And scary, too. The desire she felt for him was palpable—combustible. So much so that she feared if she even so much as touched his hand, the tight rein she had on herself would explode and they’d both get burned. Sex wasn’t going to solve anything for them. To the contrary, it would only complicate a vulnerable, precious situation.
“Here we are,” she said, opening the door. The firm’s offices were cleaned professionally once a week. She’d cleaned again, anyway, that afternoon. Dusting behind things. Dusting books. Getting a smudge off the windows that had a lovely ocean view. Straightening the knickknacks on her desk—a framed photo of her and her father, taken at his house in front of the Christmas tree they’d decorated together when she was fourteen. A colorful flower pot she’d picked up in Italy. A carved wooden angel a client had given her.
She knew she wasn’t going to look anything but pregnant, but she’d worn the dress that showed off her legs best, and had been walking around in her favorite pair of high-heeled shoes all day in spite of the added weight she was carrying.
“This isn’t a seduction,” she said as soon as he was in the room, afraid to look at his face, to see what his reaction would be. He needed to fit in, to be comfortable in her world. Not to have sex with a randy pregnant woman.
Sex clouded things and they couldn’t afford any more lack of clarity. Her father never fit in her mother’s world, and they’d all gotten along just fine. She’d grown up well loved. Well taught. Happy. And still alone.
“I’m not locking the door, and I’ve let the lawyers working late tonight know that I’m available if they need anything. We can be walked in on at any time.” She blurted, in case he thought she was coming on too strong with the dress. And the intimacy.
He stood there, barely in the door, looking around, and she couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Wasn’t even sure he was going to stay.
“I have some papers for you to look over,” she blurted. “Legal papers.”
His face turned toward her, his expression easy—and inaccessible. “So we’re not eating?” His head motioned to the table over by the window. Bearing glasses with ice, water and little lemon slices floating on top.
“I made cabbage rolls again yesterday,” she said. “It’s what I do when I’m working out a problem in my mind. Cook, I mean, in general, not just cabbage rolls...”
“What papers did you have for me to look at?”
Okay, so she should have given him some warning. She’d just landed on the idea the day before, when she’d been cooking, in an attempt to find some clarity on their situation. More than anything, she’d needed to have him in her space. Legitimately in her life.
And knowing that there was a fine line between him playing a part in her world, or being completely out of it.
She was tired of feeling like they were something scandalous.
Lustful, unsatisfied illegitimate friends who’d met over a medical procedure. He looked uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry,” she said, standing there with her hands clasped below her pregnant belly.
“For what?”
“You can go. And we’ll be fine.”
Shaking his head, he stepped closer to her. Still with that foot of distance between them, but closer than he’d been. Close enough that she could smell that he’d showered recently. And see the shine of light in his eyes. “I have no desire to leave,” he told her. “I’m just...kind of pleased,” he told her. “This is nice. Completely unexpected. And...smart, too. You’ve thought of everything.”
She’d tried. “I hope you like beef and rice cabbage rolls.”
“I do.”
His hands were in his pockets, pulling his shorts taut. That was the only reason she noticed the bulge there.
“I thought we should talk, really talk. And in order to do that effectively,
we needed privacy. And no waitstaff watching us and stopping by to see that we were okay.”
He nodded. Still watching her. Her body was heating up by the second. She could only imagine the man’s effectiveness when he was actually trying to turn on a woman.
It seemed like he broke a spell when he turned his head toward her desk. “I’m a bit confused about the paperwork you want to go over, though,” he said.
“You don’t have to agree to anything or sign anything,” she told him, suddenly worried that he’d feel ambushed when, in fact, she was trying to gift him. “Not if you don’t want to. I just...” She shrugged.
He nodded, walked toward her desk, took a seat in one of the chairs she’d dusted, and for a second there she was jealous of the leather that got to touch his backside.
This wasn’t going well. Not at all as planned. And she’d given it so much effort.
Where was her poise? Her talent for taking control of a situation and putting everyone at ease? She’d never been in her office and not had it.