Surrendering Series Box Set

“I love it. I feel totally sexy.”

“Fabulous!” Her smile was a mile wide and she clapped her hands. “You look smoking hot, by the way. Like, if I swung the other way, I would have made my move already. All you need are those red heels and you’re in business.”

The red shoes would be awesome with this.

“Okay, I’m going to put my clothes on now, because I’m hungry and it’s a little cold in here.”

Sloane gave me the thumbs up and I heard her going to the kitchen and putting things in the microwave as I went back to my bedroom.

Once I was dressed again, we finished our dinner and continued our Sandra Bullock marathon. Sloane was twitchy and I could sense that she wanted to ask for something else when she made me a cup of tea and brought it over.

“What do you want now?” I said, taking it from her.

“Would you wear it tomorrow? I want to see how it works when you wear it all day. You know, real world experience.”

“Real world experience for your underwear?” Like a test drive?

“Rory, I have to make sure that these products work for real people. And you’re a real person, so we’ve got to give it a test run. Please?”

I could sort of see what she was talking about, but I really wished she’d find someone else to do this. Still, she’d been really good to me lately, so I’d be a bitch to say no.

“Okay, okay. I just need to figure out what to wear over it so it doesn’t show.” Anything white was out, so I went with a black shirt and tan leather skirt and my red shoes. I laid them out next to the underwear outfit that night and sighed. The things that Sloane talked me into.

~*~*~

The next day I had a little secret under my clothes. I felt like people knew, even though that was impossible. I wished I could forget that I was wearing it, but every time I moved the ribbons caressed my skin and I remembered, and felt like I had the word SLUTTY HARLOT stamped on my forehead. Not that what I was wearing was remotely slutty or harlotty (if that’s even a word), but I did feel a little naughty. It was definitely not office-appropriate underwear.

I was dreading seeing Lucas (Mr. Blaine, for the love of CHRIST), because I knew if anyone would figure out my little underwear secret, it would be him. He was the kind of guy who could see under your clothes whether you wanted him to or not. Like Superman.

Correction. I wanted him to see under my clothes, it just wasn’t appropriate for the workplace. Any other place was fair game . . .

“Good morning, Miss Clarke.” There was another bag on my desk, along with my coffee.

“You didn’t tell me what you liked, so I got everything again today.” Oh, hell. I was going to gain forty pounds if I didn’t tell him.

“You have to stop doing that, Mr. Blaine. I can get my own breakfast,” I said as I snatched the bag, pulled out a donut and handed him the bag back.

“Strawberry frosted donut. Noted.” He grinned and took out the cherry Danish and I swore his eyes traveled up and down my body twice and my cheeks started getting red. HE KNEW.

“You look very nice today, Miss Clarke, if I may say so without incurring a sexual harassment reprimand.” Oh, aren’t you Mr. Smooth? He said it with one of those smiles that only lifted one corner of his mouth. Yum.

“Thank you, Mr. Blaine. You look very dapper yourself.” He did, in a grey pinstriped suit with a dark purple tie. Not that many guys could pull off a purple tie, but he made it look easy. And sexy. Very sexy.

“Well, thank you for the breakfast. I’ll get yours tomorrow. Cherry Danish? Black coffee?” I said, trying to dial my bitch level back a bit.

“Perfect.” His eyes did another sweep, and I swore this guy had x-ray vision. I should start calling him Clark Kent, even though he looked nothing like Clark.

I gave him what I hoped was a composed smile as I headed into my office and closed the door.

~*~*~

By midmorning I was glad I had the sexy underwear on because it gave me a little more confidence when I had to deal with an asshole on the phone who was unhappy with one of our products and DEMANDED to speak to someone in charge.

Of course, he’d not only been using it on an ancient computer, but he’d bought the wrong model and was mad that it didn’t do what he thought it should. Usually those calls got routed somewhere else, but sometimes they slipped through the cracks.

I finally got the guy off the phone and went out to get some coffee and cool down. I hated it when people got me riled up. I could usually handle myself, but that guy had just pushed my buttons.

I didn’t meet Mr. Blaine’s eyes, but I could feel him watching me. Great. Now he was going to think I was some stupid girl who couldn’t deal with a phone call.