He wanted to see her outside of work. He wanted more. He wanted more than one incredible night. There was no doubt in his mind. One taste was not enough. Not nearly enough. He needed a shower. A cold one.
* * *
Scarlet stood by her car with tears in her eyes. The word scratched into the shiny black duco couldn’t have pained her more if it had been etched into her skin. And somewhere deep inside her, it was. The echo of Geoffrey’s accusation in the small, enclosed cavity rang in her ears. What was it about the Radcliff family? She’d behaved impeccably for a decade and after one day—one day—in Tony’s company, she’d ignored the rules that had kept her safe and allowed herself one night—one night—of freedom. She eyed the word. It hadn’t felt that way. It had felt… special. They’d communicated at a deeper level. Connected at a deeper level. She felt like she’d known him for years. He was fresh air to the stale her life had become. She was twenty-nine years old. Old enough to have a physical relationship with a man if it felt right. She wasn’t a gullible nineteen-year-old anymore. She’d made the decision to be with Tony. She’d decided to have sex. They’d had sex on her terms. No stolen kisses in the dark of an enclosed space. Kisses in the open air. Kisses on the beach. And more. Much more.
That’s rubbish. You know his type. You’re deluded if you think there was more to it than sex. And what if someone had seen them?
Not possible. Not likely.
Breathe.
In.
Breathe.
Out.
She would deal with this. She googled her local panel beater and booked her car in for the next day, but to drive home with that on her door and her bonnet for all to see? She felt branded all over again. Like she needed to wash and wash, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get the stain off her skin.
She eyed the small tattoo. She hadn’t been pissed and she hadn’t been stupid. She’d kept her vow to herself. It’s okay. It’s fine. Let’s get to work.
* * *
Scarlet lowered her coffee cup to her desk and eyed the teetering stack of files. Why did it all seem suddenly insurmountable? Like no matter how hard she worked, there was always more. Endlessly more. She booted the computer, put in her password and waited for the home screen to appear. Sipping her coffee, she opened her electronic diary and ran through the day ahead. The day ahead was like every other day… full. Over-full.
“Hi there. Are you okay?”
Scarlet looked up and Tony was there, his eyes as blue as the sky or the ocean. Crystal clear. Pristine. His charcoal suit fitted him to perfection and her body heated. He wore a soft blue shirt and her hands itched and prickled with memories of the hard curve of his pecs, his broad shoulders, the light dusting of fine blond hair over his tanned chest. His man-nipples tightened and strained against the fabric and her body heated and liquefied. She eyed his tie—navy with fine purple stripes—and yearned to pull him close with it, to press her lips against the heat of his. Her mouth dried. Her tongue felt thick and awkward. She fought to swallow against the sand in her throat. “Yeah, fine. Thanks...” She lifted her gaze to his eyes and gulped. “…for asking.”
“Any news from Bob?”
His gaze was loud with the words he had no hope of saying in an office of law with an open door and her body reacted. She squirmed in her seat. “None. Yet.”
“Can I see you later? We need to talk.”
“Of course. Okay.” A thousand needle pricks punctured her skin.
“Great.” He gave her a wink and closed the door.
Scarlet sat and stared at her schedule for a long moment. Her body swarmed with unwanted sensations and emotions and the words swam in front of her eyes until they crystallised and came into focus and she realised she had a mention in how long? Fifteen minutes! She rummaged through the files, found the right matter and opened it up. Her reading comprehension was exceptional—usually—but she found herself visualising a beach and moonlight and a naked man with a polished, statuesque body, only he wasn’t cold or made of stone and she was wrapped around him like seaweed.
Snap out of it, Scarlet. Get it together. Work. Focus.
She forced herself to read the words, to make her notes and then she realised she was late. She was never late. She rushed to the stairwell, then realised she didn’t have time to walk eighteen flights. She retraced her steps and stood in front of the lift. The doors opened and she schooled her breath. You can do this. She stepped forward and just as the doors were about to close, a hand and an arm pushed in. She yelped, her heart staccato-thrashing against her ribs.
“Almost missed it.” Tony. Tony’s voice.
Her heart banged a different kind of percussion. The doors closed and she stood there with her back against the wall. Alone. With a man. In a lift. Panic rose from somewhere deep in her belly and her vision blurred. “Please don’t press the stop button.” Her words were a hiss or a whisper. A frantic hiss or a whisper. But his gaze said he knew how she felt. He knew what pounded inside her. He took her in his arms.
“It’s okay, Scarlet. You’re safe. I would never hurt you. Ever. I wanted to tell you how much being with you last night meant to me. And that word scratched into your car? I would never think of you like that. Ever. It wasn’t like that.”
“What… was it like?”
“Amazing. Special.”
“For me, too.” She must have smiled because he smiled too. He cupped her face in his hands and settled his lips on hers. She closed her eyes and that small enclosed cavity opened and spread. The night sky shone above them. Vast. Endless. Spacious. And a part of her—that tightly wound, eyes-scrunched part of her—relaxed just a smidge. His tongue tasted and soothed and it relaxed a bit more. He dragged her closer, file and all, and she eased into him, her body like heated syrup.
“You have courage, honey.”
“I do,” she said, her mouth a hair’s breadth from his. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He stepped back and winked as the lift doors opened and the cool air of the foyer rushed in. “See you when you get back.”
She smiled. The doors closed and took him back to level eighteen and she walked with light steps towards the county court on William Street. She enjoyed the breath of the wind and the touch of the sun where it penetrated the densely packed buildings and shone on the footpath. She was still light-hearted when she returned an hour later. She put her hand on the door handle to the stairwell and changed her mind. She’d take the lift. Her butt wouldn’t thank her, but her tightly packed schedule would.
It was when she checked her emails several minutes later that an odd subject line caught her eye. The matter of S. L. v U. T. What was it? Her stomach clenched and she broke out in a cold sweat. Her hand shook as she manoeuvred the mouse and clicked on the item in her inbox.
Photos stared back at her. Photos of two people, wet and naked in the ocean. Two people in a very compromising position. A close-up of their bodies joined, ecstasy and pain on her face. Ecstasy and pain on Tony’s. Below the photos was a warning. Back off, slut. I want your resignation on Daniel Wigmore’s desk by ten o’clock tomorrow morning or this email will be forwarded to each and every one of the equity partners and your career is history. Done. No firm will want you. You’re a liability. A slut. No man is safe around you.
Scarlet’s stomach heaved and she near choked on her tongue. She jumped back from her desk as if a python had slid out of her monitor and spat poison. Who could have done this? No one but Tony knew. Was this part of an ugly plot to get rid of her? Did he want the position that badly? But he couldn’t have known they’d end up together and these were bad for his career, too. Besides, he couldn’t have predicted what had happened. He’d promised nothing would happen. It had been her decision to take it further. Hadn’t it? Or had he used reverse psychology to get what he wanted? Was she such a fool that she’d fallen for it? She rewound the events of the night before. None of it made sense. The photos were real enough. She stepped closer to the monitor
, her movements slow as if to move quickly would aggravate the beast. Who had sent them?
She eyed the sender address. It was a generic one. Nothing specific. Nothing to give away the identity of the sender. Probably sent from a local library or internet café. Whoever had sent them was smart enough to cover their tracks. The bastard was no doubt responsible for the damage to her car as well.
She fumed, storming from one end of her office to the other. What now? What should she do? There was no way she would allow herself to be blackmailed. No way she would give whoever it was that kind of power over her. She didn’t know if Tony was involved, but he was certainly the main beneficiary if she resigned and that spoke volumes.
If it wasn’t Tony, it had to be Geoffrey. The guy hated her. Blamed her for his own weakness and the destruction of his family. Never mind that he had been a partner holding all of the cards and she’d been a lowly receptionist, so fresh and new to the business she’d had no clue that low-lives like him existed. Well, she’d learned and she’d fought and she’d won. There was no way she’d allow him to push her down now.
She pictured him the day before, his face twisted with hatred. This wasn’t a coincidence. He was a spoilt brat who couldn’t see he’d created his own destiny. The question was whether Geoffrey had gone rogue or if Tony had been privy to the plot.
Had Geoffrey followed them?
He could have.
Why? Because he didn’t want Tony succeeding where he’d failed? Well, boo hoo Mr. Big Shot. Tony was a hundred times the man Geoffrey was. A thousand times. Unless he’d known. Unless they’d concocted the plot together. Kill two birds with one stone? Revenge and clear the way to the partnership position Tony wanted so badly. But, his father was dead. There was no need to impress him anymore. Or perhaps that hadn’t been true either. Perhaps that had been a sob-story to weaken her. Was his father even dead?
She didn’t know. The light at the periphery of her vision became watery and flashy and pain stabbed in her temple. Her stomach shifted and adrenaline raced. She hadn’t had a migraine since her early twenties, but she’d suffered badly from them when she was younger. She reached into her drawer for paracetamol, picked up her phone and called her legal assistant. “Trace, I’ve got the mother of all migraines brewing. Could you come in and go through my diary. Put out the fires. Postpone what you can.”
She eyed the photos on her screen and took out a USB drive. She saved a copy of the email and the photos onto it before she deleted them from her computer. She didn’t want anyone to find them. Dark spots floated like ghouls in her vision. She could hardly drive like this. She picked up her phone and texted for an Uber-driver to pick her up.
Throwing her bag over her shoulder, she stepped from her office, her vision swimming, her focus on getting the hell home.
“Scarlet.”
Tony’s voice came to her from the distance, but near-blinded, she pushed towards the lift. Thunderous waves thudded in her head. “Migraine,” she muttered. “Going home.”
“I’ll take you.”
“No need. I ordered an Uber.”
“I’ll come around later and check that you’re okay.”
“I’m okay.”
“You don’t look okay. You look grey. Pale.”
“Feel sick.”
He took her arm and directed her into the lift. “What happened? You were fine.”
“Mmm.” She closed her eyes and leaned against the mirrored wall. Her head throbbed and felt like it had split down the middle. The right side of her face felt numb. Her arm, too.
Tony settled her in the car and asked the driver to call him when she was safely home.
* * *
When Scarlet opened her eyes the next morning and eyed the time, she saw it was after seven. She was late. Two mornings in one week? She sat upright and her head spun from the jerking movement. She waited for the awful sensation to steady and subside. She’d thrown up before she’d retreated into sleep—a deep, dark sleep—and she needed a shower. She padded to the bathroom and stood under the hot spray for a good while, shampooing her hair and washing away the faint scent of sickness. She smoothed conditioner over it and used an exfoliating mitt to soap herself while she waited the obligatory sixty seconds before washing it out. Every wipe of the mitt brought a wave of memories. Of lathering up with Tony. Of touching and smoothing her hands over his incredible body. And it was then, when her mind turned to the ocean, that she remembered. Her hand stilled. Her blood ran cold. Her mind rushed to the time. Under three hours. She had under three hours to work out what to do. The thought of her boss seeing the photos rubbed against her skin like sandpaper and her stomach heaved.
She should tell Tony. Show him the email. Confront him.
How could she trust him? He might pretend he knew nothing about it or worse, come to her rescue and she’d assume he was on her side… when maybe he wasn’t. She cringed as she fought the shame. She wasn’t a gullible nineteen-year-old anymore. Where could a relationship with Tony go anyway? He wanted the position she wanted. And imagine Christmas lunch. Family events. She’d have to face Geoffrey over the dinner table and pretend she was fine with it when she wasn’t fine with it. She wasn’t fine with the hatred in his eyes or the suggestion that she’d seduced him, when in truth, he’d preyed upon her. She wasn’t fine with the shame. She could hardly have ignored her boss and told him to piss off. It was her first full-time job. She’d worked hard to get it. She was good at it. Why should she have given it up because her boss was a jerk? As it turned out, she’d had to give it up anyway.
“Are you planning to stay in there all day?”
Her heart near bounced off the ceiling. “Jesus, Radcliff. Is that you?”
“You let me in. Last night. I didn’t want you to be alone.”
“In the shower?”
She heard him chuckle. “How are you feeling? Last time I saw you, you looked like death. You slept like the dead, too.”
“I didn’t remember. I’m a lot better this morning.”
“I’ve made you some eggs on toast. A green smoothie.”
Tears mingled with the droplets of water from the shower. “Coffee?”
“And coffee.” She could swear she heard a smile in his tone.
“Can you pass me my towel?”
“I’ve seen you naked, honey.”
“Not today you haven’t, Radcliff.”
He placed the towel in her waiting hand and she pulled it behind the smoked glass door. He’d brought fire and brimstone into her life. Or maybe he’d just stirred the embers.
“See you when you’re ready.”
“Give me five minutes.”
* * *
“There you are.” Tony moved fluidly around her French provincial-style kitchen sliding poached eggs onto toast slathered with avocado. He glanced up from his work and assessed her. “You still look pale. Are you okay?”
“I’m not great.”
He pushed coffee towards her and it was hard to hate him. He was a victim here, too. He just didn’t know it…or maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t care. Maybe she had more to lose than he did. She settled herself on one of the stools at her grey and white calacatta marble island bench. He’d found her coffee machine and the scent of freshly brewed coffee rose rich and full.
“Are you well enough to go in to work? I’m meeting with my brother to get dad’s funeral sorted today so I won’t be in.”
“What time’s your meeting?” The word brought a wave of nausea to her stomach and the fight drained out of her. She didn’t want to show the photos to her managing partner. She didn’t want her reputation ruined… again. She didn’t want to feel shamed… again. She couldn’t face it. She didn’t want to. She didn’t have to. She could resign.
“Eleven.”
“I will go in.” She toyed with her food and watched him devour his share. She could get a job elsewhere. Maybe. If Geoffrey didn’t sabotage her. It would set her timeframe back. Who knew when she’d make partner? U
nlike Tony, her name wasn’t enough to push her way in and mess with the pecking order. She’d have to earn her stripes all over again. Long hours. No weekends off. She’d seen light at the end of the tunnel. Now, she felt exhausted. Overwhelmed. Defeated.
“Here. Try the smoothie. Your body needs hydration. Protein, too.”
“What do you care? Why are you here?”
“I thought that was obvious.”
The revolt of her thoughts collided with the warmth in his eyes. “There’s no need. It was one night. I’m a big girl, Radcliff. You’re off the hook.”
“There’s no hook. I’m here because I want to be. We made love, O’Connor. We’re not done yet.”
“We’re more than done.”
He stepped around the bench and spun her stool until she fitted between his thighs. He took her face in his hands and her heart along with it, his blue, blue gaze blazing. He closed the distance between them and her body wept. Wet. Ready. Hungry. His mouth settled on hers and she fought the magic even as she sank into his kiss. Even as she felt those waves buffeting her body. Even as his arms wrapped around her and her heart sighed along with his.
“We’re not done,” he repeated, his mouth lifting from hers, his gaze steady.
“Tell Geoffrey that when you see him.” Her insides squeezed with a different kind of emotion and she pushed Tony back, turning to eat the breakfast he’d made for her.
Seduction in a Suit: An Office Romance Collection Page 119