The F-Word
I roll onto my back, fold my arms beneath my head and stare up at the shadows dancing across the ceiling. I am not a jerk who compares making love with one woman to making love with another, but there’s no escaping the fact that this was…
Incredible.
Man. It was amazing—but as amazing as it was, now what? I have gone from being my PA’s boss to being her lover. And one of the basic rules in business is that you don’t sleep with someone who works for you.
The realization wipes the smile from my face.
Coop warned me of where this was heading. So did Casey. I warned myself, for Christ’s sake. Despite all of that, here I am, lying in a bed that bears the scents of sex and woman, waiting for Bailey to come back so we can make love—and what’s with the making love thing? We fucked, is what we did.
And we’ll do it again.
Why not?
I don’t have statistics to back me, but I’m damn sure that the Basic Rule thing gets ignored a lot. You just have to set the right parameters…
The right parameters?
What in hell does that mean? What will it mean once we’re back in the real world? If she won’t even address me as Matthew in the office, she’s sure as hell not going to want to do anything like this. I know my Bailey. She’ll have rules. No fucking before noon. No fucking on my desk and, hell, the very thought of bending her over that gleaming glass surface, pulling down her panties and taking her while life outside my locked door goes on its humdrum way has me turning hard again.
Okay. The thing to do is end this now. Get up. Tell Bailey this was great, but it was a mistake…
The bathroom door opens. In the second before she switches off the light, Bailey stands silhouetted in the doorway, the white robe untied and framing her body.
Everything logical drains from my head.
Or maybe everything logical rushes into it.
This isn’t about fucking or about figuring out the rules. It’s about being with this woman.
“Matthew?”
I sit up against the pillows, hold out my arms, and she hurries across the floor, straight into them.
I stroke the curls back from her forehead.
“Are you all right?” I ask softly.
“Yes,” she replies, and within a few seconds’ time, I know that she is all right, indeed.
* * *
We doze.
When we wake, I notice faint red marks on her throat. On her breasts. Dammit. Did I do that? Did my beard scratch her?
“What?” she asks, reading the look on my face.
I stroke my fingers over the marks. “My beard,” I say. “It left marks.”
She smiles. “Mmm. I know.”
“I’m sorry. I should have been more gentle.”
She puts her hand over my lips. “I love the feel of your beard on me, Matthew.”
“You do?” I say. I don’t know why, but her admission pleases me.
“On my throat. On my thighs. On my nipples.” She catches her breath as I bend to her and rub my face lightly against her breasts.