: Chapter 6

I was right about one thing. Every time I see Mimi Valente, no matter what expression she’s wearing and no matter what she has to say, I see her mouth softly open and her eyes glaze. Hear her soft, tortured breath in my ear. Feel her fingernails digging into my forearm.

Wouldn’t you be curious? she’d said in the car.

The answer is fuck yes. I can’t stop thinking about all that I could show her. I can’t stop imagining it, and I just… can’t.

“Have you got a tic?”

I blink, glance up, then scowl as I notice Mimi standing on the threshold to my office. And here comes the start of another hard-on.

Our conversation two weeks ago was nothing short of a revelation. I’ve never met anyone like her. That she says what she’s thinking is refreshing. She’s so open and unaffected, and that makes her more than a little dangerous. The things she’d had to say seemed like a lot of information to take in. A lot to digest. But as I’d driven away from her aunt’s house, I’d done my best to push it all away. I told myself that I wasn’t too worried. I had another few weeks of running interference before the day she’d end up working for me. Enough time to wear her down, to encourage her to find something else. I’d pay a finder’s fee to an agency, whatever it took. And if it came down to it, I’d decided I could always take El’s suggestion and place her with another department. Out of sight, out of mind. As opposed to not only being within sight but also within reach for eight hours a day while dressed like she’s auditioning for the part of a sexy secretary on Mad Men.

“You’re doing it again.”

So much for plans. So much for making sure she wouldn’t be my PA because just the day after our lunchtime showdown, Jody had been instructed at a routine doctor’s appointment that she needed immediate and complete bed rest. I don’t know who was more annoyed: me or Jody. But I do know who was most excited when she’d bounded into the office the following morning like an eager-to-please puppy. Almost two weeks in and it’s wearing having to constantly remind myself that the ways I’d like her to please me are not on offer.

“What?” I mutter, not bothering to hide my exasperation this time. “Doing what?” My pen clatters as I drop it to the desk, the chair creaking as I thrust myself back in it. She probably thinks I’m an arsehole because every time I look her way, it’s with a scowl. But, as the saying goes, it’s not her, it’s me.

“It looked like you were having a silent conversation with yourself. There are all kinds of thoughts flitting across your face.”

“That’s because this is my thinking face.” My thinking I must’ve pissed someone off in a previous life to have to put up with this.

“Really? It looks more like a needs more fiber in his diet kind of face. There are supplements you can take, you know.”

“I am not constipated. Or geriatric,” I add when it occurs to me what she might be suggesting.

“I know.” Her shoulder lifts and falls casually but our staring match continues. “No one would look at us together and wonder is he her daddy or is he her dad?”

“What?” I give my head a shake, not sure if I heard that right.

“I’m just saying, you’re in good shape for a man of your age.”

“I’m thirty-six. That hardly makes me Methuselah.”

“That’s exactly the point I’m trying to make.”

This woman drives me to distraction. Short of firing her for an inauspicious start that wasn’t her fault, what can I do? That’s not to say I hadn’t considered it as a course of action best for us both. But the prospect of the shitstorm that would follow—Jody’s potential stress, Polly’s emotional blackmail, my brothers’ interference—I’d decided having her here might be the lesser of those two evils.

“Whit?”

I realize I’m still staring, so I roll my eyes with the finesse of Primrose, my youngest sister. I can’t have her, but it doesn’t stop me from wanting. “Shut the door and come in, for God’s sake. I’m not going to bite you.”

She turns and reaches for the door handle and murmurs something that sounds like, “I wouldn’t mind.” Whether that was wishful thinking on her part or mine, I’m not sure. “We need to go over your schedule.”

“Fine.”

She crosses the space between us, coming to a stop at one of the Le Corbusier chairs placed on the opposite side of my desk, close enough for me to see the tiny pearls she wears in her ears but far enough away not to be tormented by her scent. Frangipani, sunshine, and holidays. It sounds ridiculous, but since her car confessional, I’ve tried very hard not to be within sniffing distance. The scent of her makes me want to press my nose into her skin.

“You have an interview scheduled with the FT on the fifteenth,” she says, leaning her thigh against the leather arm. Lucky arm.

“What about it?” I make a vague gesture to the chair, but she shakes her head.

“I’m good.”

“I wasn’t asking. Sit.”

“Fine,” she huffs out. But, of course, it would’ve been too much to ask for her to walk around the chair. Instead, she slides over the arm, the expensive leather easing her slide with a flash of leg and a soft giggle. “Sorry,” she says, smoothing her skirt as she demurely crosses her legs.

Curious. So curious. Is she wearing her blue lace underwear? Her blouse is pale and diaphanous, high at her neck and tight at the wrists. Her skirt is knee length and navy, yet coats like a second skin. Stockings, I’m guessing, and heels, but nothing too obvious. Her foot begins to bounce, my gaze sliding from her electric blue heels to her knee. Those fucking legs. What I wouldn’t give to have them wrapped around my head.

Uncross your legs, darling.

That’s it. Press your knees nice and wide.

Slide your skirt a little higher.

Let me watch you grow wet with my words.

“Whit?” My eyes snap to hers to find them dancing with merriment.

It’s not like she needs to guess what I’m thinking because I told her—in very explicit terms—in the car. It was an error in judgment, but I didn’t think for one minute she’d end up working here. Telling her I’d always be imagining her riding my fingers was supposed to be ammunition, something to worry her, not titillate.

Not that she ever says a word about it. Not that she needs to—I can tell when she’s thinking about it, when she’s replaying my words or replaying that night from her own perspective. Her cheeks take on this pink, rosy hue, and she has this way of looking at me with those clear gray eyes. It’s almost as though she can see right into my dirty soul.

Fuck it, I need to get laid.

“What’s with those?” I make a negligent gesture in her direction. Clearly, I can’t help myself.

“What?” She sits up a little, her gaze sliding to her blouse, then the floor.

“Those. The shoes.” The bright-blue fuck-me heels. “You didn’t have those on earlier.” She wore black flats, not that I usually notice these things.

“Oh yeah.” She holds out her leg, turning her foot this way and that admiringly. I’ve stopped looking. But only because she’s flashing a little thigh. “I’m wearing them in.”

I’d like to wear her—

No. No, I would not.

“They’re pretty, though, right?”

“They’re hardly workplace appropriate.”

“They’re shoes. Enclosed toes. Seem plenty appropriate to me,” she argues.

“Yes, if you want to break your neck.” Or wrap them around mine. “Listen,” I add gruffly, “if there’s a problem with my schedule, I expect you to bring it to fix it, not just my attention.”

Her smile dampens as she lowers her leg, then reaches for her iPad. “You have a meeting with Alexander Beckett scheduled the same day. There’s a chance they might overlap. I thought I should ask which you’d like to reschedule.”

“Postpone the FT interview. Beckett is more important.” He’s the reason I was able to raise the finance for this venture. “Is it just Beckett or Olivia as well?”

“Jody made a note,” she murmurs as her attention dips. My attention remains on her face. By sheer force of will. “Both.” She glances up, seeing right through me again anyway.

“Better order lunch. She likes the sashimi from—”

“Okaish.”

“That’s the one,” I return brusquely. I feel like a complete shit. I bring up her shoes, then turn on her like a dog with a sore tail.

“You’ve got emails from another couple of publications requesting interviews… got it!” she tags on, tapping the screen because I’m already shaking my head. “There’s also a note to remind you that Lavender’s birthday is at the end of the month.”

“Shit.” I rub my hand across the bristles already sprouting on my jaw. “I completely forgot.”

“What can I help you with? Lavender is your sister, right?”

“Yeah, she’ll be turning twenty.”

“Then I can definitely help. I was twenty not too long ago.”

I try not to scowl. When she puts it like that, I feel like an old pervert. But Mimi is nothing like petulant, combative Lavender. I mean, I’m thirty-six, not sixty-six, but that still puts a dozen years between us. A dozen years and the fact that I’m her boss. It sounds like a recipe for disaster. For both of us.

“Is there something wrong?”

Me. I’m wrong. Wrong for wanting to bend her over my desk in nothing but a garter belt and stockings. Wrong and such a cliché. I give my head a quick shake and come up with some bullshit answer. “I was just thinking that Jody wasn’t up for shopping for personal gifts. Corporate was the limit. She said it was too much responsibility.”

“I don’t mind.” Mimi’s shoulders jump along with her words. “Who doesn’t love shopping?”

“Well, me.”

“I bet I could convert you.”

“No, Mimi. You really couldn’t.”

“I bet I could,” she retorts happily. “My enthusiasm knows no bounds!”

“Yes, I’ve noticed that about you.” Wouldn’t you be curious? The phantom of her soft words curls around my ears again. Yes. Yes, I am. Curious. Hungry. And ignoring my impulses. Clearing my throat, I reach down and adjust my cock, thankful for the cover of my desk. “Would you book somewhere for dinner that night?”

“On the twenty-eighth? For how many?” She angles her iPad.

“Well, there are seven of us,” I say with another frown.

“I cannot imagine growing up with so many siblings. It must’ve been amazing.”

“Yes, amazing, if you like to spend your childhood banging on bathroom doors,” I murmur. “Seven plus Archer,” I say, carrying on. “That’s Heather, my sister’s husband. Then Polly and also whichever fuckwit boyfriend Lavender has on the go. Miranda, our cousin, her husband, Harry, and their two boys. And you could ask Brin and El if they’ll be bringing a plus-one before you book.”

“Is El dating?” she asks.

“No, not as far as I know. Not seriously, anyway. Why do you ask?” I add, casually.

“He asked me out next weekend.” She makes a diffident gesture with the pen. I frown as I notice her foot begins to bounce again. “That’s not a problem, is it?”

“Why would it be?” I answer a little too quickly.

“I’m just being a good little employee.”

“Well, ask, all the same.” I’m surprised I’m able to form a full and coherent sentence when all I can think of is El seeing her—really seeing her. Feasting his eyes on her long legs. Maybe even getting her out of her underwear.

“Do you suffer from headaches?” At her question, my gaze sharply lifts. “All that jaw clenching can’t be good for you.”

El is taking her out, and she’s treating me like I’m in my dotage. “No. I don’t suffer from headaches.” I just have six siblings who are headache-inducing. And a thing for my PA that makes my cock ache.

I definitely need to get laid.

“Where’s he taking you?” I ask casually, I hope.

“To dinner, some Thai-Italian fusion place.”

“Sounds like a stomachache in the making,” I mutter. It’s little wonder she treats me like I’m an old git when I behave like one.

“Then we’re going to a club.”

Maybe I should have a word with him, remind him of Mimi’s position in this business. Of how close she is to Mum. Yes, that’s it. A quiet word with Polly should piss on his fireworks.

“Getting back to your sister’s birthday, we’re looking at thirteen people, possibly fifteen. Sixteen if you’re taking a plus-one.” She gives a small, polite smile.

I briefly consider lying. Then remember I’m not a teenager who plays games. “Thirteen. Potentially fifteen.”

“No date for you?”

“I feel like we’ve already talked about this.” Her cheeks pink, and I get a very visceral kick out of knowing she’s recalling our car conversation about a nameless, faceless woman. Why she likes the things she likes. Why she’s sexually submissive.

“We spoke, but it wasn’t what I’d call an edifying conversation.”

My smile slides into a tease. “You don’t think so?”

“Not where you’re concerned. You don’t date, but you have…assignations. I think that was about the strength of it.”

“How prim, Mimi. You can use your big-girl words, you know.”

“Curse, you mean?” I nod. “I don’t like to,” she adds. “It’s not my thing.”

But I’m not yet ready to give up. “My dad used to say that vulgarity is like good whisky. That it should only be shared with the right people and on the right occasion.”

“Is that what you believe, too?”

“No. I did once try to give up swearing, but I found I cunt.”

Her expression darkens, unimpressed.

I set off laughing. “So prim and proper,” I tease.

“I just don’t swear,” she proclaims as my chuckling draws off.

“You will.” At least I’d like to make her. Make her eyes roll back in her head as she spews a filthy stream of consciousness.

“You think you can make me?” she answers with a little too much daring. She barely moves but her answer is all cocked hip and attitude.

“Working with me will drive you to it.” It’s the nearest I’ll allow myself to get to the truth of it. “And being at Lavender’s birthday dinner pretty much guarantee’s it.”

“I’m invited?”

She looks surprised. And happy. I hadn’t meant to invite her, and while Polly would’ve done so anyway, I find I want her there. I bet she’ll turn up wearing a pretty dress, the kind that makes her look like a gift. A gift I’d love to unwrap but will end up just staring longingly at instead. But I’m not about to say any of this.

“Of course you’re invited. I’ll need your help as referee.”

“You’ll have games?” Now she looks slightly confused.

The game I want to play is let’s unravel Mimi. It’s a bit like pass the parcel but with only one player. Me. I get to unwrap each of her layers as I unravel her mind with my filth.

“Games? Only if you consider frightening whichever boy Lavender is currently dangling from her black-painted fingernails.”

“That’s not nice.” Her lips purse in disapproval.

“No, but someone has to do it. She has terrible taste in men.”

“And the role automatically falls to you?”

“Sadly, yes. At least since Dad died.”

“So you play the dad—” Her eyes fly wide as she bites off the end of the word, her cheeks going from pink to beet red.

“Like a dad, yes.” My lips quirk as I consider this. “Which is not,” I add, dropping my tone, “at all like playing a daddy.”

She swallows, her lashes fluttering as her breath leaves her chest in a whoosh. “That’s what I meant about your explanation not covering all the bases.”

“That’s a curious turn of phrase,” I purr, unable to help myself, it seems.

“I was kind of surprised how much fun skipping straight to third base was.”

I curl my hands around the arms of my chair, anchoring me to it when all I want to do is round my desk, pick her up, and slide home.

This is becoming a bit of a recurring theme. But then her phrasing penetrates my lust-filled brain.

“You’ve never…” Shit. “Don’t answer that,” I add quickly, but she’s already shaking her head, those gray eyes wide and solemn.

“They usually start north of my waistband, not that I have a ton of experience.”

Why do I like the sound of that? I’ve always preferred experience over a novice. Haven’t I? “Right, well, this conversation has crossed over into the inappropriate, so let’s—”

“I thought there must be a guy manual or something.” She gives an adorably pensive twist to her lips.

“A manual?” I’m really not sure what’s going to fall out of her mouth next.

“I don’t know. Like sexual lore or something.” She scratches her temple with her index finger, still in contemplation. “Maybe something on the internet?” And now she’s looking at me as though I have all the answers, which is flattering but also slightly daft. “It’s just, the handful of guys I have been with have all, you know.” With her palm, she makes a circle over her breasts. “Sung from a very similar hymn sheet?”

“Did they make you sing?” Fucking hell. Maybe there’s something in the water. Something more dangerous than listeria.

“What do you mean?”

I’m definitely going to hell. “Did they make you come?”

She bites her lip but doesn’t answer, which is probably for the best.

“If I answer your question, you have to answer mine.”

“That’s not how I work.”

“It’s not like I’m gonna jump you. I just want to know what you like.”

“Why? What good could come of it?”

“I guess I’m trying to make sense of what made me enjoy it so much.” Her gaze dips to her lap where she picks at a piece of invisible fluff. “Why I didn’t stop you. Was it you? Was it the role you were playing? It was shocking, but I felt kind of compelled. No, that’s not the right word,” she adds as her gaze lifts, her expression not quite beseeching. “Why did it make me feel so good?”

I almost groan. Why does she have to be so fucking perfect?

“I can’t answer that for you.” More importantly, I don’t want to because then I’ll have to admit there are other men like me. Other men with whom she might find what she’s looking for. Other men she might share the experience with.

“Well, that’s okay.” I almost fall off my chair. Mimi Valente giving up—listening? “Because that’s not what I want to ask.”

“No?” So much hesitancy in that word. Rightly so, as it turns out.

“No. What I’m asking is why you like it.”

“I like it when people do as they’re told.” It’s the truth. But I could also be trying to put a stop to this dangerous interrogation.

“People?”

“In a general sense.” Who doesn’t like to be in charge and have those around them pay attention? It would make my life generally easier if they did. “More specifically, I enjoy it when women do as I say.” Again with the truth.

“In the bedroom,” she whispers.

“Sexually,” I amend.

“You like them to be a little submissive? Like me?”

“Stop.” I bring my head to my hand, ostensibly to rub my temples. The reality is, I need to hide the truth from her. The truth of what her questions mean. “This is ridiculous,” I add with an unhappy frown.

“I’m just saying.” She gives a tiny shoulder shimmy that I suppose is meant to convey her innocence.

But yes, Mimi. I like them when they’re like you, even full of questions and pushing boundaries. I like to call them my good girl when they’re compliant and punish them in a way that meets both of our satisfaction when they’re not. “This conversation is edging territory I’d rather not discuss.” And I’d rather not suffer my hard-on edging the underside of my desk. “You should go back to work.”

I expect another question, an oh, but I haven’t asked you about—

I’m surprised when she stands.

“Yes,” she demurs, “I should get back, just like the boss says.”

I have nothing to offer, nothing sensible, anyway. Except… she didn’t answer my original question. She pauses when she reaches the door, and I think for a moment that she might’ve read my mind as she lifts her gaze. My gray-eyed guileless temptress. Or should that be agitator? “Does Lavender have a favorite restaurant?”

“Somewhere that serves lentils, probably.” Has Mimi really led such a sheltered life, or is she playing a part? And there’s that question again: have previous lovers made her come? “I’m not really sure,” I add, drawing my laptop closer.

“No problem. I can ask El.” I suppose that answers that conundrum. Temptress or agitator, good girl or bad? Try frustrating to the end.

“Just don’t book a steak restaurant,” I reply, refusing to bite.

“And a budget for her gift?”

“Spend whatever you think.”

“No budget? You should probably come with me.”

I can’t restrain the twist of my lips. Mimi Valente is not bad. She’s an out-and-out brat. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Fine. Have it your way, Daddy Warbucks.” She tips her gaze again. It doesn’t hide her smirk. “One last question.” Thank fuck. “What kind of things does Lavender like?”

“Edibles,” I say with a sigh.

“O-kay.” She marks something on the iPad when she looks my way again. “I wonder if El likes people to do as they’re told, too.”

I send her a withering glance. “My brother is nothing like me.”

“I expect you’re right. He seems way more laid-back. Maybe I’ll just ask him to hook me up with a dealer.”

“It was a joke,” I say repressively.

“Yeah.” She sighs. “I’m beginning to wonder if you think that’s what I am.”

And with that, she flounces out of my office.