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“I make a habit to get the business done first. Dining with clients, it’s always made sense to me. Everyone can find out whether you want to work together. See if you really have anything to talk about, before you start to expend time and money. Business before pleasure. With you, I’d be happy to watch and listen to you while you talked about more or less anything.”
He’s watching me now.
I don’t have anything to say to that. I know he’s trying to put me on the spot and I’m not playing into it.
So with a brief smile, he goes on. “I do have pressing business that I want to transact with you, though. It’s quite urgent, too.”
“You want my office back.”
“Yes.” The corner of his mouth lifts and his lips peel apart. “Only so I can move you into a bigger one, though.”
“Oh?”
My scalp tingles. Is it me or is it him? I feel like I’m sensing his feelings and his intentions. More than I usually would. I feel what he’s going to say next. Any other time I would dismiss it as wishful thinking, but this comes with a distinct sensation. It’s obviously something else.
I’m expecting what he says, word for word, but it still takes my breath away.
“I want to offer you a partnership.”
When I don’t respond, he says, “What? Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about it. Everybody who joins a law firm wants to at least be offered a seat at the partners’ table.”
“No. I mean, yes. I have thought about it.” I tell him, “I didn’t expect it, though. Not so soon. And especially not now.”
His frown is unsettlingly attractive, with the hint of an amused smile.
“Not now? Why?”
“I’ve been away. If anything, I expected to be fired. I didn’t think cooking dinner was the usual way to can a lawyer, but still.”
“You’ve been away, so we’re afraid of losing you. To another practice, to another city.” I sense that what he’s saying is true. But he has are other motives at work here, too. I feel like, if I focussed, I could go deeper. It’s freaking me out. “We like your work,” he says, bringing me back to focus. “You attract good clients, too.”
Now, I don’t need any extra perception to know he’s not being truthful about that. The clients I attract bring ‘flagship’ cases. They could all be career-making cases. Many of them are massive injustices that need to go all the way to the supreme court.
Lost causes, in other words. Cases that could get a lawyer’s name written into the history books. But are more likely to make her go broke while she fights to get them heard. Raven Warnak Stein doesn’t want those cases. They want corporate cases with big fees and high-profile, white-collar criminal cases of the winnable kind.
Most of all, I want to feel him, pinned to the ground beneath me. I want the heat and strength of his abs, clenched and firm, ridged and taut under my ass. Then I want to slide down. Down until I can feel my wetness soak into the front of his pants. Feel him harden under my swollen lips. Feel the thickness of him pulse beneath my wings.
But I don’t. I’m determined not to do any of that.
He’s got me here under the cover of business, but his real intentions go farther. Deeper. I know. And he knows I know.
Those same ideas, the ones I tried to ream out and drill away last night and this morning, the dreams I hoped the Hitachi would buzz and judder away in a thousand splashing, collapsing implosions, they’re what my body is here for.
My head, my mind, my conscious and determined intention is here for the business. And the dinner, of course, which I know will be sensational. And Lucien’s elegant company, and… damnit. It’s hard to keep my mind on track. Especially when his eyebrow flexes and his hip cocks like that.
He holds out his hand. “Please,” he says, “Take my offer.”
He’s offering his hand like it could be for a handshake. But I think it’s an invitation to more.
The tingle in my scalp intensifies. I know his intention. He wants what I want. I can see his thoughts. Feel what he’s feeling. And I’m nauseous.
I can’t risk being with him. Not like this.
“I have to go.”
Chapter Two
Something like it happened before. I was in high school and stressed out.
