn about it? No, that would be weird. I hope something bad hasn’t happened. He might have been in a car accident. What if he’s lying bleeding on the highway right now? Maybe I should check the Emergency Room? Staring sullenly at Ethan’s empty chair with my back to the doorway, I jump when someone loudly clears their throat behind me.
Ethan saunters into the room with a slick, knowing grin. “Hey, Tiffy, what’cha looking at?” His lips twitch with amusement.
I jerk my eyes away from Ethan’s desk and narrow them at him. I’m exposed, a kid with her hand caught in the candy jar. “Nothing,” I snap, ignoring the guilty feeling at the sharpness of my tone. “And my name is not Tiffy.”
Ethan’s not perturbed. “Really? Because it looked like you were staring at my desk. Like you were missing me.”
I scoff. “That shows what a big ego you have, Ethan. I was looking at your desk…and thinking how relieved I am that you aren’t here for once.”
Ethan stands over my chair and smirks down at me. Suddenly, he bends down to my level, placing his hands on the chair’s armrests. He leans over, caging me in. The heat rolling off his body blasts hot as a furnace. His eyes drill into mine, his closeness causing a sudden hitch in my chest.
With soft, slow words, he says, “It’s okay for you to miss me, Tiffy. If you were gone, I’d miss you, too.” His breath is warm and minty. It breezes over my face like a caress. There’s a heaviness growing deep inside, sinking into my core.
Then he’s up and away. Sitting down at his desk, Ethan says in a casual voice, as if we had been talking about the weather. “The dentist had a last-minute cancellation, so I went in for a teeth cleaning.” He flashes a wolfish smile over to me. “Gotta keep these pearly whites shining.”
My flush of embarrassment is followed quickly by fury. He’s playing with me, and I hate it. Hate that he caught me with my guard down. Hate that my traitor body reacted with such primal lust at his closeness. All these years of evolution, and I still can’t escape that flush of attraction. Ethan knows exactly what he’s doing, and it pisses me off.
I snarl at him. “I told you not to call me Tiffy.”
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