Page 72 of Delayed Penalty

“You’re kind of heavy,” she mutters, shoving against me lightly.

I laugh, rolling off and tugging her to my side because I can’t seem tonottouch her. “That’s rude.”

“Not sorry. Now I can breathe.”

She slides her fingers through the hair on my chest, her ear pressed against my heart, and there’s no wayshe doesn’t hear how hard it’s thumping right now. I could say it’s from the nonstop sex or an aftereffect of my orgasm, but it would be a lie.

It’s her. It’s Quinn. It’s being this close to her.

I have no fucking clue how to feel about that.

“Hey, Hayes?” she asks after several quiet minutes.

“Yeah?”

“What are we going to do?”

“What do you mean?”

She leans up on her elbow, shooting daggers my way. “What do you meanwhat do you mean? I mean, what are we going to do aboutthis?” She wags her finger between us. “Where do we go from here?”

“I…”

I don’t say anything because I don’t have a good answer for her. The right answer would be to chalk this up to getting it out of our systems and walk away, or for me to fire her. I don’t want to do either of those things.

I want more of this. More of her.

But I also know it’s wrong. I’m supposed to be turning my life around, improving myself, setting an example for my niece. I’m not supposed to be fucking her nanny.

“Where doyouwant to go from here?” I flip the question to her.

She nibbles on her bottom lip, thinking about it fora moment. “Well, I certainly enjoyed what just happened.”

“Me too.”

“What if we just…do this?” she asks.

“Do what?”

“You know, fool around.”

I raise my brows. “I’d call what we did more than justfooling around.”

She rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.Fucking.” The word goes straight to my dick, which has no business being half-hard again. “What if we just keep doing it? A friends-with-benefits sort of thing.”

“But we’re not friends. I’m your boss, and you’re my employee.”

It’s funny because a few months ago, I wouldn’t have cared one bit about power dynamics. I would have taken what I wanted from her and forgotten about her when I was done. Now though…now it feels like regressing, and for the first time in my life, I don’t want to regress.

Even so, I’m not sure this one afternoon together was enough either.

“I’m not going to report you to HR, if that’s what you’re worried about. Wait, do we even have HR?”

“Honey, IamHR.”

She smiles. “Say that again.”

“I am HR.”

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