Tempt Me (The Macintyre Brothers 1)

Sleep was a long time coming, and I only fell asleep after another sad bout of solitary masturbation with images of Ella in my mind's eye. In truth, Ella should have been there with me, enjoying a second orgasm of the night. She was young, intelligent, and beautiful and she was attracted to me and I to her. We would have been fucking our brains out, if all had been right with the world.

But of course, it wasn't.

The next morning, I went through my usual routine of getting up and cycling after which I would take a shower and grab a cup of coffee on my way to the office. I should have spent the day at the office in the financial district, but I wanted to finish up some work at the new building. As I rode through the park, I thought back to my first meeting with Ella, and smiled to myself at how sweet she had been, offering to help pay for my medical costs, in case I didn't have good insurance as a lowly bicycle courier.

My knees and elbows were all healed up, but that event had left a mark on me. I enjoyed the fact that she didn't know me as the Joshua Macintyre Jr. I was just a guy to her, someone she was attracted to, who she shared chemistry. When she found out who I was, and that I was her boss, she was hesitant. If I had remained that bicycle courier, we would have probably been fuck buddies by now, but that changed everything and I had to work my ass off just to get her to give me a chance.

So I was really happy to see her rushing along the sidewalk to the building entrance.

"Hey, lady, watch where you're walking!" I called out when I got up beside her.

She jumped at the sound of my voice, then when she got sight of me, I saw relief on her face when she recognized me.

"Oh, it's you," she said and held her hand over her heart. Then she smiled. "You trying for another set of scraped knees and elbows?"

"Every day at this time," I said in reply. "I'm extra careful now and use the bike lanes whenever I can, just in case the tourists don't obey the rules of the road."

"You weren't obeying them that day, if I recall."

"Neither of us were obeying the rules. You have to know that they block the bike lanes with construction equipment and other obstacles so sometimes, we bicycle couriers have to improvise."

She nodded and stopped at the sidewalk that angled up to the front door of the building.

"Maybe if we can't follow rules, we should avoid each other. You know. One of us has to be responsible."

"Don't say that," I said. "We can be grownups. We're both gainfully employed."

"Well, not really..." she said with a grin. "I am unpaid..."

"Okay, we both went to college and got degrees. So there's that."

"Yes. But we both have made bad decisions when it comes to romance."

"And that's why this won't be a romance. Just pure unadulterated pleasure."

She glanced around and then turned back to me. "You keep saying that like you're trying to convince yourself."

"I know it's true," I replied. "I'm just trying to convince you."

She smiled. "I have a job to get to."

"Think about it," I said and removed my helmet and glasses and ran a hand through my hair. "You should come with me. It'll be memorable. You'll be able to include real details in your stories."

She tapped her head. "I have it all up here. Stuff I haven't actually done, I can research online."

"Nothing like the real thing," I said as I walked with her to the front door, and into the building where we waited for the elevator. Luckily, we were the only people waiting and when the elevator doors closed, I was pleased to be alone with her. I rested the bike against the wall and moved closer to her, leaning against the wall beside her.

"Have dinner with me tonight. Last night, I sat alone in my apartment and ate some takeout food in my underwear. It was pathetic."

She laughed and glanced at me. "That does sound pretty pathetic, but actually, I did the same. Except, I was wearing my nightgown."

"We should at least do it together," I said. "Then it wouldn't be so pathetic."

The elevator doors opened and it was time for her to get off.

"This is me," she said and started to leave.

I grabbed her arm. "Come have dinner with me tonight. If you want, we could go somewhere nice, or stay in and sit in our pajamas. There's a Nicks game on."