It’s pretty far-fetched, but the timing’s tight. If Daniel’s got a little core of familial operatives in the company . . .
Fury surges from my gut at the thought. Would he really stoop so low? I knew he was going to try to stop me somehow, but I thought he’d be honorable.
“Did Daniel put you up to this? Some off the wall attempt to try to smear me?” I demand. “Because if he did—”
“No!” Elle says bravely, raising her hand. She’s scared, very scared, but in her voice, I hear honesty. She shakes her head vigorously. “He would never! And if he knew I’d done this . . . he’d kill me.”
I open my lips to call her a liar but pause. She’s convincing. Is she right? But why else would she be in my office, carousing like a half-naked tart after a night at the pub?
The sincerity in her body and in her face stays my words.
“Then why?” I ask.
She drops her gaze, her first true yield.
“Have you ever been dared to do something so crazy that you know you should say no, but there’s a fire inside you begging you to do it even though you know it’s ridiculous?” The words are a tumble of syllables across her pursed lips.
I arch an eyebrow, baffled, amused, and intrigued all at once. “A dare? So if someone were to dare you to jump off my balcony into the canyon behind us, Miss Stryker, would you?” I ask.
Normally, I’d be certain I knew the answer to such a ridiculous question. With this woman, I’m not at all sure that she wouldn’t find a way to do it.
“No,” Elle says quietly, her stock rising in my eyes by the word. Playful? Yes. Prone to foolishness? Obviously. But at least she knows how to comport herself when necessary. “Unless you’re talking about base jumping, because then, I might do it. Though I’m scared of heights.” She shrugs like that would mean nothing if she were actually dared.
And her stock skyrockets.
Intelligence and guts, with a side of crazy and planned maneuverings.
Fascinating. And terrifying if this is Daniel’s daughter.
She’s good, which means he’s even better.
“So assuming I believe you, tell me about this dare,” I prompt. I lean back in my chair and close my eyes as if she’s going to tell me a bedtime story, but truthfully, I want to focus on her voice. See if there are any wavers in the lies or falters in the tale.
“My friend, Tiffany, and I work downstairs. We dare each other to do silly things to keep life interesting. Silly stuff, nothing unprofessional on the clock, and weird stuff only in our free time. It’s just a thing we’ve always done. Well, she dared me to talk to you a few times because you’re . . . well, you.”
She pauses, and I crack one eye open to find her looking me up and down. Curious. I note the thick swallow and slight up tilt of her lips as I close my eyes again, waiting for her to resume.
When she stays quiet, I open both eyes.
“So instead of speaking to me, you wallpaper my office with . . .”
I pick up the paper again, and she snarls, “I did speak to you. ‘Good morning, sir,’ and I get a grunt. ‘Nice suit,’ and not so much as a thank you, and I dropped an entire file in front of you once and you virtually stepped over me on your way to the elevator.” It’s an accusation.
How could I have never noticed her? While I admit I’m not much of a morning person, have I really been so wrapped up in my own affairs that I’ve just walked by without seeing Elle? How could I never notice this stunningly beautiful creature?
I’m not unaware of my appeal and am no stranger to women chasing me for my looks or my money.
But the timing is suspect, so very underhandedly dubious.
“So with my unintentional ignorance of your interest, you and your friend decided the next logical step was . . . this?” I flash the image of her own ass her way before turning it back to my view.
“She dared me to ‘make my mark’ in a way of my choosing. Her ideas were crazy.” Her bottom lip disappears behind her teeth for a flash.
“Hers were crazy? Do tell,” I say, interested in what could be construed as crazier than this high-school antic.
With a sigh, Elle ticks off on her hands. “Leave my panties on your desk, leave an ass print on the wood, move everything one inch, and my favorite was drawing a mustache on the self-portrait she was sure you have, but since there wasn’t one, I had to improvise. It didn’t seem right to draw on that picture.”
She points at the picture of a frizzy-haired girl I keep on my desk, a reminder of why I do what I do. “It’s my sister, Elizabeth . . . Lizzie. She’s home in London with my family.”
Elle’s eyes brighten, and I wonder who she thought Lizzie was to me.
I’m starting to believe this crazy story she’s concocted, but I’m not stupid. Just because she might have one reason to do this doesn’t mean she doesn’t have more than one. Or maybe she’s a better liar than she seems to be.
I eye her thoughtfully and she meets my gaze unflinchingly.
I turn away first, forcing myself to think of something other than her sexiness in order to calm my thoughts. I decide to stalk her, like the Wolfe I am, and maybe see if I can use this situation to my advantage. I rise from my chair, pacing about the room and feeling her eyes track my every movement. She thinks she’s watching me, but I’m observing her just as closely.
“Your father is a powerful man,” I say, keeping my voice clipped and level, a schoolmaster at lecture. “So why are you working on the ground floor when I’m sure he could get you a job elsewhere?”
“He offered me one,” Elle answers immediately, more confident than before. “I turned him down. I don’t want any favors.”
There’s something to her tone, a distaste, perhaps, and I wonder if she is as unappreciative of her father’s nepotism as I am.
Perhaps we have that in common—a desire to set our own course and lead our own successes and failures.
“Why not work for another company then?”
Elle smiles serenely, as if she expected the question. “There’s earning my way and then there’s blind stupidity. Fox is the best, I’m the best, and here, I’ll learn to be even better. It worked for my father and it’ll work for me, and best of all, he’ll have a front-row seat to see me succeed.”
Good answer. And in that self-confident smile, I get the sense that there’s something more behind her than a mere mischievous little wood sprite. And something else . . . something more with her father.
I put pieces of the puzzle together. Daniel and his daughter have a good relationship, one where he wants her close by, but she still feels the need to prove herself to him and be independent of his reach. She’s a bit wild and crazy but smart and methodical.
I grin, circling her, and I can sense her anxiety. Her breath catches, and her breasts, which have been lifting up and down in hypnotic, wave-like motions, stop, pressing out even more against her white blouse.
I swear . . . bugger me, but I think her nipples are hard right now. At the thought, my cock twitches. Bloody hell, I need to get laid. And quit staring at the photocopies of her ass.
It’s time to stop this . . . for now. I need a bit of distance to decide how best to proceed here.
“You may leave, Miss Stryker. You’ll hear from me soon.”
Elle gets up to leave but pauses at the door, looking back at me with narrowed eyes. “What are you going to do?” Her suspicion is understandable, even admirable.
I lift an eyebrow. I’ve got so many options in front of me right now. I could fire her, but something is telling me not to. I could tell her father, but I don’t want to do that either.
I could use this to my advantage.
“I don’t know yet. You’ll just have to wait and see.”
Sitting down behind my desk, I pick up the final remaining copy of Elle’s picture, looking at it but not truly seeing it even though it’s gorgeous.
Even though the plain paper shows the generous curvy roundness of her sexy ass spli
t by a swatch of lace, I see her eyes flashing with anger. I see her lips, plumped as she bit them, her nipples, hard against the cotton of her dress shirt, and her cheeks flushed in anger even as she’s the one invading my private sanctuary.
I need to think strategically here, but every thought in my head is clouded. With a growl, I grab the paper and head to my private en suite. Locking the door behind me, I undo my belt and take my cock out. I’m rock hard, already resigned to the inevitability of what I’m about to do.
I grip myself firmly, angry at my own weakness. I grasp the photo, wrinkling the edges beneath my fingertips, and jack myself, up and down fast and hard as I picture her. Ass on my copier, bent over the same machine, sprawled out on the floor with her skirt shoved up around her waist, all tempting visions that tantalize me. I let my eyes trace the skinny strip of lace on the copy paper, wishing I could see just a bit more.
It doesn’t take me long, less than a half dozen strokes to spurt long, thick ropes into the toilet as I grunt my release. I’m careful not to let a single droplet touch Elle’s picture. I don’t want it ruined.
Afterward, I wash my hands and return to my desk. I fold the picture up carefully, tucking it into my coat pocket.
With the edge off, I try to think through the unexpected happenings of today.
Daniel is going to come at this HQ2 fight with both barrels loaded like the strategic, battle-hardened business executive he is. He’s bold, brash, and in your face. Rather like his daughter, I think. But where it is delightfully refreshing and intriguing in Elle, it’s bothersome in Daniel when he’s sitting on the opposite side of the table from me, the obstacle to my getting what I want.
While I’d considered that Daniel was using Elle as a means to get at me, if that’s not the case, perhaps the better option is the reverse? To use Elle as leverage.
The question is how do I use that leverage? I could just expose her, drop a hand grenade on Daniel’s day and reputation and secure the HQ2 project while he’s picking up the pieces.
But that’s not guaranteed, is rather unsportsmanlike in our professional competition of one-upmanship, and more importantly, it’d hurt Elle. I don’t know why, exactly, but I don’t want that.
In fact, I’d fancy seeing her again.
I mean, who wallpapers an executive’s office with copies of their arse on a dare? It’s wild, and I find myself intrigued, even wanting a little bit more of that.
Maybe there’s a better way to leverage Elle Striker—for me, for her, and against Daniel.
Chapter 6
Elle
Dear Universe,
I am SO dead.
Signed,
Elle
I’ve always loved the bedtime story, Little Red Riding Hood. There’s just something so dangerously exciting about the wolf pretending to be nice . . . before revealing he’s anything but.
And that’s exactly how I felt underneath Colton’s gaze as he paced around the room, staring at me like I was a piece of fat, juicy steak. He was the Big Bad Wolfe, and I was Little Red Riding Hood, wondering if he was going to eat me up.
Or eat . . . something else. I couldn’t stop looking at his mouth the whole time. I’ve never reacted that way to any man, but if he’d ordered me to prove it was me in those pictures, my clothes would have hit the floor before he could have said the ‘t’ in skirt.
I’m not usually so wanton, am in fact rather discerning about who lies in my bed, metaphorically speaking, but Colton brings out some sex-hungry goddess in me. And I’m not entirely sure that’s a good thing. Weakness, in any form, is not something I like to experience.
It was frightening, shivering in my seat, withering beneath his gaze, torn between desire and terror, the whole time literally counting the seconds until he exploded, screaming at me for daring to desecrate his office . . . before sending me home with a pink slip.
But he didn’t.
Surprisingly, he was mostly calm, cool, and controlled . . . and oh, so sexy.
And I could’ve sworn when he looked at my ass on that paper, he got excited, his tailor-made dress pants looking extra tight in the front. But I’m not sure if that was just my imagination and wishful thinking.
Whatever the case, my need for adventure and thrills has finally landed me in hot water. Scalding, boiling hot, and I’m both the crazed stalker and the bunny in this ugly scenario.
What was I thinking?
You weren’t, my traitorous brain answers.
For all the blissful buzz successfully completing a dare brings, the failure of one has never felt quite so acutely sharp.
The elevator, never the fastest of machines, seems to take even longer. When it finally dings and lets me out on the ground floor, Tiffany’s already waiting at the doors, almost hopping back and forth in nervous excitement.
“Where have you been?” she whispers urgently. “It’s been over thirty minutes since you went upstairs!”
“Let’s go,” I hiss, pushing her out the door and toward my car in the parking lot. I start Cammie up and gun it for the open road.
I glance in the rearview mirror, admitting to myself that I’m checking for Colton’s blue Lotus. When the road behind us is empty, I quickly relay everything that happened, and Tiffany’s jaw drops open further and further, first with delight and then horror.
“Close your mouth, Tiff, or you’ll go catching flies. Or dicks,” I say, tapping under her chin with my fingertips.
“Please say we’re not fired. I so do not want to be slinging wings down at Hooters or something.”
“Don’t go dry cleaning those orange bootie shorts just yet,” I reply, reminding Tiffany that between her freshman and sophomore years in college, she did ‘sling wings’ for money. “And I think you’re safe, at least. I’m definitely not, though.”
Tiff lets out a long, pent up breath before tugging on my arm. “Well, what happened then?”
Making the turn toward the highway, I shake my head. “I don’t know what happened. He grilled me for a few and then told me to leave. Said I’ll have to wait and see?”
“Wait and see?” Tiff fumes as she roots around in her purse for her omnipresent emergency packet of peanut butter cheese crackers. She’s a stress eater and always has a snack with her just in case the shit hits the fan, which it most definitely has. “What the hell does that mean?” she asks through a spray of orange crumbs.
Tiff offers me one of her crackers, a massive generosity on her part, so I take it, even though my stomach’s too tied up in knots to really want food right now. “I don’t know, but I don’t like it. I think he’s going to fire me, but I think he wants to fuck with my head some before he does. Honestly, I think I’m gonna be the one wearing orange shorts! Worse than that, though, Dad’s gonna kill me!”
Tiffany stews for a second, her brain working through everything I’ve just told her as I take the exit for her apartment. “Okay, calm down, chica,” Tiffany says, suddenly relaxing and waving away my worry. My hands tighten on the wheel in response, doing the opposite of what she says.
“I think this is actually a good sign. If he was going to fire you, he would’ve done so already. He would’ve called security and HR immediately and done it all right then, escorting you out in a blaze of shame and glory. That he didn’t do that probably means that he’s not going to. The question is . . . what is he going to do?”
Tiffany casually pops a peanut butter and cheese cracker sandwich in her mouth and munches loudly, swigging from her water bottle to make sure she doesn’t have any orange flecks on her teeth. “He’s a cocky, arrogant bastard who has you dead to rights. How’s he going to use that?”
One does not disrespect Colton Wolfe like I did and get away with it, it appears.
Which means he’s up to something, and it must be worse than getting fired. It just scares me what it could be, especially considering how interested he was in the fact that I’m Daniel Stryker’s daughter.
I drop Tiffany off with a promise to let he
r know if anything happens to change things. As she goes inside, I hear her loud voice. “Ace, did you even move off the couch today?”
I cringe, thinking that she’s got her own drama to deal with. Maybe she should give those orange shorts to Ace? I think I heard about a male version of Hooters once? Tallywackers, it was called, I think. Dad bods are all the rage, so maybe Ace could work there and do a little wing slinging of his own, far away from Tiffany’s screeching.
The next day dawns bright and sunny, the antithesis of my mood. Sophie must’ve stayed away from my tossing and turning self, so at least I wake up without a hairball today. It’s the only bright spot in my grumpiness.
Work brings coffee in quantities so massive that I’m running to pee every hour on the hour, which pisses Miranda off royally.
After lunch, she blows through and reminds Tiffany and me, “Back to work, girls.” Like we weren’t already busy, me with a copy job and Tiffany with the phone to her ear.
The afternoon drags out. Once the mailman comes by at two o’clock like he normally does and we prep the day’s FedEx shipment for Arnold, there’s precious little to do until five.
The boredom makes my nervousness even worse, because every time I hear the elevator ding or my phone beep with an internal call, I swear it’s HR with a pink slip and a reminder to leave my parking lot access card on my desk when I go.
At about four o’clock, I see Betty Roberts, one of the HR supervisors, emerge from the elevator and my heart stops in my throat. Oh, God, they picked now.
“Hey, Tiffany?” Betty says, pulling out a piece of paper. Tiffany, who’s playing this a lot cooler than I am, looks up. “Hey, we just got a call from the healthcare provider. Said they need to confirm your data, so could you fill this out for me, please?”
That little scare is nothing, though, when Ricky comes down forty-five minutes later. I’ve got my back turned to him, so when his hand claps down on my shoulder, I nearly jump over the reception desk in fear. “What the . . . Ricky!”
The Dare Page 6