The Billionaire's Desire: The Complete Series

by Cassie Cross

  When Cole exited the bathroom, Abby was trying to figure out how she was going to get home with her blouse being completely decimated, all the buttons above her midriff having been popped off mid-fling. Briefly she wondered if she had enough safety pins in her desk to make herself presentable for the train ride.

  Cole walked over to the closet on the far side of his office. From the corner of her eye, Abby could see him glancing in her direction a few times, and she tried to think of something to say to break the silence. If she made a big deal about the sex, it certainly wouldn’t happen again, and she couldn’t just ask him about the weather. Work, she figured, was the common denominator.

  “I’ll come in early tomorrow and fix those figures.”

  Cole nodded, pulling a crisp white shirt off its hanger. “I’ll have a talk with Alex and John about the inaccuracy in their reporting.”

  Abby couldn’t hide her smile. Cole admitting that Alex and John had a part in her mistake was a victory. She’d have to send them a thank you gift, because if they’d reported their numbers correctly, tonight never would’ve happened. Still, those words weren’t exactly the ones Abby imagined she’d hear after a night like this. She laughed, thinking of all the times she’d fantasized about it, and how the reality was nothing at all like she’d imagined.

  “What’s so funny?” Cole asked.

  “It’s just that in all the times I thought about this happening—and believe me, I’ve thought about it a lot—I never imagined that the first thing you would say to me after would be, ‘I’ll have a talk with Alex and John about the inaccuracy in their reporting.’”

  “What did you imagine me saying to you?” Cole asked, grinning.

  Abby’s heart nearly stopped. What would she have wanted to hear? A million things, but she did her best to put on a playful expression before answering Cole as lightheartedly as she could.

  “Oh, I don’t know. That I’ve ruined you for all other women, that I was the best you’ve ever had. The usual.”

  Cole walked towards Abby, his expression unreadable as his eyes met hers. Not knowing what he was about to do, her heartbeat went haywire, pounding an uneasy rhythm inside her chest. Without saying a word, Cole placed the clean shirt he was holding across the back of the chair beside the two of them, then slid his fingers down the plackets of Abby’s blouse. His knuckles gently skimmed her breasts, and even though Abby only felt him through her bra, she still got goosebumps.

  Cole curled his fingers around the plackets and pulled, ripping off the remaining buttons, then pushed the fabric over Abby’s shoulders. She shivered as she shrugged out of the sleeves and let the blouse fall to the floor. He reached over and grabbed the spare shirt he’d pulled from his closet and held it out so Abby could slide her arms through. It was ten times too big for her; her hands didn’t even clear the cuffs.

  “What are you-”

  “You can’t go home wearing that,” Cole said, gesturing to Abby’s discarded shirt as he started buttoning the new one from the bottom up. Abby watched as he dressed her, focusing on the deft movements of his fingers and the flawlessness of his skin.

  When every last button was secure, Cole rolled up each of the sleeves. His blue eyes met Abby’s for one fleeting moment, and then he brushed the underside of her chin with his index finger.

  “My car is downstairs,” he said softly. “Jack will take you home.”

  “I take the train all the time. I’ll be alright.”

  Cole shook his head, then gently pushed a strand of Abby’s hair behind her ear. “Not tonight.”

  “But won’t he wonder why I’m wearing your shirt?”

  Cole smiled, and Abby wanted to lick the dimple on his cheek.

  “I don’t pay him to wonder why you’re wearing my shirt, I pay him to drive whomever I want wherever I want. And tonight, I want him to drive you home. I thought you would know by now,” Cole said, dragging his finger along Abby’s collarbone. “All of my employees are incredibly discreet.”

  Their eyes met as he said those words, and Abby understood exactly what he meant.

  She must be discreet.

  Abby looked at the clock, surprised at the time. “You have a conference call with Tokyo in two minutes.”

  Cole sighed. “I know.”

  Before Abby left, Cole kissed her. Long and slow and perfect, enough to make her want more, enough to make it difficult for her to leave him. But she didn’t have a choice because as soon as his lips left hers, his phone rang. Abby watched him as he walked away and returned to his chair, right where she’d found him. She could hear her pulse beating in her ears, and her fingers were shaking.

  Oh, what that man can do to me. There are so many possibilities, and I want them all.

  Abby made her way to the door, and was about to close it behind her when she heard Cole speak.

  “Goodnight, Abigail,” he said softly.

  “Goodnight.” It was the first time she liked the sound of her full name falling from his lips.

  LATER, WHEN Abby was in bed, still wearing Cole’s shirt, she replayed the events of the night over and over in her head, wondering if she’d imagined them. Wondering what they would say to each other in the morning.

  Should I pretend like it never happened?

  She wanted it to happen again (and again, and again). But if it was just a one-time thing, a lapse in judgment, could she live with that? Could she look at Cole the same way and be the same assistant to him that she was before he’d made her want to melt out of her own skin from the sheer pleasure he gave her?

  She could.

  She had to.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  IT WAS well after midnight and Cole was still at work, sunken into his chair, staring out the window. He had chosen this office because he loved the view, but tonight he couldn’t even appreciate the scenery. During tonight’s teleconference with his Tokyo office, Cole was tipped off that one of his employees was attempting to sell information about KC-23, the codename for one of the biggest and most secretive software projects that the company had undertaken.

  Cole’s mind was swimming.

  This was an entirely new situation for him. Even though he demanded a lot from his employees, he had always treated them well. He’d never had anyone betray him. The traitor’s name was Josh Hamilton. Cole hired him straight out of the MBA program at Yale, Cole’s alma mater, based on a recommendation from one of the faculty advisors that Cole frequently consulted when he was recruiting. Cole even knew Josh’s father. What he didn’t know was exactly what Josh was attempting to sell.

  While this new software was innovative, Kerrigan Corp. was mired in issues with patent attorneys, so the work was currently unprotected. That’s why he had the people he trusted most working on the project.

  Cole had just gotten off the phone with the head of the Chicago office, where Josh worked. They had agreed to start sending Josh false specs to limit the damage done until they could figure out exactly what he was up to, and, most importantly, if he was working alone. Then, Cole would fire Josh’s ass and pursue whatever legal options were available to him.

  Cole turned his chair back toward his desk to check his email. He was waiting for an email from the IT department in Chicago, detailing all of Josh’s outgoing phone calls and chat conversations. Still nothing.

  His gaze drifted to the edge of his desk, where he’d had Abigail only hours earlier. Cole should’ve been singularly focused on saving his company, but he couldn’t stop thinking about Abigail. The sweet strawberry smell of her hair, the way her lips tasted, the warmth of her body when he slid into her. All the times he’d imagined fucking her (and he had imagined that a lot), he never dreamed she’d feel so exquisite. He never dreamed he could make her bloom with just one touch of his hand.

  Hell, just thinking about her made him hard.

  Abigail.

  What was he going to do? He hadn’t intended tonight to go the way that it did, although he couldn’t say he was sorry for the outc
ome. He was going to have to navigate this carefully; he’d never had sex with an employee before. It was strictly against his rules. He’d written it into the company Code of Conduct, for Christ’s sake. But Abigail, she was worth breaking rules for. Cole knew he couldn’t settle for having her once. Hell, he wanted to have her again, just thinking about the way the brush of her hair across his wrist set his skin aflame.

  Cole reached into his pants pocket and fished out his Blackberry, then pressed his Contacts button. Hers was the first name listed. His cock ached for her. He slid his hand down between his legs and allowed himself one stroke for relief. Cole refused to beat off to the memory of a woman he could have in his bed with the press of a button.

  In fact, his thumb hovered over that button. He could call her and have his driver pick her up. She would come as soon as he asked, he knew that much. He could have her in his bed, fall asleep to the smell of her on his sheets. He could have her in this very chair, and watch her perfect tits bounce as she rode him.

  Just as he was about to call her, someone called him. He pressed the button for the speaker phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Yes, sir. This is Clark from IT. I’ve just emailed you transcripts of Josh Hamilton’s chat conversations and phone records. ”

  “Thank you, Clark.” Cole went to end the call.

  “Sir?”

  “Yes,” Cole replied, sounding exasperated.

  “I happened to notice that there was one number he’s been calling frequently over the past few days. It’s a number in your office.”

  Cole could feel the adrenaline surging through his veins. “In my office?”

  “Yes. It belongs to an Abigail Waters.”

  Cole’s heart sank into his stomach. “Abigail Waters? You’re sure?” He didn’t want to believe it. He couldn’t believe it.

  “Positive. You’ll see it when you open the call listing.”

  “Will you get me a call listing from Abigail’s work phone, please?”

  “Absolutely. I’ll send it over as soon as I can.”

  “And I want to see his emails too.”

  “No problem.”

  “Thanks,” Cole said, then ended the call.

  Cole didn’t like spying on his employees, but he wouldn’t have any employees left to spy on if he allowed them to steal from him. Still, whatever it was that he had with Abigail was only going to be complicated by this. Cole repeatedly clicked on the Send/Receive button in his email client, waiting for Clark’s message to appear.

  A minute later, it did. The file was huge, no wonder it had taken so long.

  There were two attachments. One with Josh’s phone log in it, the other with the chat transcripts. Cole opted to open the phone log first.

  He scanned the list of numbers, all of which appeared to be business related, and most of which were Abigail’s direct line. The call log went back three months. At first, the calls to Abigail were sporadic, and lasted no longer than five minutes. Those, Cole figured, were probably work-related. At that point in time, Josh was still finishing up another project and only beginning to transition over to KC-23. The call frequency increased over the past three weeks, but each call lasted less than a minute; not long enough for any meaningful conversation. If Abigail was conspiring with Josh, Cole thought it would’ve been wise for Josh to use her personal cell to talk to her. If he had her personal cell, he wouldn’t have called her work numbers every day.

  Cole took a deep breath as a calm spread over him like a warm blanket. He was confident Abigail wasn’t involved. Still, he wanted to check the chat transcripts to be sure. He clicked on that file.

  Cole scrolled through work-related conversation after work-related conversation, only paying close attention to the ones Josh texted to Abigail, afraid of what he might find. There was some fairly lighthearted (for Abigail, at least) grumbling about workload, but what caught Cole’s attention was the flirting. A wave of possessiveness came over Cole, and he had to fight off the urge to fly to Chicago to kick Josh’s ass. He didn’t stop to think about what it meant that he was as angry about the flirting as he was about Josh’s attempted theft.

  What is he doing?

  Cole looked back over the messages—a task that made his stomach turn—and realized that the flirting was mostly one-sided on Josh’s end. That only brought him a small sense of satisfaction, because he still didn’t understand why he was so persistent when Abigail clearly wasn’t interested.

  Then, it hit him.

  Josh was trying to use Abigail to get to him.

  Cole felt a fierce spark of protectiveness for Abigail deep within him. It was then that he realized that he was going to have to keep Josh Hamilton close, and Abigail even closer.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ABBY ARRIVED at work early the next morning, despite the fact that she spent an extra twenty minutes on her hair and makeup. She didn’t know who she thought she was fooling. Cole was the most observant person she’d ever met, and he would know that something was up when he saw her putting in more effort than she normally did. Not that she went into the office looking like a slob, but she was usually a little more understated. Eyeliner, mascara, some lip gloss. Today Abby was wearing eye shadow too, and a rose-colored lipstick she’d lifted from Becca’s makeup drawer.

  She hadn’t slept very well last night. She tossed and turned, trying to reconcile things in her mind. What did what happened with Cole mean, if it meant anything at all? Abby knew the smart thing for her to do would be to go on about her life and her work as if last night had never happened, because the minute she started having expectations, she was inevitably going to be disappointed.

  It wasn’t like she and Cole were going to get married, and he couldn’t start stepping out with his assistant at social gatherings. Hook-ups like theirs had to be hidden in shadows and behind closed doors. There wasn’t much future in a beginning like that.

  Abby reasoned with herself for hours, and just when she decided that a one-time thing would be for the best, she’d close her eyes and remember the feel of his stubble along the curve of her shoulder, or the sugary-sweet taste of his tongue, and she knew that one time would never be enough for her.

  True to her word, Abby did clean up the figures on the sales report like she said she would, and she emailed the finished file to Cole right away. He had an appointment early this morning, and wouldn’t be in until after nine, so Abby started working on a few proposals that she knew he would be asking her for at some point during the day. She was interrupted by a phone call from Josh, a co-worker in Kerrigan’s Chicago office. She and Josh shared a work-appropriate flirtation that Abby always looked forward to, even though there was something about Josh that was a little smarmy and disingenuous. Still, their flirtation was a harmless kind of fun, since the miles between them meant that nothing serious would ever come of it.

  “Hey,” Abby said, cradling the phone. She was smiling, and she knew he could hear it in her voice.

  “How’s my favorite New Yorker?”

  “Eh, I can’t complain.”

  “You can always complain,” Josh replied. “It’s just that most people won’t care.”

  Abby laughed, twirling the phone cord around her index finger. “What can I do for you this morning?”

  “Not much. I was just calling to see how you were doing. It’s been forever since I talked to you.”

  “I saw that you called a few times, but I haven’t had time to call you back. Work, work, sleep, eat. Work. Then more work,” Abby told him. “The usual.”

  “Kerrigan’s still got you overloaded, huh?”

  Josh wasn’t Cole’s biggest fan. He and Abby used to joke about him a lot during their conversations, but now it felt wrong. She didn’t want to tip off Josh that there was anything out of the ordinary, so she tried to pick her words carefully.

  “You know he is,” Abby replied, sighing.

  “Listen, I need to-”

  Abby’s phone beeped to let her know there wa
s a call on the other line. When she saw Cole’s cell number on the display, her heart skipped a beat.

  “Josh, I’ve gotta go.”

  “I wanted to talk to you about something, Abby.”

  “We can talk later, I’ve gotta go.”

  “Okay,” he said, sounding reluctant. “I’ll call you later.”

  Abby clicked over to the other line and took a deep breath, hoping that she’d sound casual. But Cole didn’t even wait for her to answer before he started talking.

  “I’m going to need the Brighton and Pyncorp proposals by eleven.” He sounded as bossy as he usually did, and relief smoothed the edges of Abby’s frazzled nerves. No awkwardness, just business as usual. She guessed that was a good sign.

  “They’re almost finished. I’ll have them ready when you get in. Anything else?”

  If she didn’t know any better, she’d bet he was surprised that she was already a step ahead of him.

  “Ten copies each for the stakeholders.”

  “Ten copies. Got it.”

  Abby could hear the hum of the limo in the background, and for a split second she wondered if Cole had forgotten to hang up the phone. “Goodbye, Abigail.”

  “Goodbye.”

  And then the line went dead.

  ONCE ABBY had put the finishing touches on the proposals and packaged them for the clients the way Cole liked, she headed to the office kitchen for some coffee. She was dragging and needed some caffeine.

  Two other assistants were leaning against the counter, speaking in whispers and giggling. Paulette, who worked for one of the area directors, and Marley, who worked for the head of product development, Keith McCall.

  “Ladies,” Abby said, approaching slowly, not wanting to disturb their gossip session. It’s a pity Becca doesn’t work here, Abby thought. She’d fit right in. Abby opened the cupboard over the coffee maker and grabbed a cup. “How are you this morning?”