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“It’s painful, I know. But I can’t believe I said that and now I’m making it worse by talking about it. I always just want to impress you and I make such a mess of it,” I admitted, and then wished I hadn’t. I might as well have started talking about my personal problems and how I had a blister on my heel from the stupid shoes I borrowed from his sister. There wasn’t much else I could do to humiliate myself unless I actually gave up and peed my pants, too.
“No, you’re making this so difficult. Don’t thank me. Don’t apologize. Most of all don’t devalue your contribution to this project. If you think I’m so fragile that I can’t handle the fact that you did succeed where I’d failed at pitching a rebrand concept to Meredith, then maybe I need to work on my ego. Because you impress me at every turn. You’re remarkable and clever and so damn likable that when you do that thing—when you say something completely unexpected and authentic and make me laugh, or you get embarrassed and act so adorable—I’m not supposed to think you act adorable. I’m supposed to think you’re a valued member of the creative team at REM and leave it at that. So, if you could stop having your personality and being smart and funny and pretty as hell in those shoes that look like they’re killing you, that would make it easier for me not to do something we’ll regret.”
I couldn’t help it. He was an irresistible force, the heat from his body as persuasive, as undeniable as gravity. I stepped closer to him. His words were making my heart pound like it was trying to break out of my rib cage. His eyes seemed darker and so intense, fixed on me like I was way more important than some intern who just put her foot in her mouth and talked about his butt.
“And if you think about my ass at all, I’m flattered. Especially since I’m so elderly,” he said with a wicked grin. I was beginning to wonder if that was the only sort of grin he was capable of, the filthy kind that made me really aware of how a zing of awareness slid down my belly and made my body tingle all over, concentrating between my legs with something like a tenderness, a throbbing.
“I wish I knew what you were thinking behind that hint of a smile,” he said, brushing the corner of my mouth with his fingertip like he couldn’t keep from touching me. I felt the kind of shock run through me, sweet and electric. I rolled my lips under, unsure what to do. I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to take that last half step that would bring me flush against his broad chest and lift my face and hope he realized how I was trembling, hoping he’d kiss me.
None of the things we were, those roles, student and teacher, intern and boss, Maria’s best friend and Maria’s big brother—none of them defined us in this dim space warmed by our nearness and the sound of my pulse pounding in my ears. I parted my lips and lifted my gaze to meet his eyes, braver than I thought I was capable of being. I felt it, a click of connection, an understanding snap into place between us.
We met in the middle, Rick’s hand sliding along my face and into my hair, my hand on his chest where his heart seemed like it was hammering as hard as my own. I felt a ghost of a smile curve my lips as he covered my mouth with his. It was slow and sultry, Rick’s soft lips moving over mine, pressing and drawing back, pressing and drawing back, teasing me closer. When we locked lips a third time, he touched my upper lip with the tip of his tongue. I heard a high little moan and realized to my mortification that it was me. I was moaning out loud. He smiled against my lips and slid his tongue in my mouth with a satisfied growl that felt possessive and thrilled me down to the toes that were curling up in my shoes.
In seconds, a tentative sweet kiss blazed into something more, something erotic and long-awaited, a mating of our tongues. He claimed me decisively. His arms wrapped around my body, pulling me flush against his hard chest and holding me close while his tongue darted expertly in and out of my mouth. I was glad of his arms around me because I was losing my knees pretty quickly. Chills rose on my arms. I tilted my head, kissing him back as fervently as he kissed me. Sensation rode through my body and took my brain offline completely. There was nothing in the world but Rick’s body, his arms, his mouth on mine, the spicy scent of his cologne and the way he took command of me.
Molten and sleek, our bodies wound and twisted together, slow, syrupy movements as we caressed each other. Even the way his fingers slid across the back of my neck made me shudder, a big, powerful reaction to a small, tender touch. The shadow of dark stubble at his jawline seemed to scratch my palm as I touched his face, and I kept smiling. I couldn’t stop smiling because Rick Esperanza was kissing me and it felt better than anything I had ever imagined in my life.
Where had he been? Where has this feeling been all these years? I couldn’t bear to be even an inch or two away from him, our need for greater closeness hampered by the desire not to part for even a moment. Not even to put down my laptop bag. It would break the spell I believed, that if I did something so dull and sensible as stopping the kiss to set down my bag, that he’d realize what we were doing and go back where he was before, in his office, in hiding, being all things to all people and none of it for his true self.
I knew it was the authentic Rick with me then, his tongue in my mouth and his big hands on my back. There was no room between us for a lie, for an artificial gesture or word. We were fusing into one being, two people caught up in the greatest kiss the world had ever known, a kiss that grew steamier and more promising with every gasp for breath.
Rick lifted me off my feet, holding me close and kissing me, my feet dangling above the carpet. I never felt unsteady or unsafe—he had me. Those insanely jacked arms and shoulders held me and made me feel weightless, cherished. His kiss was wild and tender. I could live in it forever, pure joy and desire and the sensation of being adored. Not liked or admired, adored. Straight up, old-fashioned adoration.
I was awash in it, a gleam of thrilling sensuality that thrummed all the way to my fingertips. Kissing him was wonderful, my belly swooping like I was on a roller coaster when he slid his tongue in all the way. I’d never felt anything like it before, not even close.
The sharp, high ding of the elevator might as well have been a fusillade of machine gun fire from the way he reacted. Rick didn’t leap away from me as if caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He turned me away from the sound, covering me, setting me on my feet and with his palm, pressing me to his shoulder so my face was hidden from whoever was intruding. I heard him say, “Excuse me, please. Have a good evening,” and I heard the wheeling of the janitorial carts go past. The night cleaning crew had arrived and interrupted us. And he had shielded me from embarrassment, from being recognized as if his first priority wasn’t to bellow ‘it’s not what it looks like’ to safeguard his own reputation, but that what he cared about most was protecting me.
I was blushing, and I knew I should be ashamed that we got carried away in a hallway of the office building, that we were acting like teenagers making out in a crowded movie theater with no regard for public decency. But I was just sorry we got interrupted. Because the tingling warmth that had flooded my body was receding and I had to brace myself for what was coming. I knew, was absolutely positive, that he was going to say he was sorry. That it was a mistake. Inwardly, I cringed. I’d rather anything than to hear him say those words at that moment. I broke away from him, mumbled good night and swiftly boarded the elevator, punching the ‘doors closed’ button urgently. Before he could recover from my sudden escape and want to have a conversation about how he would never go near me again and how inappropriate it was.
Riding down in the elevator, I couldn’t help smiling. Complicated or not, it was still the most perfect thing that had ever happened to me. The ultimate kiss.
CHAPTER18
RICK
Of all the possible courses of action when Hailey peeked into my office, I chose the one that made everything worse. I could have said, ‘have a good evening’ and let her leave. I could have nodded and said I was busy and couldn’t talk. I could have asked about my sister who is her best friend or her coursework since I am her goddamn professor. Instead, I insisted on walking her to the elevator as an excuse to prolong the interaction. Then I decided to put my tongue in her mouth.
Decided might be too proactive a word when it felt more like surrender, like falling into a pool or opening my eyes in the morning. Natural and good and right, but nothing that needed the name of volition. Because wanting her was like breathing, needing her, touching her was just one desperate action after another, frantic for relief. That was what it had been. A complete relief to kiss her. Not the slaking of some illicit lust. Something true and good and almost wholesome.
She was meant for me, and the way she kissed me back, the way she touched my cheek and just went for it, kissing me as passionately as I kissed her. There was no way to undo this, to make it right. I had done something I shouldn’t have, no matter how right it felt. It was wrong, professionally and personally. She interned at my marketing firm, studied in my class. She was my younger sister’s friend. As such, she deserved respect and politeness, not a man who took advantage of those connections to press my attention on her. Never mind that she had responded in kind, that she had seemed eager, seemed so damn perfect. I had put her in an impossible situation.
My impulse was to contact her and ask if she was okay, if we could talk, but even that seemed like the panicked reaction of a guilty man. I had done the wrong thing, so the only course was to do the right one now. To leave her alone and give her space. Pursuing her, messaging her, trying to reassure myself of her well-being and her understanding that I wasn’t going to trap her or coerce her—that was putting my interests ahead of hers. Hailey deserved better than this, and I wanted to go look for answers in a tequila bottle. To forget it ever happened. Like there was any chance of that, any chance that I wouldn’t relive the perfect union of those moments with Hailey every night, every time I closed my eyes. She would haunt me, and that kiss would haunt me, not only with guilt but with longing so fierce it threatened my sanity. A kiss like that, a woman like that could drive a man out of his mind.
Facing her in class was a grim chore for me, to appear detached and impersonal, but to wonder if it was acceptable to apologize. I had people I could ask, friends of mine who had been down this road. I didn’t want to admit it to them, that I had fallen into the same pattern, walked off that cliff myself. So I stood at the front of the classroom and delivered my lecture and let them do group work. I rotated among the groups, making sure they were on track to complete their project by the deadline.
When I reached Hailey’s group, she didn’t even look at me. I spoke to the other women in the group about their progress. Josh looked at me, eyes narrowed, and then slid his eyes to Hailey and back to me. He was suspicious that something was going on. If he put that much thought into his coursework, he wouldn’t be hanging onto his place in the marketing program by his fingernails, I thought sourly.
I felt like an ass because Hailey avoided looking up at me or speaking to me. She must feel very uncomfortable around me since I kissed her. I’d have to speak to her about it eventually. There didn’t seem to be a good way to address the situation. If I spoke to her at Berkley, it was a de facto reminder that I was her professor, and at the office, it was likewise putting into relief the fact that I was the founder and CEO of REM where she had landed a career-making paid internship and a position on the creative team of our biggest account. Asking her to meet on her own time to discuss this seemed demanding, like I was forcing my way into her personal time—which, since I’d already invaded her personal space, didn’t seem like it was a major infraction, but still. It gave me pause. I needed her to know that it wouldn’t cost her anything to turn me down, to tell me to stay away from her. I would be respectful going forward, and I would never threaten her degree or her career. I hoped she knew that, but it needed to be said.
What didn’t need to be said was that she was perfect. That I had never felt so obsessed with any woman, so fascinated and enraptured, every old fashioned, romance novel word came into play. Everything about her made me want to look at her and listen to her and never stop.
It was every bit the fucking disaster I’d thought it would be if I ever touched her. The memory blazed in my mind, every detail as sharp and bright as it had been when I lived it. The clench of my chest and the surge of necessity, the need to hold her and kiss her, the inevitability of joining with her threatened to take me over again, body and soul.
Shaking it off, I walked to the parking lot so I could head to the office. She was ahead of me. Hailey crossed the street as I came to the curb, twenty feet or so behind her. Josh caught up to her, approached her, leaned in. I saw her speak briefly, seeming dismissive, and even dodged a step to the side away from him. He closed that distance and touched her arm, persisting. She shrugged him off and sped up her walk.
I crossed the street and increased my pace, drawing closer to them. When Josh’s hand, the same one she’d shrugged off of her arm moments before, curved into the small of her back, I wanted to break it. Everything seemed to go up in flames around me, and the word ‘mine’ reverberated in my caveman skull for an instant before I called out to them.
“Hey, Josh,” I said. He looked back at me, puzzled as I caught up to him. “I think she made it clear she didn’t want your hands on her. Back off.”
