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  For the most part, he and Rachel had been getting along. She was open with his ideas and wasn’t being sensitive with him critiquing hers. As a matter of fact, if they wouldn’t have gotten into the argument they were now in four hours ago, they could both be home by now. Whether it was long week or the thirst to pick a fight, Rachel took his comment about her female figure and ran with it completely in the wrong direction.

  “Rachel, I said nothing about her breasts,” he pressed. “All I said was that maybe we should make her a little more feminine in the dress, that’s all.”

  “Oh, so a smaller woman can’t look good in a dress?” She fired back.

  “That’s not what I’m saying at all!” He exclaimed, his voice rising.

  “Then what are you saying?” Rachel shouted back.

  “I don’t remember!”

  Brad fell back into his chair, exhausted. He couldn’t remember his point at all. What had it been? Unable to help himself, he felt a joker like smile spread across his face and he began to laugh. Softly at first, and then with his entire body.

  Beside him, Rachel looked at him as if he’d gone insane. “What’s so funny?” She asked, balling up her fists and planting them on her hips.

  Brad laughed even harder, and leaned back into his chair. “Everything! Especially when you’re this tired.”

  Rachel’s tough facial expression slowly slid off her face. “Have you been sleeping?” She asked, genuinely concerned.

  Brad’s laughter subsided, and he nodded. “Whenever I can get it,” he answered honestly. He got up, walked over to his coffee machine, and started getting another pot of coffee ready. “Want some?” He asked, turning to face her.

  Rachel nodded her head, her anger nearly gone now. “Yeah, but here. Let me do it. You sit down.” She took the can of coffee grounds from him and the measuring spoon, and began to scoop them out.

  Behind her, Brad didn’t sit down. Instead, he looked down at the woman who could switch moods at the drop of a hat. When she was angry, boy look out! But when she was calm, she had a serene, almost motherly nature to her.

  She had worn her hair down today, as she usually did. But to move it off of her neck she had pulled it over her left shoulder, exposing the nape of her neck. Her shirt was interesting, he thought to himself, studying the cut. It dipped into a V in both the front and back, stopping just before anything like cleavage of a bra strap could be seen. It was elegant, and the color of cerulean blue. Up close, he could see the silkiness of her curls, and had the strongest urge to reach out and feel one with the tips of his fingertips.

  “Rachel, I…” he whispered, extending his hand. His hand came down gently on her shoulder, his thumb brushing over the smooth skin the nape of her neck. “I’m sorry if I offended you.”

  Rachel turned around, her brown eyes looking up into his blue ones. The movement made his hand slip away and he realized that he immediately missed the warmth of her skin. She looked up at him with an imploring gaze, waiting for him to continue. Brad’s tongue darted out between his lips before he spoke, and he watched in satisfaction as Rachel’s gaze followed the motion.

  “Your drawings are incredible. Truly, they are. If I didn’t think so I wouldn’t have asked you to stay on.”

  “Really?” She asked, her voice soft. Brad fought the urge to close his eyes as her gentle tone rubbed over his ears. Such a lovely voice, he thought. He wondered how amazing it would be to have her talk in that tone all the time.

  “Yes,” he rasped, stepping closer. Unable to help himself, he reached out, and placed his hands on her hips. He could feel her small curves there, the warmth of her skin, even through the fabric. Brad was absolutely sure that if he drew the shirt up and over her head, he would feel the silkiest skin he’d ever felt in his life.

  He should stop. He knew he should. He was her boss after all, and it was just unprofessional to start a romance in the workplace. But those eyes. Those beautiful, big brown eyes were looking up at him almost longingly, and her lips, a perfect cupid’s bow, were parted slightly as if in invitation.

  “Rachel, I…”

  She stepped into his arms before he could think of what else to say. Her arms wrapped around his neck and he drew her into his chest immediately. Their lips came together in a forbidden kiss, coming together and separating with great fervor as they tasted one another for the first time.

  A small moan poured from Rachel’s throat as Brad held her close, and he tightened his arms even further around her. She felt warm and soft in his arms, and he could feel his muscles bulging from the temptation to hold her even closer. Her lips were soft and warm, and tasted slightly of cinnamon. He wasn’t sure who pulled away or when, but suddenly they were standing a foot apart, panting for breath.

  “What was that?” Rachel asked. Her hand went up to push the curls out of her face and he could see that she was trembling. Through the fabric of her loose shirt, he could even see her taut nipples, and he immediately wondered if she was even wearing a bra.

  “I don’t know,” he confessed, leaning back onto his desk. “But I want to do it again.”

  Rachel opened her mouth, closed it, and opened again, as if she wasn’t sure what to say. She looked like she was in turmoil, and Brad suddenly wondered if he had made a horrible mistake. He stood completely still, waiting for her to react. It was the longest minute of his life. What she said next didn’t make him feel any better either.

  “I should go.” The words came out breathless, and in a rush. That beautiful blush of hers had colored her cheeks pink yet again, and she looked positively embarrassed.

  “Go?” Brad asked, confused. “After that? You just want to leave?”

  Rachel nodded her head, looking distraught. She abruptly turned and walked into her office for a brief second to grab her jacket and purse, then proceeded to walk by Brad as if he wasn’t even there.

  “Wait, where are you going?” Brad asked, following her.

  “Home,” she called over her shoulder, not stopping to try for the elevator. The stairs would do just fine.

  “Did I do something wrong?” Brad asked, taking the steps right behind her. “Is it not what you wanted? Please, Rachel, tell me. It’s okay if I was wrong, I don’t want to force you into anything.”

  “It’s not that,” Rachel said, still taking the stairs down until she found the outside exit door in the stairwell.

  Brad remembered that the key cards to get back in to the office were upstairs in his jacket pocket. If he stepped outside now, he wouldn’t be able to get into his car or take any of his stuff home. Reaching out, he grabbed Rachel’s wrist loosely and stopped her. To his relief, she stopped, and didn’t pull away from him.

  “Please,” he implored. “Talk to me.”

  Rachel looked positively conflicted, and Brad knew that there were a thousand thoughts racing around in her brain; she just had to pick the right one.

  “I like you,” she said at last, looking ashamed at her confession. “But you’re my boss.”

  She pulled her hand away from his and pushed the door open, disappearing into the dark street. Brad stayed there for a moment, watching her go. He wanted to go after her. To apologize. To do anything. For a second he contemplated going out after her anyway. So what if he had to take a taxi home? But then he remembered that the office wasn’t locked up yet, and all the lights were on. Sighing, he stepped away from the exit door and made his way up the stairs.

  Chapter 12

  Rachel

  Rachel spent the weekend in her room wondering what the hell she had gotten herself into. She had wanted him to kiss her. Of course she had. Maybe not all week long. But in those moments in the privacy of his office, she definitely had. His scent had filled the room, a mix of musk and cologne she didn’t recognized, but immediately loved. Even when her back was turned to him, she could feel the seductive heat from his body as he stepped closer. When his hand had touched her shoulder, she had desperately wished that his lips would come next; care
ssing the tender spot that she loved having kissed the most.

  When he had finally kissed her she had felt everything. The tickling coarseness of his beard, the hardness of his chest through the professional shirt he was wearing, and of course, the softness of his lips. They looked like they were made out of stone, those lips. But the reality was that they were very soft, and sweet. They had guided her into a warm embrace that she was sure she’d never quite felt before. When he had finally let her go-or had she let him go? She immediately wanted to kiss him again. His hands, so strong and guiding, had held her so close and steady. How she wanted to feel those hands again!

  Then panic set in. Panic at the realization that she had just kissed her boss, very passionately she might add, in their office! At the bottom of the stairwell she had wanted nothing more than to allow him to persuade her to come back upstairs, but she couldn’t. Once home in the quiet safety of her room she checked her phone, and saw that she had several missed calls from Brad. No text messages, though, she liked and hated that at the same time. Brad was not the guy to send text messages, that much she knew. He would call, or even show up to talk to her. But he wouldn’t cheapen the importance of this particular conversation with texting.

  “Are you okay?” Isabella asked Sunday morning. In one of the few times Rachel had left her room, Isabella had just happened to be in the kitchen. “Rachel? What’s going on? You’ve been locked in your room all weekend.”

  Rachel ran a hand through her curls and put on a fake smile. “Nothing,” she lied, grabbing box of crackers and the jar of peanut butter from the cupboard. “Just feeling introverted. Don’t worry; I’m sure I’ll feel better by tomorrow. “And before Isabella could ask her any more questions she took her snack and went right back into her room. She hadn’t lied. There were times where Rachel needed her own space, away from everyone. This was definitely one of those times.

  The next day she got up and dressed for work. Usually it was an easy task; a dress shirt and nice pants or a skirt. But today she couldn’t quite figure out what it was she wanted to wear. She seemed to pull everything out of her closet before she sighed in resignation and picked a black three quarter sleeve wrap dress. It had a low V in the front, and the skirt fell just above her knees so that she could show off the muscles of her athletic calves. She put on her pair of red Mary Janes just for fun, then added a silver chain and diamond earrings for jewelry.

  “You look nice today,” Bella said, in the kitchen as usual fixing her morning egg.

  Rachel thanked her, but didn’t say much more. Her nerves were skittering up her spine like ants, and she just wanted them to go away. Bella offered to make her an egg, but Rachel politely refused. Her stomach was in knots and all she wanted to do was get to the office to get the day over with. It seemed to take the Bella’s forever to get ready, and by the time they were finally Rachel was ready to pull her hair out. In the taxi she snuck her phone out of her purse and looked at it. Twenty missed calls from Brad, including two that he had made that morning. How the hell am I going to handle this? She thought to herself.

  The cab pulled up to their office building way too soon, and before she knew it she was being ushered out of the car. Ready or not, the time for confrontation was here. She held her breath as she got onto the elevator, certain that Brad was going to greet her at the doors and demand an explanation. But the thing was, he didn’t. She stepped out of the elevator and made her way into the office, her eyes looking around the bull pen for him, but not seeing him at all. He wasn’t in his office either, but on her desk was a list of things that she was supposed to have done by the end of the day.

  “Hey Tristan,” Rachel called, poking her head out of the office door.

  Tristan stopped midstep and turned around. “Hey Rachel. What’s up?”

  “Nothing! Why? What’s up with you?” She asked, paranoid.

  Tristan chuckled, leaning against the doorframe. “It’s just a greeting Rache. What can I do for you?”

  Rachel felt a flood of color stain her cheeks. She felt like an idiot. Flinging her hair over her shoulder, she forced out a laugh. “Right. I knew that. Um, I was just trying to ask where Brad was. He’s usually here before me in the mornings. Have you seen him?”

  Tristan nodded his head. “Yeah, he came in for a few minutes, but he said he had a lot of meetings today upstairs, and that he’d be working mostly there today. Why? Do you need some help? I promised Brad I’d assist if you needed anything.”

  Rachel shook her head, feeling antsier than ever. “Thanks for the offer Tristan, but I got it covered.”

  Tristan looked a tad disappointed, but nodded his head respectfully. “Okay. Well, I’ll be in my office if you need anything.”

  Well, Rachel thought, sitting back down at her desk. That’s that. Needing something else to focus on, she picked up the list Brad had typed out for her and looked it over. It would definitely take her all day to finish, probably even into a little overtime. That was all right though, she needed a distraction.

  ~

  A knock on her office door made Rachel jump, and she looked up to see Brad standing in the doorway of her office. She felt her heart begin to flutter as she looked at him. The rest of the office had left not long ago, maybe twenty minutes earlier. They were all alone nonetheless, and Rachel realized suddenly that she was thankful for that.

  “Hey there,” he said casually, as if everything was normal.

  “Hi,” she rasped. Rachel suddenly felt like she was in high school again, talking to her crush for the first time.

  “You didn’t answer any of my calls,” he said. He didn’t sound angry, or even upset. It was as if he was stating a fact during a presentation.

  “No I didn’t,” she agreed.

  “How come?”

  Rachel shrugged. “I had no idea what to say,” she said honestly. “I still don’t.”

  Brad walked into the office, but kept his distance. Instead of coming close, he took a seat in the chair on other side of her desk. “I know what I want to say,” he said after sitting down.

  “What’s that?” Rachel asked, hoping her voice wasn’t shaking. Her stomach was alive with butterflies and she couldn’t seem to get them to calm down. Thoughts of curling up in Brad’s lap and kiss him silly were running rampant in her mind, making it impossible to focus on anything.

  “I liked kissing you,” Brad stated. It was the truth; Rachel knew it. She could her it in his voice and could see it in the way he stared straight into her eyes as he said it. When she said nothing, he continued. “I liked it, and I would be lying if I said I don’t want to do it again. Something happened when we kissed, Rachel. It was electric, magnetizing. Tell me you didn’t feel it.”

  “I felt it,” she whispered, feeling the heat grow between her legs, remembering the headiness of the kiss.

  He leaned forward, his blue eyes gazing into her soul. “Did you like it?”

  Rachel nodded her head, her mouth suddenly very dry. “Very much,” she rasped.

  Brad stood up, and she made no move to stop him. His eyes never left hers as he came around the desk and leaned down until their faces were only inches apart.

  “I should be mad at you,” he said, his tone betraying his words. “I kept losing focus all day today, wondering if I was going to get to see you, or if I would have to wait to until tomorrow.” His eyes left hers, only to roam down her body and right back up it again.

  “You look beautiful today,” he told her. His voice, dark and deep, brushed against Rachel’s ears like black velvet, and she trembled in her chair from it.

  “You don’t look so bad yourself,” she told him. And he didn’t either. Fitted charcoal gray suit, white shirt, and black tie with his hair pulled back. He looked sexy as hell, she couldn’t deny that.

  Brad gave her an amused smile, and his gaze flickered down to her lips. “I’m going to ask you this time,” he told her. “If you say no, on my honor as a gentleman I will back off. But if you say yes…” Hi
s voice trailed off, and Rachel didn’t need him to finish the sentence. She was a woman after all.

  “Ask me,” she whispered, trembling.

  Brad tilted his head, his eyes looking over hers, her lips, and the line of her neck. It was a slow perusal. A tease. “Can I kiss you?” He finally asked.

  “Yes,” Rachel breathed, already rising out of her chair. He took her into his arms immediately, pulling her close so that when their lips finally met so did every other part of their body.

  Rachel moaned as his lips caressed and molded over hers, taking her breath away. Expertly his tongue slid over her lips, parting them so that he could find hers and massage it with his own. She sighed in pleasure as his masculine taste filled her mouth and robbed her of her senses.

  A low, throaty moan escaped from Brad’s throat as he held her close, and Rachel felt a new wave of moist heat splash across her thighs. It was the sexiest sound she had ever heard, that moan, and she wanted to hear more. Boldly, she slid her hand between the two of them and cupped the rather impressive bulge between his legs. Brad growled in response, and lifted her up so he could spread her legs and sit her on the desk.

  “Careful sweetheart,” he warned, pulling her hand away from his crotch. “You’re not ready for that just yet.”

  His hands buried into her curls at the side of her face, and he drew her in for another head spinning case. He seemed so rough, Rachel thought, and yet every single action landed on her with a surprising gentleness. Even the way he held onto her hair was somehow sweet and kind. He kissed her for several more minutes, their passion rising until, suddenly, Brad stopped, and pulled away to kiss her forehead.

  “What’s wrong?” Rachel asked, realizing that the situation was perfectly in reverse.

  Brad smiled at her and shook his head. “Nothing,” he assured her. “I just was wondering if you were hungry.”