“Except it’s not the end of the story,” Blaze said thickly.
She watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed and somehow even his throat was sexual. “What- uh- what do you mean?”
“Getting hired was just the start. Tell me…” He ran his tongue over his bottom lip, making it glisten in lighting the expensive crystal gilded chandeliers overhead threw off. “Why did you really ask me for this? You could have had anyone.”
“No. I- well- I have no idea what you mean by anyone. I work too much. I have no social life. Never had. Probably never will. I don’t have the necessary skills to get guys to like me on dates, so I learned a long time ago not to bother.”
“Impossible.”
“Oh, it was possible, believe me. I’ve been on so many bad dates that I just stopped trying. Online dating sucks. Getting hooked up sucks. Meeting people at work sucks. It all sucks. So, yeah. Unless I wanted to die a virgin, which I don’t, I thought this was my best shot.”
“And if I’d said no and fired you?”
She shrugged, though it wasn’t as casual as she wanted it to appear. “I guess I would have lived with it. With myself. Got another job somewhere.”
“It was really worth the risk?”
“Honestly, I weighed the risk and I didn’t think you’d actually say no. Being that you banged your own secretary and the whole office knows it.”
“I never pegged you as one to listen to rumors.”
“The screams and the noises spoke for themselves.”
Blaze scraped the rest of his cheesecake off his plate and took his time savoring it. When Colette watched his tongue sweep out over his bottom lip like it had in the car after he’d tasted her, she very nearly spontaneously ovulated. She cursed herself for wearing lace and not her thick, absorbent, ugly as hell cotton panties.
She shifted, rubbing her legs together to try and ease the ache, but Blaze’s eyes landed on her and with a knowing light that made her face heat up and she stopped what she was doing.
“Are you going to eat that?” He indicated her barely touched cheesecake.
“No. I don’t think so. I was honestly too full for dessert, but since you ordered for me and didn’t ask…”
“I’ll eat it for you. Pass it over.”
She did, a little amazed that a guy like him could eat like that and still look like a bronzed Adonis.
“How many times a week do you work out?”
He shrugged as he started in on her dessert. “A few. Why? Do you like what you see?”
“Can you possibly say one thing that isn’t totally conceited?”
“It was just a question. Not at all conceited, unless you took it that way, since you like what you see, and you think I must know it.”
“You’re a dick.”
“What was that? You’re going to like my dick? I really have no doubt about that.”
Colette strangled a frustrated groan.
“I have a really nice penthouse. The whole top floor of a high rise downtown. I also own a king-sized bed, but I think that’s a little boring. Too vanilla, when the glass table, the quartz countertops, the massive leather sectional- bought because it easily wipes clean- or the floor, on top of the sheep skin rug in the living room, could all work well.”
Colette glanced around frantically to see if anyone near them at the other tables had heard. The other diners, who looked very well off indeed, if the amount of jewelry and fur was any indication- yes, fur, in Florida, but they went about what they were doing, eating, laughing, talking, and paid them no attention. Thank god.
“Wh-why- how… we’re having dinner!” She hissed anyway. “Have some care.”
“Why? I’m rich enough to do and say what I want, when I want.”
Ire spiked in her chest, cutting off her breath and the hair on the back of her neck stood up in pure outrage.
Colette leaned in, fisting her hands on the tabletop. “No. That is not how things work. Just because you have money, you don’t get a pass on being rude or being an asshole.”
“Asshole? I’m surprised you swear. You seem like the good girl, mousy type. The kind that goes to church every single Sunday, maybe on Wednesdays too. The kind that still has her twenty year old cherry intact.”
“Oh yeah?” she hissed, leaning even further forward.
She knew she probably looked like a crazed banshee or a raging bull with one of those straps tied over its junk for sport, but she didn’t actually care at the moment. The urge to throttle the smug bastard overrode any of her concerns for decorum or common sense. She might have just lectured him about causing a scene, but at the moment, the rules didn’t apply to her. And she didn’t have a cent to her name. Go figure.