by Lola Finn
Instead, he saved me.
He took me under his wing, sending me to a private school so I would graduate, and when the time came, he paid every penny for me to attend college. An Ivy League, imagine that. He offered me a job then, never letting me stumble once.
Since then, I’ve managed guest services and the hotel at the Cove. I already paid him back the money, but it comes nowhere near what I owe him. I’d do anything for him to repay him for everything he’s done. For every goddamn opportunity he’s given me, which has earned me a spot as one of his most trusted employees—under Millie Jacobsen, of course.
Hence our weekly meetings where we discuss any number of things about his businesses. The meeting I rushed into late.
And then, I turned around to the sexiest set of eyes I’ve ever seen. Only this time, they weren’t hooded with lust. Palmer was fucking nervous, a scared little deer down the hunter’s scope.
Which could only mean one thing.
She’s the new front desk receptionist I threatened to fire. This is what I get for not paying attention to which ivy they were sending me. There all the same, so I didn’t see a point.
The door clicks, and she slowly turns around to face me again, my office suddenly the size of a closet with the two of us alone. I don’t even know where to start with this shit storm. My muscles are somehow still relaxed from the last time I came to the pictures of her perfect naked body. The pictures filling my phone, the text messages.
And now she’s off-limits.
I walk around to the front of my desk, leaning against it, and nod to the chair in front of me. She cautiously sits, blinking up at me.
“Briggs, I—”
“Someone wasn’t honest last night,” I interrupt, grabbing the info sheet on my new employee I never bothered looking at.
“I was just as honest as you,” she fires back, and my eyebrows shoot up.
“You said you work in customer service, and until this morning, Palmer Evans worked at Haven Cove as a personal trainer.”
I toss the paper back on my desk.
“I already had the job. I just hadn’t started working it yet. Plus, you said you were in administration.”
I lean back against my desk, studying her. “I am. I run a hotel and manage staff of one of the most exclusive summer resorts in the country. Plus”—I motion around to the room—“we are in the administration building.”
Her eyes narrow. “You told me your name is Briggs.”
“It is. Oliver Briggs. Ms. Jacobson is the only person in the past five years to call me Oliver. Now, why didn’t you tell me you worked at the Cove? Ivies fucking love to brag about that shit.”
Palmer shrugs, looking away. “You ever think that’s why? You’d automatically assume I’m just like the rest of them. Townies versus ivies and all of that, right?”
She has no fucking clue I’m not a townie, but I’m not about to correct her. If she thinks less of me because I live in Seaside Heights for more than twelve weeks a year, then she truly is like every other fucking ivy.
“Well,” I say, sitting back, not quite sure when I started leaning forward in the first place. “Now we know where we stand.”
I move around to sit behind my desk, ignoring the drag from me to her, trying to pull me back.
“Which is where, exactly?” She quirks her brows.
“Boss,” I say, pointing to myself, and then I gesture to her. “Employee. Nothing more.”
Her cheeks flame. “Is that what the text you sent a little bit ago says? I haven’t had a chance to read it.”
Fuck. She’s right. On my way into the building earlier, I sent her a reminder of how I plan to rail her sweet little pussy tonight. Planned. Jesus Christ.
“Fine,” I grind out. “Nothing more as of three minutes ago.”
Palmer purses her lips as she stands, pulling her phone out of the back pocket of her khaki shorts. My gaze travels over the legs that were wrapped around my head, and when I look up, her mouth has curved into a smug grin as she reads the message. My eyes shoot to my phone on the desk when it lights up, her name on the screen.
“Nothing more as of when?” Her smile turns bratty as she bucks against what I’ve said, and it burns through my core, my jaw clenching as the room pulses between us.
“Go back to whatever the hell you were doing,” I demand as she marches out of my office.
And the second the door slams behind her, I rip my phone off the desk, growling as I check her text. The picture is of her bent over in the sexy black skirt from last night, the tiny red thong she was wearing, peeking out, and the slightest hint of her glistening lips.
Fuck.
My cock lurches in my slacks, and I shake my head, throwing my phone back down.
Boss and employee. Nothing. Fucking. More. We can’t be.
I’ll just have to keep telling myself this shit until my dick falls the fuck in line.
***
It’s been three days since Palmer stormed out of my office. She tagged along with housekeepers and concierges the first day, and thank God, my nighttime receptionist agreed to come in and train her on the rest. She caught on quickly, only needing Traci to hang around for one day before she was running the lobby better than my last two years’ worth of ivies combined.
Now, the weekend is finally fucking here, and since we’re off on Sundays, I just need to make it through one more day of being in close quarters with her.
Then I’ll finally get a reprieve from her cupcake scent and flashes of skin on the cameras.
I’ve heard a few more of the staffers talking about the accounts Cole showed me the other day. The name on the blog is Exposed, which suits it rather well given the content. I scroll through the Instagram posts every now and then in my downtime. Like right now, after a busier morning when I pull it up on my phone, relaxing back in my office chair.
The latest post features a lacy black thong across one of the guest beds. So wet. Now make me taste it.
Damn.
I can’t deny the appeal of trying to figure out who’s behind the posts. For one, they’re hot. Putting a face with the body would enhance a number of people’s jerk off fantasies. But also, Haven Cove operates around secrets and scandals. The idea that one of the staffers is pulling this shit off without anyone knowing drives people crazy. And it has to be a staffer with the areas where they took some of these photos.
A muffled laugh comes through the closed office door, breathy, slightly raspy, and it makes my blood pressure spike. I immediately start to stand to find out what or who the hell Palmer’s laughing at, but then I reach over and flip on the monitor in one corner of my desk.
After a fiasco with the last two ivies at reception stealing guest credit card numbers, Brent and I decided to have the security cameras feeding into my office from behind the front desk and lobby to increase the chances of issues being caught immediately and not lost in the hundreds of other feeds from around the resort.
I full screen the camera over the waterfall, showing me Palmer’s backside, and just as I suspected, it’s a fucking ivy, grinning at her from the other side of the counter—the concierge for the Diamond Suites building.
As far as douche bag ivies go, this one ranks pretty high up there.
She cocks her head to the side, leaning forward with her hands, bracing her on the desk while he folds his arms and leans in from the other side. By the next airy giggle, I’m throwing open my office door, more pissed at myself than the little fucker talking to her right now.
The door bangs against the wall as I stride up to the front desk, rounding the corner. The ivy’s eyes dart up to mine, and he straightens, quickly backing away from his intimidating boss storming toward them.
“Do you need a recap of your job description?” I growl at him.
“Uh…no, sir.” He gives a half-smile to Palmer and then gets the fuck out of my line of sight like a guy who wants to keep his place at the Cove.
Palmer spins to me, her eyes flaring and jaw set. “What was that?”
“You seem to have already forgotten your job is to make sure the guests are enjoying themselves. Not the goddamn ivies.”
She huffs, folding her arms over her chest. “You sure didn’t have an issue with an ivy enjoying herself the other night.”
I shake my head. “Not anywhere close to the same thing.”
“You’re right.” Her hands fall to her sides as she stomps around me. “He hasn’t sent me pictures of his hard cock.”
My blood boils as she disappears behind the corner and into the hallway. Our night in the bar comes rushing back. Her moans, her sighs, her throaty voice saying my name. The taste of her.
Fuck.
Before I can stop myself, I’m stalking after her, catching her just outside of my office. I grab her arm and pull her around. She gasps, her eyes wide as I push her back against the wall.
“Talk about my cock again,” I growl, my body pressing into hers.
She licks her lips, her eyes darting between mine. “Your big, hard—”
My mouth crashes down onto hers, and the moan that escapes her has me grinding my raging hard-on against her. We tangle in each other, her arms hooking around my neck and my hands sliding over her hips, pulling her into me.
“Briggs,” she whispers as I move down to her neck, and I push up her shirt to her tits, her nipples pebbling under my palms.
Suddenly, the bell to the reception desk rings on the other side of the wall I’m dry-fucking her against. The entire world snaps back into focus in an instant, my sanity fighting its way to the surface.
What the fuck am I doing?
I jerk her shirt down, not even sparing her a glance as I storm back into my office, slamming the door behind me.
My head clears even more once the air’s free of her. I was really about to fuck up. If not for the guest, I would have just screwed her against the wall. Maybe having the decency to carry her in here first, but I can’t even say I trust that I would have done that.
Staffers hook up around here all the time, but this is different. Palmer’s my employee. My eighteen-year-old employee. Brent might have given some leniency to his son earlier this summer with his girlfriend, but their situation was nothing like mine. And after everything that man has done for me, I would never put him in a position to have to fire me for not keeping my dick in my pants with my employee.
I brace my fists on my desk, hanging my head as I breathe, get my shit together, and convince my cock to stand down. Then I lift my gaze to the monitor, watching Palmer help the guest at the counter. Her moans swim in my head, the feel of her skin still fresh on my fingertips.
When it comes to Palmer Evans, I need to find a way to stay away.
I need to find one real fucking fast.
Chapter Five
Palmer
Other than the few times I truly thought I’d get fired—texting my boss a picture of my thong on day one, and then grinding on him in the hall this afternoon—I collapse onto my cot Saturday evening having survived my first week in the lobby without major incident.
My calves still ache from standing all day instead of working out, but I’ll take it as a win. And despite the tension with Briggs, I’m actually really good with the guests. I’ve even had one calling straight to me at reception instead of their concierge.
Lying on my mattress, I listen to the quiet and sigh. I spend most Friday and Saturday nights in the cabin alone. Leighton only stays here on the weeknights, spending the weekends at the Cabot house on the other side of the golf course. Her mom and Mr. Cabot are getting married at the end of the summer, which I’m sure makes family dinners interesting with Knox, Mr. Cabot’s son, being her boyfriend. The start of summer was wild when all of that came to a head.
My other bunkmate, Ainsley, usually shows up around midnight. A huge improvement from when she would sneak in between three and four in the morning. She “hangs out” a lot with the other lifeguards on her shift. Well, two of them anyway.
It used to bother me, everyone pairing off except for me, but over the past few weeks, I’ve gotten pretty used to it—found ways to keep myself busy.
As I walk back into the cabin from the staff showers, I toss my bag on the bed and then take out my laptop to catch up on a few things—i.e., scrolling through Jessica Niels’s social media for any clues that might help me when I finally time a run-in with her.
She’s really into light blue this week and is all about facials. Shit. Of course, she’d start going to the spa the week I stop working in the building.
Someone knocks on the door, and I finish reading a caption about a new candle being featured on her website before I bound over to answer. I lift the little fabric curtain hanging over the four-pane window in the door, and my chest flutters when I see Briggs on the other side.
I drop the curtain and swallow, my heart pounding as I creak the door open.
“What are you doing here?” I say.
He presses the back of his hand to the door until I step back, letting him swing it the rest of the way open and walk in. He slams the door behind him, breathing heavily, and with the athletic shorts and tennis shoes, it’s a fair guess he ran here.
“Well,” I ask, following him a few steps.
In under thirty seconds, he’s taken up the entire space with his masculine scent and muscular body. His eyes scan the cabin, landing on my still open computer and swooping over the rest of my cot. My mind instantly jumps to him, throwing me onto the mattress to finish what we started earlier, but with as fast as he bolted then, I won’t hold my breath.
All week, he’s been in dress shirts and slacks, and I drink him in while he stands in front of me—the hard chest beneath his T-shirt, biceps stretching the fabric to its extreme.
When I look up, his gaze is raking over my body too, starting at my thighs where my lounge shorts barely cover my ass cheeks and then dragging up to the oversized sweatshirt slipping off of one of my shoulders. He finally meets my stare, heating my skin and liquifying my insides.
“I came to talk to you,” he says, his voice low and gruff.
I shrug, feigning disinterest as I walk past him to my cot. “Then talk. Although you could’ve texted me.”
He shakes his head. “This needed to be said in person.”
As I lean back on my palms, pulling my legs up, his attention moves to my bare skin as it usually does anytime more appears. It sends my pulse racing, the way he looks at me even though I know he doesn’t want to. But I want him to.
“What happened earlier…” His voice is monotone, his muscles tense. “Shit like that can’t happen anymore.”
“You mean the shit you started?” I cross my arms, suddenly feeling defensive.
Other than the text I sent him before leaving his office the other day and moaning into his mouth after he kissed me in the hallway, I tip-toed my ass around him all week. Sure, I almost sent a number of texts, but I always deleted them before going through with it. Except for like three, not that he answered them anyway.
“That was a mistake.”
The words sting, and he must see it because his tone softens.
“We can’t…It won’t happen again.”
“I don’t think you needed to run all the way down here to tell me that,” I bite at him, my feelings raw and in need of a bitchy mask. “Especially since it sounds like you need to be working on convincing yourself.”
“Palmer—”
“Why are you really here, Briggs?” I tip my head to the side.
“I’m making sure we’re on the same page here,” he growls out, his jaw tightening.
“And what page is that?”
“Damn it, Palmer.” He takes a step toward me, so he’s towering over me. “If you make this any more of a problem than it already is, I’ll have you transferred back to your little gym gig faster than you can fucking blink.”
&
nbsp; I swallow, my pulse racing the closer he comes. “I’m not making this a fucking problem. You turned all caveman when I was talking to the concierge and pinned me to the wall. It was you kissing me. Your cock—”
He leans in closer, boxing me in when his hands drop to the mattress, his face hovering right in front of mine. “It’s all me, huh?”
Goose bumps break out all over my body, his lips skimming up to my ear.
“You’re not affected by this in the least?” He tugs at my earlobe with his teeth as a heated shiver teases through me. He dips lower, sucking on the skin of my neck just below. I can’t stop the moan falling from my lips or my body from arching up to his.
But then he chuckles and pulls back. “That’s what I thought. Do what you can to stay away from me, Palmer.”
He straightens up, walking backward as his full lips turn up into a dark smirk, which does nothing to stop the throbbing in my core.
“And stop fucking teasing me with the texts.”
Briggs walks out, shutting the door behind him.
At least I know he’s still reading my messages.
Chapter Six
Briggs
Leaving Palmer’s cabin, I need to burn off even more steam than I started with at the beginning of my run. Every time I think I’ve got a handle on my shit with her, she manages to creep back under my skin. She might as well live there at this point. A fucking problem, for sure.
I keep a gym bag in my office so I can hit the gym after work most days, but even a late-night workout doesn’t sound like enough right now. It might be the last thing I want to rely on to cool down, but I jog back up the hill to the admin building, swiping my key card and heading down to my office. A few hours under a stack of profit and loss statements should numb my mind.
Plus, I didn’t get shit done today after our little “moment” in the hallway. Even with the door shut so I couldn’t hear her, I checked the cameras more times than I care to admit. And not for security reasons, no matter the excuses I spouted to myself all afternoon.