Page 19 of Babies for the Big Shot
But then she slides a document across the table toward me.
Our fingers touch, just barely. A moment so slight it should register as nothing. But the landing is a live wire. A sharp, clean surge that breaks straight through the layers of detachment I’ve spent a career perfecting.
I see it hit her too, just a flicker of reaction. She draws back a fraction too fast. Her pen slips, skidding across the table toward me.
Of course it does.
I retrieve it. Hold it out to her. Unhurried, deliberate. Our hands don’t meet this time, but the echo of her mouth on mine flashes back with surgical clarity. The elevator. Her gasp. My name, torn from her throat in a voice that wasn’t meant for the light.
I’m unraveling. Quietly. Precisely. From the inside out.
I sit back, attempting to resume the role I’ve built, measured, unaffected, focused. I look at the screen. Pie charts. Projections. Risk models and color-coded mediocrity.
But all I can see is her.
Then she looks up. Meets my gaze.
And smirks.
It’s nothing. A slight movement at the corner of her mouth. A reflex. Likely not even meant for me.
But it lands with impact I cannot quantify. It takes the air from my lungs, the ground from beneath my reason.
Because she has no idea what that look does to me.
And that is the moment I understand the full scope of the problem.
This is no longer residual attraction. No longer a lapse in judgment echoing through my workday. This is fixation. Cold, quiet, insistent.
And I do not want it to end.
Even knowing what it may destroy.
I built this company from the ground up. Defined the rules. Fortified the perimeters. Enforced the boundaries with discipline most men can’t fathom.
And now the entire structure is shifting beneath my feet.
Because of her.
And I can’t seem to stop the slide.
CHAPTER FIVE
Sara
I’m fine.
Totally fine.
Just a normal person at her totally normal job working for her totally not insanely hot one-night stand boss.
Coolcoolcoolcool.
Nick Ashford is everywhere.
In the hallway. In meetings. In my head.
In my dreams, which—thanks, brain—have been turning into 3 a.m. reruns ofElevatorgate: The Pantsing.I woke up last night clutching a pillow and muttering, “Sir, this is an elevator,” like some kind of sleep-deprived retail worker in heat.
