“Julian, what did he say to upset you?”
“He wants to get into the archive. He thinks he can give me flowers and get his way.”
She shook her head, obviously far more perceptive than I wanted her to be. “It can’t just be that. You’d be angry but not like this. There has to be more.”
“Don’t you think it’s enough when you add in what he said to me before he left? I’m sure you heard everything.”
Gwen bit her lip. “Yeah.”
“I have no doubt Marshall did too. He’s probably already written a complaint about me.”
“The director will ignore it. She doesn’t want to lose you. Who else would do so much extra work for free?”
I ignored her jab at my dedication. “If they want to keep me here, they have to keep the library open. If we’ve got lunatics running in with monkeys and threatening us, that just makes us look worse. They’re certainly not going to find any more security for us.”
“I don’t think that man was going to hurt anyone or—”
“Neither do I, but he could easily hurt us just by being here.”
She frowned. “You still haven’t told me what he said.”
I might as well confess it, but I would never tell her how the crazy man had made me feel or the things he’d made me think about before he’d humiliated me with his bribe. “He said he could help with the library’s funding problem, but he would only do it if I let him into the archive.”
Gwen blinked. “And you didn’t agree to his terms?”
“You would have?”
“Hello. Yes. If all he wants is some information he can find here, and he could help keep us open, then of course I would agree to that.”
I sniffed. “I suppose you would have let the damn monkey run around freely too if that’s what he wanted.”
She glared at me.
Maybe she was right. “What if I just take a sick day and you handle it when he comes back?”
“No. I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
I took a step back. “That’s your scheming expression.”
“This man is just what you need.”
“A man involved in God knows what who wants to find some information and is willing to bribe me for it while…”
“While what? What’s really making you angry?”
“Wouldn’t bribery and threats make anyone angry?”
“Yes, but what I meant was that he was exciting. You need excitement. Besides, you’re never this dramatic. There’s something else going on. You think he’s hot, don’t you?”
“I already established that I find him attractive.”
“You know that’s not what I mean. He does it for you, pushes your buttons, maybe ones you didn’t know you had.”
I shook my head vigorously. “Absolutely not. That’s an absurd suggestion.”
“Is it really? Because I’ve only seen you like this one other time, and that was when—”
“Don’t say his name. You agreed.”
She held up her hands in surrender. “I wasn’t going to. When He Who Shall Not Be Named was working here.”
“It’s nothing like that. I learned my lesson.” I’d been enamored with the library’s former assistant director, an elegant older man. He loved telling people what to do, and I found his commanding nature sexy as hell. I’d thought he liked me too, but he was just an asshole who liked that I was willing to do his work for him.
“Julian—”
“Just let me go home.”
“Promise you’ll call me if you want company later?”
“Sure.” I wouldn’t, though. I intended to spend the evening wallowing in self-pity. I hated dating, but I didn’t want to be alone forever. I was likely going to lose my job in the next year, and even Gwen, a fellow archival librarian, found me too boring. But the spiral into darkness never came. The entire walk home, I couldn’t get Monkey Man out of my mind.
He’d brought me flowers.
As a bribe.
He could help with the library.
Unless he was lying. He was probably lying. But if he wasn’t…
Gwen was right. I’d have to forget about my standards and give him what he wanted. I could do that for the good of the library, couldn’t I?
I was still pondering that when I unlocked my door on the lower level of the carriage house and climbed the steps to my apartment. I went straight to the bathroom, wanting a shower. If only I could wash off all that had happened that day. Hell, washing off the last year wouldn’t be bad at all.
The shower didn’t make things better, though; it made them worse. I kept imagining the man returning, demanding entry into the archive, using that low, sexy voice to tell me all the ways he could reward me for my help. What if he didn’t just want access to the archives? What if he wanted access to… me?
No. No. No. I wasn’t going there. It didn’t matter that being forced by a demanding alpha male like Mr. Alluring was one of my favorite fantasies, one I’d never dared share with anyone. I wasn’t going to think about that man when I…