“Oliver,” I heard the HR director whine, but he quickly shut her down.

“Don’t you have payroll to sort through?”

“Don’t be a dick,” she said angrily. “Besides, your mom is in meetings all day. She hates when you go through her things.”

“I don’t mind waiting. She’ll be in here eventually, and I don’t really care if she doesn’t want me here.” When Dora started to interrupt him again, Oliver heaved a deep sigh and promised her, “I’ll listen to everything you have to say about Finley as soon as I speak to my mother about it.”

Finley. The woman Pen had said my boss looked up frequently on her desktop. I’d managed to do a little research on Finley Scott, but the beautiful brunette who’d probably once shared Oliver’s bed was almost a ghost. All I knew was that she was a year and a half older than him and they’d dated on and off for a number of years. Although I wanted to know more, it had seemed like a waste of time to ask my best friend to do research of her own when she was already doing so much for me.

“Oliver, I don’t think you should—” the HR director began, but then the door slammed, causing my chest to tighten in fear.

Were they gone?

Several seconds passed by, and then, to my horror, I realized I wasn’t alone when I heard footsteps drawing closer to me.

"You can come out." Despite the heavy, betraying thud of my heartbeat, and the ringing in my ears, Oliver's voice—spoken directly to me—was something I couldn't ignore.

"Get your ass out here." This time his smooth voice was low and undeniably dangerous. "I can smell you, Lizzie. You're the only one in this building with that perfume. And it makes me think of..."

Think of what?

What the hell did the Bvlgari scent make him think of?

He was cutting himself off intentionally, baiting me with the unknown, and if not for my gasp for air, he might have given up. But I did breathe. And he took it as an invitation to continue.

"That perfume makes me think of fucking you. Everywhere. Anywhere. Your scent is a distraction, so I'm asking you again: Come out and tell me why the hell you're under there." The sound of his footsteps approaching Margaret’s desk continued. "Or maybe I should just call security to drag you out.”

Holy fucking shit.

Part 2

Expose

verb  \ ik’spōz

Make (something) visible, typically by uncovering it.

“Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free.”

-Jim Morrison

Chapter 8

I pressed my palm against my chest, uselessly trying to calm the erratic beats. The skin beneath my fingers felt hot to the touch. But to my mortification, the fact that Oliver had caught me—and that I might lose what little leeway I’d gained in unraveling my past—didn't seem nearly as monumental as what he had said a moment ago.

That perfume makes me think of fucking you.

I was twisted for focusing on that. Twisted and wrong for wanting more of him. I shifted, the hem of my knee-length gray bodycon dress riding up on my thighs. He rapped his knuckles on Margaret’s desk gently, and I jumped.

"Okay," I whispered breathlessly. “I’ll come!”

He released a ragged breath and then stated in a suggestively low voice, "Well, in that case, stay right where you are, beautiful. I'll come down there, too."

I nearly bumped my head scrambling out, and I wasn't prepared for him to touch me, but his hands hooked under the tops of my arms. Dragging me to him, he pinned me against the side of the desk.

"You're hiding under the desk in my mother’s office.” He stroked his thumb under my chin and tilted my face until his blue eyes penetrated mine. “And I want to know why."

“She’s my boss.” I reached behind me and spread my hands out on the glass, but my arms continued to tremble. That was something that probably wouldn’t stop until Oliver was far, far away from me. “Why else would I have been under there?”

He moved his face closer to mine, and I arched my back, my breasts swelling against his chest as he leaned over me. “That didn’t answer a damn thing,” he murmured, feathering his fingers over the sides of my face. “Should I let you go and make that call down to Carl?”

He had to be teasing, but the tiny hairs on the back of my neck still stood on end. Regardless of whether or not he was threatening to call security just to get a rise out of me, I had to tell him something if I didn’t want him watching me like a hawk for however long I was at Emerson & Taylor.

Think, dammit. Think!

My brain clawed through a dozen excuses, struggling to come up with one that would rapidly get him off my back. When the right one hit me, I almost let out a sob of relief. It was so perfect. And so believable, especially given how every nerve in my body was reacting to him at this very moment.

“I was under her desk—” I stared up at him from beneath my lashes, and his lips thinned into an impatient line. “—because I came in here to grab something for Margaret. And when I ... when I heard you out there with Dora, I thought the worst.”

“You thought the worst?” he repeated, accentuating each word, and I nodded, lying back a little further on the desk. His body followed mine. One of his hands dropped from my face to my back to splay dangerously over the clasps of my bra, and I gasped. “Unless you don’t want to keep making that noise, I’d suggest you explain, Lizzie.”

“I thought you were bringing her in to...” I stopped speaking deliberately, swallowing hard, hating that even though I knew that hadn’t been Oliver’s intention, the thought of him touching another woman’s body like this infuriated me. “I wanted to see for myself whether or not you were involved with Dora.”

The fingers stroking my back stiffened, and I watched as all emotion disappeared from his naturally tanned features. Had he bought it? I held my breath, waiting for him to move. Waiting for him to give me some sort of response. When his face stretched into a smile, I knew that I’d not only sold the bullshit excuse to him, I’d also stroked his ego.

“Oh, Lizzie,” he said, cupping the back of my neck and leaning his forehead against mine, “haven’t you realized? You’re the only one in the office I want to fuck.”

Wow. Self-control. Vanquished.

I wrapped my fingers around the blunt glass edges behind me so I wouldn’t reach up and drag them through his disheveled brown hair. “If your mother finds me in here with you, she’ll fire me,” I warned, butterflies spreading through my belly as he nudged my knees apart with his. I felt the coarse fabric of his pants sliding up between my bare legs, and a second later, his muscled thigh gently grinded against my sex through my lacy underwear.

My core clenching tightly, I tossed a panicked stare at the closed French doors on the other side of the room. “Oliver,” I panted, rubbing against his hard quad, “I can’t do this with you.”

“Don’t worry. You’re not.” Reluctantly, he released me. I lowered my head toward the onyx floor, breathing in deeply to catch my breath while he sat down in Margaret’s chair. His rough voice drifted casually from behind me. “When we do this, there’ll be no inhibitions between us. There will be nothing between us. You will be mine.”

“All that just for one night?” I readjusted my dress and turned to him. From the tiny pinpricks exploding over my skin, no doubt my face was red. “And here I was thinking you wanted a quick lay.”

“All that just because it’s one night,” he corrected. “Never confuse yourself for a quick lay. And there will be nothing quick about us.”