Page 31 of Not Safe for Work
But she still savored it. Reveled in it.
She hoped that it meant something, that she used it now.
“Well, I suppose that depends on what you mean by happy,” he said, lightly enough that she shouldn’t have felt suddenly tense. But she did. And not even the rest of his words could soothe her, not completely. “He spent all day yesterday furious that Robert Brisdon backed out of the Lederman deal. In fact, he was so busy pounding his desk and stalking around and looking at everyone with ice-dagger eyes that I had to remind him he hadn’t eaten dinner. And then he ate it, angrily.”
“Oh, I hate it when he eats angrily.”
“It sounds like he’s grinding nails between his teeth.”
“Exactly. It makes me cringe all over. I had to stop him when he did it at that lunch meeting with the guys from that trumped-up little IT company.”
Abel laughed, clearly remembering. “Oh, the ones who wear sandals and only like authentic things?”
“Yep, the very same. God he hates them.”
“He hates everyone. Except me and you.”
Now she looked at him, as directly as she could. Mostly so he couldn’t leverage his way out of things in that effortlessly charming way of his. The other day she had tried to talk him into getting out of bed so they could work on a proposal together, and they somehow wound up fucking until four in the afternoon instead.
She didn’t even know how.
He just had a gift—that she now had to circumvent.
“But does he though?” she asked.
“Does he what?”
“Hate everyone except me and you. Sometimes I think maybe he hates us, too.”
“He didn’t seem to hate you last night, when you put your finger—”
She covered her face with one hand, as an image of that very thing flashed behind her eyes. He had shuddered when she’d done it. And then Abel had said curl your finger, and the shudder had become something else—something desperate. Something that almost made her believe he loved this as much as they did.
“Oh Christ, don’t make me think about that right now,” she moaned.
Though she suspected it was already too late.
Abel was looking at her in that heated way now.
There were still twenty minutes before they would arrive at the airport.
I’ve played this all wrong,she thought.
But then to her surprise, he answered.
“Sounds more like you’re troubled by the things we do.”
“That wasn’t troubled and you know it, you absolute nightmare.”
“Hey—you’re the one who accosted me in the elevator the other day.”
“I was just thinking of our first meeting. The memory made me do it.”
“Wanted me to fuck your ass then, did you?”
She flushed from her collarbone to the roots of her hair—and this time it wasn’t just the remembering that did it. She could still feel him there, trying to work his way in. Still hear him saying: That’s it baby, open up for me just like he does.
But she did her best to shake it off.
