28. Emmy
I’ve never sent a nude in my life, but this photo could prove pretty embarrassing too. And the bigger question is why I sent it.
Why am I fucking up his date? Liam’s a good guy. He deserves some sweet, devoted girlfriend who makes sure he hasn’t fallen through a roof at the end of each day. Why does it bother me so much when I have no intention of being sweet or devoted myself, and I work way too many hours to consistently monitor his roof issues?
I don’t know. But I’ve had a pit in my stomach since he said he had a date, and that pit grew immeasurably when he walked out the door this evening as if he’d given up on me. I just wanted to fight with him a little. I wanted to give that string between us a little tug to see if he was still holding the other end.
And he was.
I open up the laptop and begin watching more of the interviews for the grocery manager’s position. While I’m not normally involved to this extent, everything in our attempt to win Lucas Hall has to be perfect. I refuse to throw it all off track because some new manager with a snotty attitude is making us look bad.
I’ve watched the interviews of four lackluster candidates when the front door wooshes open.
I grab scissors and have barely climbed to my feet when Liam enters the office. His eyes are black in the dim light. There’s not a hint of a smile on his face.
“Come here, Emerson,” he says. “And put down the scissors.”
I walk around the desk slowly. “Why are you in my office?”
“You just sent me a picture of your panties hanging off your heel. Why do you think I’m here?”
A shiver runs through me. As many times as I’ve fantasized about this, I’m also not prepared. I guess maybe I just never thought he’d give in.
“Right,” I say dryly. “We’ve played this game before—the one where you act like you’re going to do something and then just walk away.”
He closes the distance between us, grabs my hips and spins me toward the desk, pressing his mouth to my ear, his chest to my back. “No, this time I’m going to give you exactly what you want.” His hand slides over one breast and my nipple tightens beneath it. “You want me to treat you like a whore, Emerson?”
This is where I’d normally lash out and insist that there’s nothing whorish about women wanting exactly what men do. Except…I like it. I don’t want him to take it back. I want him to use me until I can’t stand straight and walk away without a word.
His palm wraps around my throat. “Admit it.”
I swallow. “Yes.”
He sets his keys and his wallet on the desk beside me. “Then bend over.” His palm presses between my shoulder blades until my face is against the monthly desk calendar and my ass is in the air.
A cool breeze hits my legs as he lifts the skirt around my hips.
“You should have left the panties off,” he hisses.
And then he tears them, as if they’re made of paper. I should object to that, too, but instead it has me absolutely soaked.
His hand slides between my legs and air hisses between his teeth when he discovers the effect he’s already had. As his fingers circle my clit and slip inside me, it’s as if my tissues are swelling around him, tightening to grip and keep him right where he is. He very clearly has a lot of experience at this, but it’s more than that. It’s that I’ve been craving this, from him and no one else, for a very long time.
His fingers continue to circle and press until my gasps take on a rhythm, until my hands cling to the far edge of the desk to keep me upright. That’s when his hands leave, and I hear the tearing of foil.
The head of his cock pushes against my entrance. He’s not even inside me and I can feel the fullness of it, the way I will have to stretch to accommodate him. He thrusts inside hard, without warning.
“Fuck,” he whispers, perhaps more to himself than me. His palm presses flat to my back as he thrusts again.
I groan aloud, and I don’t know if I’m complaining or begging him to continue—because it’s both. It’s too much, too tight, and unbelievably good at the same time. He moves faster, and I grip the desk for dear life.
I’m so fucking close and we’ve barely started. “Liam,” I warn, my voice low and breathy, swept up as my stomach tightens and a charge moves down my spine.
“Don’t you dare come, Emmy,” he growls. “Don’t you fucking dare.”
“I can’t, I can’t…oh, God.” I cry out as I let go, my eyes squeezed shut, clamping down around him until he’s all I can feel.
“Goddammit,” he says and then he thrusts faster, finishing with a low groan. “Fuck.”
My eyes remain closed as he hovers above me, hands pressed to the desk, milking the last of his orgasm.
My thighs bite into the edge of the desk, my legs strained from leaning over the way I am…but I wish we could stay like this for a minute—his harsh breaths on my neck, his chest rising and falling against my back, his hand still gripping my hip. I don’t want it to be done, whatever this was.
He pulls out and starts tying off the condom. I push my skirt into place, so wet that moisture drips down my inner thighs as I stand. It bothers me that he isn’t meeting my eye. That he’s getting dressed again as if I’m not even in the room.
“I didn’t sleep with Troy,” I say quietly.
He glances up, his hand still on the zipper of his jeans. A muscle in his jaw clenches. “Why’d you tell me you did then?”
I swallow. “Because you had unrealistic expectations of me. You were acting like this was going to turn into something, and it’s not. I don’t want to be someone’s girlfriend. I’m not even staying.”
He steps toward me, tucking a finger in the waistband of my skirt to tug me against him. He presses his mouth to mine. “Don’t lie to me again.”
“I’ll lie to whoever I want. You don’t own me.”
He shakes his head. “Em, I know I don’t own you. But you and I have texted daily for months. Asking you not to lie is a pretty minimal request. Now get your stuff and I’ll walk you out.”
“I’m still working,” I argue.
“You can get your shit or I can sit right here until you’re done, but it’s not safe for you to be walking to your car alone this late.”
I release a heavy exhale. “For fuck’s sake, Liam. You’re already acting like I’m your girlfriend.”
“I was also going to wait for you back when I was calling you a whore,” he replies. Our eyes meet. “You know you loved it, so don’t complain about that too.”
I fight a smile as I turn to grab my laptop. “It was okay.”
“That’s high praise from Emerson Hughes,” he replies, elbowing me.
We walk out together, and he locks the door before we go to the driver’s side of my car. “I’m not going to kiss you,” he announces. “That way, you won’t accuse me of trying to be your boyfriend.”
“Good,” I reply.
He bites down on a grin. “We both know you want me to, though.”
I roll my eyes as I climb into the car, but I feel a little incomplete as I drive away.
I guess, perhaps, I wanted him to.