“Come ’ere.”
“Who are you talking to? I’m not here, remember, crazy man?”
The casters of his chair squeak softly as he remains seated and rolls over to me, grabs my wrists, and tugs me down until I fall into his lap, straddling him.
He peers up at me, all seductive and coy, and I smile as the haze lifts and his dark hair and blue eyes come into view. A beam of sunlight chooses this exact moment to shine through the massive window behind his desk, illuminating the curly tips of his lashes. Even the universe is conspiring against me to make this man shine. What hope do I have?
“Hi.”
I offer the world’s coolest “hi” back.
“Thanks for the coffee.”
“You’re welcome.”
“It’s good to see you.”
“It’s…okay to see you.”
He runs his hands up and down my back. “Did you miss me?”
“You were gone?”
He laughs. “Fuck off.”
“How are Wagner and Sammy feeling?”
“Sammy’s almost back to his usual boisterous self. Wagner, being old, is taking longer to recover.”
“Glad they’re feeling better.”
“So am I. Means I get to come back here.”
“There’s a downside to everything.”
“Hm.” Maverick spreads his legs apart, and since I’m perched on them, my legs go with him. “I wouldn’t exactly call this a downside. Let me read the note.”
He lifts his hand to snag it from me, but I snatch it away at the last minute. I grin, thinking I’ve won, until his hands land firmly on the globes of my ass, and he pulls my cheeks apart. A thrill zips through my body, and my face burns. Maverick has a unique way of being able to alternate between being sweet and filthy, and it really turns me on.
“My hands seem to be full. Show me what you wrote,” he says, firming up his grip on my ass.
My heart roars in my ears as I slowly lift the note to his face.
“I may have missed you…a little,” he reads out, his sapphire eyes glimmering, two rows of perfectly white teeth on full display. “Aw, Jaxi.”
“Don’t call me that.” I mean to poke him in the chest, but for some reason, my palm lands flat against his pec and then sort of just stays there, content to absorb the warmth of his skin through the material of his designer shirt. “I don’t like it.”
“All right. I won’t call you that again. Thank you for being honest with me.”
I try to brush off the way he emphasizes the word “honest,” like he’s reminding me of our deal. As if I could forget. No matter how hard I try, my conscience keeps nagging away at my wrongdoing—the voice in my head awfully similar to Pip’s rich baritone—urging me to tell Maverick the truth.
I want to.
And I will.
I’ll have to at some stage. He’s my boss. My loss of vision directly affects my ability to do my job. But I’m currently straddling Maverick while his hands are planted on my ass cheeks. We’re not exactly interacting as boss and employee, but as…I don’t know what exactly. But it’s not that.
And inthiscontext, I’m not ready to say anything yet.
