It made no sense, and in that nonsensical way, it made all the sense in the world.
“I really like you,” she said as he pressed kisses along the column of her throat.
He didn’t stop kissing her, continuing along her collarbone to her shoulder until he said, “Good to know.”
Then it was hands and mouths and so much groping.
He was hard, she was ready, and he took everything she gave.
There wasn’t a lot of preamble this time, the foreplay made up only of his touches and her groans. He got undressed, donned a condom lickety-split, spread her thighs, and drove home.
She gasped, wrapping her legs around his waist and letting him ride her. She panted, he moaned, the world blurred.
This was new.
This time he didn’t make eye contact. He shoved his face into her neck and made feral sounds rivaling her own.
This was…this was something different than before. The feelings coiling inside her were just as arousing, but this time they weren’t foggy. It seemed like she’d put her glasses on and the world had refocused.
He gripped her hips, pressing into her with the hard length of him and, suddenly, she realized what this was.
This was his claiming of her body. Making it his. Owning her.
She’d never given her body over like this before.
“Trav,” she said on a gasp.
He didn’t stop. His name on her lips seemed to spur him further, push him more. With each thrust, she unraveled a little until she became genuinely worried there wouldn’t be anything left when it ended.
Except, as he thrust harder, he lifted his gaze so it held hers, and in that moment he was someone she’d never known. This man she was with was making a point that she was pretty sure neither of them understood.
Everything inside her tightened to the point that it was ready to unleash. She pressed her lips together to cover the sounds she was pretty sure were coming from her.
The release took over. She bit into his shoulder to stop herself from crying out. As soon as her muscles clenched around the solid length pressed inside her, he followed. The thrusting slowed. His breaths came jagged, but more evenly spaced.
“To be totally clear. If you want a plan? You are now,” he said with a final thrust. “My plan.”
She rode the aftershocks of their lovemaking. He didn’t withdraw.
Still joined, he kissed her.
“I mean it,” he continued. “You’re my plan. Your smile is my goal. Whatever I need to do to make it happen, I’m going to do it.”
Well…huh. On that note, she couldn’t smile, because she pressed her lips against his instead.
Chapter Nineteen
“The only thing that my mother has ever said consistently is, ‘Nobody fucks with my kids.’” — Carla, Pennsylvania, USA
Rachel
The past week, her mind had been a muddle of lust-filled moments with Travis and spending time swimming at the lake—with and without her kids.
Travis made her feel everything, the water brought peace, and the slow pace of summer at Twin Lakes lulled her into a false sense of serenity.
Because then…Rachel missed another deadline.
Well, sort of. She’d missed a deadline that the client had last-minute emailed her about. The deadline had been of the tight variety and, generally, this was not an issue due to the attentiveness Rachel prided herself in providing with her service.
The first deadline she missed happened because she’d taken a Travis nap. That one hadn’t been a huge deal.
This one she’d missed because she was doing…other things with Travis. It was a massive deal.
“I’m so sorry,” Rachel gushed into the phone, really glad this wasn’t a video call because she felt like a total wreck, and she was pretty sure her cheeks were flushing. That weird red rash thing was probably going on around her neck—the one that seemed to show up only when she was really and truly flustered. “I’m not sure what happened,” she said, deflated.
“This is really unlike you,” Cassie said on the other end of the line. She seemed more than a little distracted, given the way she covered and uncovered her mouthpiece. Other conversations were happening simultaneously, Rachel could tell. Everyone on that end of the line was rushing, trying to figure out how to fix the error of the orders arriving with the wrong coupon code.
“Are you sure everything’s okay?” Cassie asked. “I’m worried about you.”
Ugh. That was even worse than making the mistake in the first place. Now the rash around her neck itched. “I’m fine. Really, this is just a onetime thing.”
Call-waiting chimed and Rachel glanced at the screen to ensure she hadn’t messed anything else up for another client that morning.
It was Kaiya.
She’d call her back later.
Rachel declined the call and turned her entire focus back to Cassie. “It absolutely will not happen again.”
It wouldn’t, because Rachel responded to all client emails within hours and handled everything that came up immediately. She wouldn’t slip again. This was the kind of service her clients had become accustomed to receiving. The kind of service she’d become accustomed to giving. She considered herself something of a concierge when it came to her company, that’s why she had three select clients instead of filling her schedule with multiple smaller clients like she’d done when she first started out.
Cassie’s change request for the coupon code had a time stamp of three a.m. that morning, and Rachel had been getting handled by Travis at that time. Then she’d had breakfast with her kids. Thus the advertisement didn’t get switched out before seven, as Cassie had requested.
Which meant, the previous version of the ad ran with the old coupon code.
Rachel’s lungs had gotten a little heavier and the air in the room denser when she’d checked her email and realized that, while she was eating a strawberry toaster tart with her kids and her ex-in-laws, the timeline had come and gone.
The old ad ran, Cassie’s request had fallen by the wayside, and the strawberry toaster tart turned sour against Rachel’s tongue.
To be fair, this was the first screwup of this magnitude. Rachel kept lists of her lists to ensure that nothing fell into cracks. There were no cracks when it came to her company.
Travis emerged from the shower wearing only a towel. She pressed her finger to her lips and mouthed, Client.
He nodded and went to pull on boxers and a pair of jeans, which was a shame.
They’d become a little bolder in their time together—still ensuring that the kids were out of the house when they were together during the day. And the locks were always firmly engaged. But they’d started seeing each other intimately throughout the day instead of only at night when everyone else was asleep.
“Rachel?” Cassie asked.
“Yes, sorry…again.” Rachel turned her focus to the notepad in front of her, pointedly not looking at Travis and his abdominal definition.
Cassie sighed. “You’re very distracted.”
“I am.” Rachel frowned, but it was the truth, so she might as well fess up. “The family summer trip has definitely diverted my attention a little, but that ends now.”
Travis scowled at her at that declaration. His scowl added to the heaviness she was already feeling in her shoulder blades.
She stood to pace as she wrapped things up.
Cassie seemed to take Rachel at her word, and the rest of the conversation turned to reconfirming future deadlines, which wasn’t necessary given that this was a one-time situation. Rachel tolerated the inquisition because Cassie was clearly perplexed about the situation.
She and Rachel had been working together for three years, and this was the first time Rachel hadn’t addressed an issue within the given time frame.
Although, if Rachel really thought abo
ut it—as she was right then—Cassie had consistently started asking for more and more on tighter timelines. Rachel had always delivered, so she hadn’t thought much of it.
Once she hung up the phone, Rachel fell back on the bed, dropping her cell to press the heels of her hands against her eyelids.
“Didn’t go well?” Travis asked, pulling on his tee.
Rachel nodded, hands still against her face. “I really screwed up.”
“How bad?” he asked.
“The old ad ran, but Cassie changed the coupon code. So now, she says, customers want both deals, and she’s really worried she’s going to lose money over the whole thing.”
“How much money are we talking?” Travis’s baritone was not soothing like usual.
This was a testament to how tense Rachel was, if the sound of his voice wasn’t doing the general calming thing like usual.
“I don’t know.” Rachel slumped farther into the mattress, letting the thick comforter, well, comfort. “Cassie wasn’t happy about it, though.”
Rachel was going to have to give her a discount on her monthly bill. That meant she was going to have to pull into her savings for the mortgage payment this month. And that meant that she’d have to replenish her savings.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Travis asked, sitting at the edge of her bed, running his hand along her leg.
“No.” She rolled over and tried the box breathing thing again.
“Rach.” Travis moved his palm from her leg to her back. “Even you get to mess up sometimes.”
She looked at him then. Really looked at him. Not his abs, not his body, not the way he made her insides flippity-flop with his mind-boggling sex appeal. No, she really drank him in.
He cared about her.
That thought made her throat go dry.
“I don’t get to mess up,” she said.
Then she told him. All of it.
“She’s in the States?” he asked.
Rachel nodded.
“And she was up at three in the morning sending you emails with changes for an ad that was supposed to run within hours?” he asked.
Rachel nodded again. “While we were—”
She gestured to the wall, where they’d had a truly inspired middle-of-the-night romp. It involved inventive use of the curtains. She wouldn’t have thought the position was possible.
Travis’s inventiveness when it came to bedroom antics was one of the many pieces to that smoldering sex-appeal thing he had going on.
“Rach, you shouldn’t have to take calls at all hours of the night.” He sprawled out on the bed beside her, rolling to his side. “No one can possibly expect that from you.”
Except him, of course. He didn’t say it, but she was pretty sure he wanted to.
To be honest, she’d jump when he called because of that thing she’d discovered he could do when they went skinny-dipping at the lake. Let’s just say, she was mighty impressed by his flexibility.
“It’s just part of the service I provide to clients.” A headache was forming just behind her eyes. “I mean, I’d like it not to be.” She rolled, so they were face-to-face. “But it’s what they expect. I’m definitely not the cheapest option on the virtual-executive-assistant market. My clients have come to know that I will get it done and do it right.”
He brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. “Do you charge them extra when they call with last-minute demands?”
She shook her head.
“Have you considered laying out the exact times you’ll be available and when they can expect responses?” he continued.
Given that he was starting to show up at work only sometimes, he really didn’t get to have thoughts on this.
“I’ve considered it,” she admitted. In fact, she’d considered it more than once. She’d even drafted it up in a document. She hadn’t seen it through because she absolutely didn’t want to ruin the relationships already established or—more to the point—admit that she was unable to complete the job as asked.
“I think I just need to do better.” She waved her hand between them. “At managing my time with you, with the kids, and the work.”
“I’d like to spend more time with you, Rach.” He shifted so they were touching, front to front. “I’ve been thinking…we should consider taking this thing between us public.”
She kept her gaze steady with his, even as she arched away. Seriously? She was mid-crisis, and he wanted to discuss this now?
“No,” she said.
“No, as in never?” he asked. “Or no, as in not right now?”
What had she meant? She’d meant that she didn’t want to deal with Evelyn’s passive-aggressiveness, explaining relationships to the boys, or having to have a talk with Gavin, since it affected the kids and they’d agreed—and both had always communicated—whenever they’d had a change in their lives that merited that type of a talk.
“I’m really stressed-out at the moment.” The headache was starting to become more than just an annoyance. If she wasn’t careful, her morning would brew a full-blown migraine. She had no time for a migraine. “Now is not the right moment for this.”
“I think it’s a fantastic moment, myself,” Travis said, his dimple making an appearance, which caused heat to pool between her thighs. The headache receded a little, too.
They had been taking it slow. Well, slow everywhere but in the bedroom.
And that one time in the study.
Also, the lake.
But that had just been once because they really could’ve gotten caught.
Although, maybe they weren’t taking it as slow as she’d thought.
“Can we keep it at just us right now? Until things calm down for me?” she asked, touching his chest because she could, and it was just so touchable. “Then talk about a plan to ease everyone in to you and me being a public us?”
“That depends.” He pressed a light kiss to her lips.
“On what?”
“Let me take you out tonight. Dancing. There’s a local place Dave says is great.”
Dancing. She hadn’t been dancing since Molly’s birthday two years ago. They’d all decided to try clubbing. They’d ended up spending twenty minutes at the actual club before evacuating to an Olive Garden because it was soup, salad, and breadsticks night.
“We have a problem with going out.” She sifted her fingertips through the still-damp hair on his scalp. “Someone here will notice we’re gone.” Or, to be precise, multiple someones.
“Already handled.”
He couldn’t just have it handled. That would be a lot of handling.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Mom and Dad don’t know it yet, but they’re taking the kids to a magic show at the Twin Lakes resort. Dave is going to cover for us here. I already asked him—bribed him—and he agreed.”
“Dave is good with us?” she asked. Ever since the night in the den, she hadn’t said a peep to him about it. He, likewise, had pretended it hadn’t happened.
“Dave is, officially, staying out of it,” Travis said carefully. “But I had somethin’ he wanted, so we negotiated.”
“What exactly did you have that he wanted?” she asked, cautiously.
Travis shrugged. “Some things are better kept between brothers and air traffic control.”
She shook her head with a bit too much force for trying to stave off a headache. “I’m not neglecting my clients again so you and I can go dancing.”
He did a push-up over the top of her. “Bring your phone and check it between songs. If we have to head back here, we can. I won’t say a word about it.”
“You’ve thought of everything, haven’t you?”
He grinned a shit-eating grin. “Just wait.”
Chapter Twenty
“It’s not my job to enter
tain my kids. I love them and keep them alive. The rest is up to them.” — Julie, Idaho, USA
Travis
The dirt parking lot wasn’t well lit at all—just the full moon above, the stars, and the light coming from a dilapidated old barn that could seriously use a coat of paint and new lumber, but did have a big, professional sign announcing the barn name as Come As You Are.
Under that was a piece of canvas hung along a thick rope with wide hand-painted letters announcing the evening as open mic night.
“This is it?” Rachel didn’t seem impressed.
He wasn’t impressed, either. He’d have to have a talk with Dave later. “Apparently so.”
“Give me a second.” Rachel had brought her laptop along and was returning emails from a hot spot she’d created with her laptop and her cell phone. “Almost done.”
She needed to set some pretty substantial boundaries with her clients, because they were walking all over her. He’d asked her what they paid for the kind of service she provided—as in, always available to drop everything and do whatever they needed at literally any time of the night. She’d dodged the question.
The only thing she was more committed to than her work was her kids.
Travis was hopeful that soon she’d find room in there for him, too.
He stretched across the interior of the SUV and kissed her on the temple. “Whatever they’re paying you, it’s not enough.”
She gave a soft shake of her head. “You know what I’d like to do?”
“What’s that?”
“I’d like to have staff.” She was fidgeting with the dangly bracelets on her arm.
He got the feeling this conversation was of the important variety. So he turned in his seat to face her. “Yeah?”
“So it’s not just me.” She went back to typing away at the keyboard. “I guess that’s my dream. So whenever anyone needs anything—at any hour—someone is monitoring the inbox. And they could be from all different time zones so it’s not a big deal if a three in the morning request comes through. Where they are, it won’t be bedtime.”
She was definitely on to something.
“Take some of my money. I’ll hire you a staff.”
Rachel, Out of Office Page 19