by Amelia Wilde
“I’m sure that could be arranged.”
Vivienne laughs, the sound uncertain. “I’m not—you’re not firing me right now, before I even start, are you?”
“This is a place of important business matters,” I say, eyeing the spilled pastries. “But I think we can let this one slide.”
Let this one slide? Who the hell am I right now?
“Thanks.” Vivienne’s smile is small, tentative, and then she squares her shoulders again. “I should—I should go in.”
I offer her my arm. “Let me at least get you to the elevators in one piece.”
Her eyes go from me to the box of doughnuts, and then she shrugs, turning the box on its side and tucking it under her arm like a briefcase. “They've already been dropped once.” Then she slips her hand into the crook of my arm. At her touch, I feel a jolt pass through my entire body that warms me.
Three wobbling steps and we’re inside the expansive lobby. Vivienne takes it in—the three-story atrium, the wide marble staircase leading to a second-floor restaurant, glassed-in elevators. “Wow.”
“Welcome to Wilder Enterprises,” I tell her. Even though the words are on the tip of my tongue, I stop myself from spilling out, Don’t ever leave.
3
Vivienne
Dominic does exactly what he says he’s going to do—he gets me to the elevator, wishes me good luck on my first day, and is gone before the doors slide closed.
I have ten floors to get my heart back under control.
Dominic is not the kind of man I typically go for. The kind of man I go for—when I have time, which is not that often, not in this line of work—is gentle, sensitive, and…
Boring.
It’s like a shock when the word comes to me, like cold water trickling down my back. But that’s not right. They haven’t been boring, exactly…
I give my head a little shake, trying to clear the thoughts from my mind. Thankfully the elevator doesn’t make any more stops, and by the time the doors open on the tenth floor, I’ve almost managed to make myself forget his blue eyes, clear like tropical water, the strong, sexy cut of his jaw, covered with stubble that looks meticulously maintained and rugged at the same time, the way his expensive custom-designed suit moved with a body that I’m absolutely positive is powerfully muscled and chiseled like his jaw. I had to pretend to be disgusted at his comment, pretend it offended me. I’ll never be able to admit that the sound of his husky voice sent tremors of desire pivoting to my core.
I’ve almost forgotten.
Almost.
There’s a little reception area immediately off the elevator, and I step toward the desk, taking in a deep breath to steady myself.
The woman sitting behind the desk looks me up and down, and a wave of dark hair cascades over my face. The jolt I got when I put my hand in the crook of Dominic Wilder’s arm rendered me pretty much senseless on the elevator ride, and now I feel like a living fun-house mirror. My hair must be a mess from the rain, and I’ve got an enormous half-empty box of doughnuts tucked under my arm. I’m carrying my heels in my other hand. And—shit—there’s got to be jelly filling staining my white shirt. About the only thing I did was to undo the raincoat, which has left my disheveled appearance entirely exposed to the woman behind the desk, who looks like she stepped off a runway at New York Fashion Week.
This is not the way I was hoping to start my time here. Not at all.
I stand up as straight as I can, trying to will away the color from my cheeks. “I’m Vivienne Davis,” I say, my voice sounding a hundred times more confident than I feel. Play the part, Viv. No other choice now. “It’s my first day.”
She raises her eyebrows, and I can practically hear what she’s thinking. It’s your first day, and you couldn’t even come in with a clean blouse? But when she answers, her voice is cool and professional, even helpful. “Why don’t I show you to the restroom before I take you back to meet Ms. Lillianfield?”
This receptionist might be a judgmental bitch, but at least she keeps it mostly to herself. I can’t help but feel grateful. “That would be great.”
She rises gracefully from the chair and holds out her hands. “I can take that, if you’d like.”
“They’re for everyone to share,” I say as I awkwardly shuffle the box into a more normal position and place it into her hands. “There used to be more, but I fell on the sidewalk, and then there was a car—” What the hell is happening to me? I never babble like this, and I shut my mouth before Ms. Runway Receptionist actually rolls her eyes. She slides the box onto the surface of her desk and comes around to where I’m standing, cocking her head to one side.
“The restroom is this way.” Of course, her outfit is also flawless—a navy skirt suit with a champagne-colored shell underneath, matching stilettos, and a delicate silver necklace that hangs gently around her perfect neck—and I look like a clown.
She steps away, leading me to one side of the reception area and down a discreet hallway, one tall door on either side. We’re almost to the door when she says, over her shoulder, “I’m Portia, by the way. Welcome to Wilder Enterprises.”
“Thank you. It’s nice to meet you.”
She nods like she’s a queen, and naturally it’s nice to meet her, and then she pauses in front of one of the doors. “The restroom is in here. I’ll be back at my desk when you’re ready.”
Five minutes later, I emerge with at least some of the jelly doughnut remnants dabbed away from my shirt, my hair in some semblance of order, and looking a little bit less like a ragamuffin. My knee still throbs painfully from where I smashed into the concrete—my pantyhose are ruined—but at least I’m not actively bleeding. I’ve also broken off the other heel by wrenching it clean off the shoe. My heels are now flats, but at least they’re the same height.
Portia gives a little nod of approval, and I’m almost overcome by the urge to tell her that I’m an undercover agent, damn it, and I far outrank her. But I smile when she says, “Ms. Lillianfield is ready for you,” and follow her back past some groupings of cubicles to a glassed-in office where a woman with black hair scraped tightly into a bun at the nape of her neck frowns at me from where she’s sitting behind her desk, her back straight and her expression stern. Portia is gone before I know it.
“Ms. Davis,” she says, standing up and extending her hand. I give it a confident shake as her eyes travel down the length of my shirt. It’s not like I could get all the jelly filling off, and she clearly notices it. “I take it you had some difficulties this morning.”
I smile and shake my head, trying to project an aura of assurance even though I’m off-balance, even though the memories of meeting Dominic Wilder are somehow still throwing me for a loop. “A little. I brought in doughnuts for everyone, but some of them became casualties of the weather when I had an…um…accident on the sidewalk.”
Ms. Lillianfield frowns. “How nice of you.” Her tone says anything but.
Okay—time to move on from the small talk, because clearly she’s not going to be won over by my natural charm. “I’m very excited to get started.” I resist the urge to cover up the jelly stain on my shirt with my hands, resist the urge to turn around and walk back out of here and tell my superior that this job is a disaster already and that nothing is going according to plan.
I’m going to see this through if it’s the last thing I do. I am not going to lose my standing in the department over a few lost doughnuts and a banged-up knee. I’m not even going to lose it over a chance encounter with the owner of the company. It’s not like I’ll be seeing him much while I’m here, a thought that gives me an unexpected pang of disappointment.
“Of course.” Ms. Lillianfield gestures toward the door. “I’ll show you to your desk, and Marie can help you get up to speed.”
I get my very own cubicle, and Ms. Lillianfield gives me a cursory rundown of the computer system, the items in the supply cabinet on the other side of the space, and the hours I’m supposed to be here—in a
shocking twist, it’s from nine to five—and then she turns and goes back to her office with a sniff.
I can hardly help letting my shoulders sag the second she’s gone, but the relief only lasts a moment.
“Oh, my God, it’s you!” The chirping voice belongs to a red-headed woman poking her head around the side of the next cubicle, and my gut goes cold. Is my cover already blown?
“It’s me,” I say lamely, covering it with a laugh. “Wait—do we know each other?”
“I’m Marie!” Her brown eyes dance with delight. “I saw you downstairs. You’re the new girl?”
“Ha—yes.” Oh, thank God.
But Marie isn’t done. “I saw you with Mr. Wilder.” Her voice is low, confidential, bursting with curiosity. “How did you pull that off?”
My entire body goes hot at the thought of him, of his eyes on me, of his hands on me. “My name’s Vivienne,” I say, giving her a pointed look and a little grin.
She covers her mouth with both hands. “I’m so sorry. I’m—” Marie fans herself. “Let’s get started, okay? You can tell me about Mr. Wilder later.”
She launches into an energetic tour of the scheduling system we’re going to use to assist the executives, and I follow along, my heart beating hard in my chest.
Forget him, I tell myself.
No. No. No, beats my heart.
4
Dominic
Vivienne Davis is the last thing I need right now.
I don’t need any distractions. I definitely don’t need any women hijacking my brain, burning into my consciousness, and making my cock harder than steel and causing a tent pole in my pants. That kind of shit doesn’t end well for anyone, if my father is any indication. It might not have been my mother who distracted him into losing everything, but after that embarrassment—after she died—
I wanted to push her into the elevator and hit the emergency stop button, trapping us between floors long enough for me to take off her absurd raincoat, lick whatever sweetness is left from the pastry explosion off her neck, and then, when she’s panting breathlessly in my arms, let the elevator continue up past the eighth floor Executive Support department all the way up to the top floor, where I keep a private apartment for emergency purposes, like if I don’t feel like calling for a driver to go back to my penthouse on the Upper East Side, or one of my friends needs a place to crash…none of that shit matters. What matters is that there’s a bed up there, comfortable as hell, and I’d like to spread her out on it.
But I don’t do any of that.
I escort her coolly to the elevator, letting her look all around at the elegant lobby of the building for a few moments, and then I turn and walk away the second she steps into the elevator.
One more moment of looking at her and God knows what would have happened.
The side effects are inconvenient enough as it is. Around the corner from the regular elevator is a private elevator exclusively for my use. Wilder Enterprises isn’t the only company in the building—there’s no way, with the level of intelligence flashing in her eyes, that she couldn’t figure that out by herself—-but I didn’t mention that I own the entire space.
The private ride up to my office suite gives me enough time to adjust my erection.
I don’t have time to think about her—I need to focus on the upcoming meeting, which is scheduled to begin in ten minutes. I need status reports from everyone at the executive level, and I’m not willing to wait.
I let out my breath on a deep exhale. They were probably looking forward to the fact that I was going to be out of the office for the next three weeks, but I’m not at all sorry about ruining that for them.
I was supposed to be on vacation—my first real vacation since I took over the shattered remnants of Wilder Enterprises more than six years ago. In those days, they snickered behind my back. I know the kinds of things they said about me. Any son of Peyton Wilder is already a failure. He’s too young and stupid to manage a corporation of this size, with stakes this high. “These stakes” did prove to be a challenge—government contracts for cutting-edge energy technology, for one, and complicated relationships with a number of suppliers and partners around the world—but I gritted my teeth and pushed away everything else to repair the company.
And repair it I did.
No thanks to my father.
I push Vivienne Davis out of my mind, burying her as deep as I can.
Focus.
I was supposed to be on vacation, and I couldn’t hack it. Three days in, I ordered that my private plane be prepared to take me back home. The property in the British Virgin Islands is nice enough, but it turns out that if you work for six straight years, there’s not much waiting for you when you decide to take a break.
Not that I need anyone.
I don’t.
Wilder Enterprises is more than enough of a companion for me.
But two days of sailing, two days of sitting in the shade on the back porch watching the ocean sparkle for miles, was enough to make my skin itch, and I needed to get back to work. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was all slipping out of my hands.
So I canceled the three-week hiatus from the office and came back.
To find Vivienne Wilder kneeling on the sidewalk in front of my building.
I clear my throat, even though there’s nobody in the elevator to hear me, and wrench my thoughts away from her.
She’s another woman working at my company. That’s all. Nothing more.
The elevator lets out a soft tone and the doors slide open to reveal a carpeted hallway leading into the study off the main room of my office. The carpet muffles the sound of my footsteps. The closer I get to the office, the taller I stand. When I pull open the door again, I’m back to being the Dominic Wilder who rules meetings with an iron fist, the Dominic Wilder who nobody would ever dare snicker at again—not if they wanted to keep their jobs, which they all desperately do. The men and women on my executive team are paid handsomely. They don’t want to lose all the benefits that Wilder Enterprises offers.
My personal secretary, Emily, is setting a tray down on the mahogany expanse of my desk when I open the door. She looks up at me with an even smile. “Welcome back, Mr. Wilder.”
“Thanks, Emily. Is everything in place for the meeting?”
“Yes, of course. The beverage selection is out—would you like me to call down for any other refreshments?” Emily is blonde, and she has a pleasantly round face that never lets anything show, and her poker-face is part of why I chose her to be my secretary. Everyone who represents me needs to have a good grasp on what they show to the world, and she does.
She happens to be the opposite of Vivienne Wilder.
Her name flashing across my mind again is followed by a spike of irritation. I cannot lose control of myself because of a chance meeting with some woman I’ll likely never see again.
But I could, because she’s down on the eighth floor, walking around right now with those emerald green eyes, that soft voice…
“No. No other refreshments.”
Emily gives a nod and goes back out the door to the reception area, and I sit down in the executive chair behind my desk—top of the line and meant to be imposing—and survey the tray.
She’s brought sparkling water and a bagel, meticulously spread with a thin layer of cream cheese, how I prefer. I sip the water, but I can’t bring myself to eat. All of my muscles are tensed, on edge.
I stand up and stroll over to the window with its view of Manhattan, obscured by the storm that’s still thundering through the city, filtering everything in shades of dark and darker, and wait for my mind to quiet itself.
It might be shitty outside, but down on the eighth floor, there’s a bright pink box of pastries and a woman with vivid green eyes, flashes of color to drown out the dreariness of the rain.
5
Vivienne
After my disastrous first day, I don’t have much time to dwell on Dominic Wilder—Dominic Wilder, the
smoldering hot billionaire whose eyes lit my nerves and senses on fire—while I’m at the office.
For two reasons.
For one, the team at headquarters doesn’t think he’s involved in the transfer of information from his corporation to unfavorables in China. My supervisor, Milton Jeffries, specifically asked me not to concentrate my efforts above the executive level. As far as I can tell, Dominic is the only person that high up in this company. Of course, they couldn’t give me—or anyone else at the FBI—any guarantees, which is why I’m here undercover and not as part of a cooperative effort with Wilder Enterprises. It’s unorthodox for sure, but if it turns out he is involved, that’s above my pay grade.
Secondly, there’s barely enough time in the day for me to win back all the respect I lost by walking in here with a jelly doughnut smeared on my shirt. It’s a fine line. I can’t be too much of a standout, because once I’m done with this job, I want to fade out of people’s minds, leaving me free to pursue other cases. But I need to be perceived as trustworthy so that I can move up the ranks, at least a little, and gain access to the kinds of information that will tell me what I need to know.
What that information is, I’m not sure yet.
But I throw myself into my job, which is like being on an entire team of secretaries. For the first two weeks, they book me solid with the kind of minutiae that I can tell usually goes to the greenest people on staff. I double-check itineraries for executives traveling to various events and conferences and meetings around the globe. I file expense paperwork. I double-check the expense paperwork that other people file. And then I refile it.
Two weeks and one day after I start at Wilder Enterprises, I’m double-checking more double-checked expense filings, really getting into the flow, half starting to wonder if being in Executive Support is my true calling in life instead of working for the FBI, when Ms. Lillianfield’s terse voice breaks into my thoughts.