His frown said more than anything else. “What harm can it do in one night?”
As if realizing his only true opponent was caving to his presence, the cat wiggled free of Chelsea’s grip to twine himself around Aiden’s legs, his purr so loud it practically vibrated the man’s jeans.
“None that I know of. But if you’re not comfortable…”
“Hematite,” called Waverley from the other room. “Oh, there you guys are. Hey, Hemy, are you ready for your dinner? I got him a can of tuna, if that’s okay, Chelsea. I found it in the cabinet. I Googled what cats like, and the answer seems to be meat.”
“He’d like that, Waverley.” Chelsea watched the child scoop up the large cat and rush from the room, then slanted another glance at Aiden. “You know, if she gets attached to him and he doesn’t have a home, the next thing she’s going to ask is if she can keep him.”
The expression on the man’s face changed so abruptly, it was like the insecurities and worries were never there to begin with. He transformed seamlessly into her boss, the guy she saw every day in the office, in the space between one heartbeat and the next. “Well, that would become Margo’s problem, wouldn’t it? I think maybe she does need a pet…”
The slow, Grinch-like smile shouldn’t have done it for Chelsea, but it did. “I’m pretty sure she won’t go for that.”
Before she could move away, he’d spun in her direction and backed her into the sink behind her with nothing more than his presence. “I have a way of convincing people to do what I want them to do, if you’ll recall.” The power and masculine charisma seemed to flow off him in waves, battering her resolve and making her want to melt into a puddle.
“Glerk,” she responded.
His smile grew. Slowly, his fingertip traced down from her temple to her cheek. “I didn’t quite catch that.”
Her mind raced. How quick would he fire her if she leaned forward and took just a little nibble of that delectable bottom lip of his? The one that spoke of sin and hours of pleasure so great it made a girl’s toes curl just thinking about it…
She wasn’t in a position to play sexy games with a man like Aiden Kelley. She’d lose, every single time. He wasn’t for the likes of her. “Nothing, sir. Just thinking that you did have a talent for business and shouldn’t be underestimated. I’m sure Margo will agree to keeping the animal, if you asked.”
She’d backed down, and she knew it. The thing was, based on the look on his face, he knew it, too.
It must’ve been her overactive imagination, because she thought he looked a bit disappointed. Which was crazy, but…
“Chicken,” he said before walking away from her.
It took her long moments to translate what he could’ve meant by that single word. By the time she did, he was long gone, but her fury boiled over anyway.
“Oh, you think I’m a chicken, Aiden? You’ve messed with the wrong girl if you think I’ll back down next time. I dare you to get all sexy like that with me again. I just dare you.”
Lucky for her, he wasn’t around to hear her. Wouldn’t he just laugh at her then?
…
Chelsea
Chelsea was surprised to see him still awake. She’d thought he went to bed a while ago.
Earlier, they’d played some board games, cared for the cat, eaten a wonderful dinner they’d made together and, afterward, the kiddo had closed herself into her room with Hemy. When Chelsea popped her head in to check on her more than an hour ago, she’d been snoring gently with the bedraggled cat guarding her from the foot of the bed. She’d stared at the two of them for a few moments, long enough for the cat to slow blink a few times before dozing back to sleep, and found peace in how content they both looked.
But a storm had rolled in since then. The thunder and lightning never had a calming effect on Chelsea, so she’d hoped to make a cup of tea and settle down in front of the television, maybe stream some episodes of Friends or something until she felt drowsy enough to sleep.
Instead, she stared at the back of Aiden’s head as he sprawled on the couch she’d hoped for, his feet carelessly propped up on the coffee table in front of him. Some sports show was on, a ticker at the bottom of the screen giving multiple scores, all of it a jumble of things she didn’t really care about.
She decided to tiptoe back out. He’d never know she’d even been there. She turned and snuck partway down the hall before his voice stopped her. “You need something?”
How had he even known she was there? Also, why was she sneaking away? He’d called her chicken, and she wasn’t exactly disproving the accusation by slinking back to bed like he’d spooked her away. But before she could come up with any kind of logical response, the lights blinked once and then went out entirely.
The hallway was creepily dark, and she just shoved back a squeak.
“Hey, you okay? Looks like the storm knocked out the power.” His voice came from right behind her, just above her right ear, and she jumped in response. “Calm down. It is okay. Just me. You’re not scared of the dark, are you, Chels?”
His hands rubbed up and down her arms in a comforting way, and some weak and girlish part of her wanted to melt into his arms. But he was her boss, and that wasn’t appropriate, so she steeled her spine and nudged her own chin up. His eyes were a glitter in the darkness. “I’m fine. You just startled me is all.”
A flash of lightning had her jolting again and illuminated his sexy face. If he’d looked even a little amused, she thought she might have been able to stomp off to her room in a huff, annoyed with them both. Instead, he looked genuinely concerned, and it put her off balance. It wasn’t often Aiden Kelley looked gentle.
“I need to go check on Waverley, but if you can’t sleep, go into the living room. Light a candle or two. I’ll be back in a minute.” He released her arms and moved past her in the general direction of his daughter’s room.
She didn’t move. For one, she knew better than to hang out alone with him in the dark. She should go to her own room, close the door, and pinch her eyes closed. The storm would likely abate soon, and she was grown up enough to wait it out. Wouldn’t be her first storm on her own, after all.
Another bolt of lightning and crash of thunder, sounding way too close, shattered her attempt at calming herself and made her stare into the night, trying to see. Storms were so much worse when they hit at night, and she couldn’t see what was coming next. Trees whipped back and forth against the only somewhat less black sky. Lightning arced from cloud to cloud in spider-like fingers, chilling her to the bone. Were there tornados in this area? Floods? What if the wind knocked one of those trees into the house?
Fear froze her in place, and she couldn’t even go into the living room as he’d suggested. She hated storms, illogical as the fear might be. They scared the bejesus out of her.
“Gorgeous, isn’t it?” His voice again appeared out of nowhere and startled her. “You’re really jumpy. You don’t like storms?”
She couldn’t answer him, couldn’t admit to the stupid fear, even as her hands were ice and her breath raced out too fast.
“C’mon. I’ll get us a drink, and we can wait it out together. As of now, Waverley and that creature are still asleep, but I want to be around if they wake up.” He sounded so calm, she wished some of it would leech into her. But she could only follow him as he led her by one arm to the living room. Not that the room was an improvement. Floor-to-ceiling windows decorated one wall, stretching high into the cathedral ceiling. They gave a stunning view of the horrible storm, and she gripped the back of the couch, sure they’d both be fried by lightning any second.
So this is how it ends…
He lit a candle and then offered her a tumbler of amber liquid. When she didn’t reach out to take it, he cupped her hand around the glass and said softly, “Here. Sip it. It should help.”
Alcohol sounded like a damn fine idea, so she slung the likely expensive whiskey back in one gulp. Holding the glass out, she ignored his amused smirk a
s he refilled it. She chugged it as well.
“Take it easy. I was hoping to take the edge off, not get you hammered. Better?” He still sounded calm and gentle, but it grated on her nerves a little. Couldn’t he see how bad this storm was?
In a few minutes, maybe the warmth and burn of the booze would return feeling to her numb fingers, but for now, she worked to focus on him instead of the storm churning outside.
She fucking hated storms.
“You going to say anything at all?” he asked.
Yes, actually… “You said you weren’t rich as a kid?”
His smile was confused. “Yeah, why? Sorry, I’m not following your train of thought…”
“Did you ever play in the street? Like, where traffic was? You know, like kickball or whatever, and when cars came, you yelled ‘Pause!’ and got everyone off the street. When it was clear, you called ‘game on?’” Another crash of thunder shook the windows, and she wondered how the kid could sleep through it. She closed her eyes, hoping for strength but only finding more fear. She really just needed to get her mind off it…
“Sure,” he said. “We called ‘pause’ when there were cars until we could play again. Still not following you, though. Do you have a point?”
“You know how I work for you and all that?”
He sighed, and she was close enough to him that his breath ruffled her hair. “Of course.”
“Pause,” she said. Before she could talk herself out of it, she went up on tiptoes and touched her lips to his.
He didn’t move, and she didn’t have the bravery to go further with it. They stood there, frozen, his breath whispering across her cheeks and her lips just barely touching his. Between the heat of his body and that coursing through her veins from her impetuous drinking, some warmth managed to seep back into her, and she felt almost safe for a second.
Then another crash from outside and she shuddered, pinching her eyes closed. He must’ve felt it or taken pity on her, or who knew what his motives were, but his arms closed around her, and his lips slanted across hers. If she’d thought he would bury her fears and distract her, she was right. Nothing mattered outside that moment.
Lazy hunger curled through the kiss, his experience clear in the slow burn of his mouth dragging across hers. His tongue slipped into her mouth, and she twined her arms around his neck to better brace for the sexy torture of his embrace.
She felt the impact of the wall behind her and wasn’t sure if the crash she heard was her system going into overdrive or the sound of the storm. He tasted like sin, and she was starved for more. His hands gripped her hips, and she pressed into his body, thrilling at the sexual tension skating across her flesh like fire.
“Chels,” he whispered, his mouth tracing a path down her neck.
“Game on,” she gasped.
He stilled, backing away to meet her eyes. Another flash illuminated his face. He looked hungry, like he could eat her up in one big bite.
The sight of that look, on his face, made her shiver with want. But he wasn’t for her, and this was a ridiculous idea. She couldn’t play in his league, knew it on a bone-deep level.
Not that she’d been able to resist a taste.
God. At least in two weeks she would tell him good-bye. Then she wouldn’t have to look at his face and be reminded of her moment of weakness. Or how wonderful his mouth had felt against hers.
She ducked under his arm and fled as fast as her legs could carry her, only stopping once her bedroom door separated them. Leaning on it, she bit her lip. Everything in her, down to the last cell, wanted to go back out there, climb him like a tree, and let him take her in whatever depraved fashion he might want to try.
Tomorrow, she’d probably be full of regrets. She’d crossed a line, stupidly. He was her boss.
Somehow, she half wished she could quit now, so she could—
What? Go back to her world while he lived in his, high atop the world in a glass tower of money and power? No, she’d be better off as far away from him as possible, since pursuing anything was an act of masochistic idiocy.
“Impossible,” she whispered. Not that it stopped the craving burning just below her skin.
Chapter Ten
Aiden
He reminded himself he wasn’t the type of man to hit on the help. His parents raised him better than that, and one thing that disgusted him about a lot of his contemporaries was their utter disregard for the feelings of those they considered “beneath” them.
Which just got him to thinking about how much fun they could have if he could get Chelsea beneath him. Or on top of him, her breasts bouncing in time as she rode them both over the cliff of insanity. Whichever, he wasn’t picky.
And, again, that was part of the problem. Chelsea knew him. She just found someone else’s panties in his office. She worked with him on the days when he was on top of his game, and she worked with him on the days when he was low. She’d been his friend, cheerleader, companion, and coworker for years.
Tossing all that out to toss her into a bed? Yeah, he’d worked hard to remind himself it was impossible. That he couldn’t. That he shouldn’t. Shit, part of him still hoped she’d change her mind and not quit at all.
Yet today, he gazed at the back of her head while she tried to convince the cat to walk on a leash and couldn’t stop thinking about just that. Could he just say, “Pause!” and nip her delicate earlobe between his teeth?
No, he couldn’t.
But her mouth last night had been liquid fire under his own. Her body fit his hands in a way he’d never guessed another could. And the little noises she made? Hell, he didn’t remember where they were or care.
He needed to keep his distance. To remind himself she was off limits. That she was leaving soon. Maybe he would’ve pursued something before Waverley, but he needed to focus on what was best for his daughter now. To focus on the things that needed done, not the fact he wanted to do his assistant.
The Grand Canyon spread out before them looking…grand and all. He wasn’t nearly as interested in the striations of rock as his daughter, but he had to admit it was big. “Is it what you’d hoped?” he asked Waverley.
She turned around from her spot atop a rock and stared at him. Her eyes were wide and her expression awed. “I don’t know what I expected. But it is fabulous. Do you know that the Grand Canyon is the only place where you can look back in time like this? Like, thousands of years.”
“No, I didn’t know that. But it is pretty cool.” He didn’t think he could see back in time thousands of years. He could see rock, weathered by time and water, carved into a deep hole. Then again, science never was his favorite subject. He did well in math, and he liked inventing…but rocks kind of all looked the same to him.
Waverley jumped down from her rock and claimed Hematite’s leash and returned to snapping pictures with her phone of the cat and the canyon. Which left Chelsea’s hands empty for all of three seconds before she’d pulled out her own phone and began clicking at it rapidly.
“You’re not working, are you?” he asked.
She glared at him a second before mumbling something that sounded distinctly like, “Well, someone has to. The business won’t run itself, after all, and here we are, trotting around a canyon when the James deal is still new and we have a ton of…”
“I hate it when you mumble,” he reminded her.
Again the glare, but it vanished when he stepped closer to her. With the tips of his fingers, he brushed the hair off her forehead. He didn’t even try to hide the pleasure that had to be evident in his gaze as he watched her catch her breath.
“I’m texting a friend,” she quickly assured him. She also took a step away from him, looking at her phone as if she could ignore his presence with the tiny handheld device.
“Tell them I said hi,” he said, turning back to Waverley. Then again, it didn’t matter where he stood or what he was doing. He was aware of Chelsea in a way he wasn’t sure he’d ever been aware of someone before. And
he was starting to get the feeling that he was going to stay just that aware for a really, really long time.
…
Chelsea
It would help if the man didn’t have an ass she could bounce quarters off of. Then again, she doubted that anyone would dare bounce a quarter or any other denomination of coin money off the ass of a billionaire. He says hi, she texted to Kimmie.
The only thing better than a picture of his ass print on a desk would be a picture of his actual ass, Kimmie answered. You’re staying in the same house. Surely, you can accidentally catch him in the shower. Something. Come on. Help a pal out.
She didn’t dare confess that she’d practically molested her boss during the storm the night before. If she told Kimmie that, she’d go positively rabid for details. So instead, she just answered, I’ll get right on that.
She kept expecting to feel some kind of shame for her behavior the night before, but so far, so good. Instead of feeling embarrassed for kissing her boss after shooting whiskey, she instead was filled with what if kind of questions.
What if she had waited to call game on? What if, instead of going to her room like a—well, he’d said it—chicken, she would’ve stayed? Would his hands have wandered? What if she’d let the moment just spin out…?
No, it was stupid and a practice in futility to even consider possibilities that were, realistically, impossible. If the kiss had affected him—which it hadn’t, clearly—he would’ve acted differently the morning after. And so far, nada. Nothing. Zilch.
They were back to normal Aiden and Chelsea interaction, even to the point that he frustrated her so much that she talked to herself.
Then again, she wasn’t his type. That scrap of lace she’d found in his office? That was the kind of woman in Aiden’s league. She didn’t even own a thong. All of her underwear came in a three or more package. A lot of it had polka dots. She was an executive assistant, not an actress, and surely not a tall, gorgeous model.
And the bra? Ha.
She couldn’t fill one cup of that magenta bra with both of her breasts. Maybe. He liked women who were sexy and stimulating and made him feel powerful. He was a billionaire. A playboy. He had more sex than…
The Irish Prince (The Billionaire Dynasties) Page 7