Damion exits his office with Maggie, and I rotate around to greet them. “I’ll be in my meeting with the department heads until about noon,” he announces, and at least for now his dark hair is as neatly groomed as his pin-striped suit is fitted.
“Good luck,” I say, noticing his glance to the accounting files I have open. I try to distract him by adding, “And please consider drinking another cup of coffee before you start the meeting.”
Maggie chuckles and continues on her way out. “Yes, please,” she calls over her shoulder.
“Yes. More coffee will solve everything,” he grumbles when she is out of range, and his temper is as red hot as the tie he’s wearing.
“You’re mad at me.”
“Yes,” he agrees. “I think I am.”
“Why?”
“I have no fucking clue.” He wrecks his neatly groomed hair with a rake of his hand.
I sigh. “That’s a problem.”
“Big problem.”
We do our favorite staring thing. In a week of practice, we really have it down to perfection.
“We should do something about it,” I suggest.
“But we can’t,” he says flatly, and with that, he walks off.
While normally I’d hang on every moment of Damion’s presence and watch his departure, this time I start digging through my files. I’ll figure out how to solve the “Ms. Miller, Mr. Ward” problem later. I have a bad feeling about the accounting issue.
I check my records and then search the drawers of the desk. I check every piece of paper, looking for anything that might have been missed or stuffed someplace it shouldn’t be. Fifteen minutes into my search, I find a sealed envelope stuck inside a copy-machine manual. Frowning, I open it, surprised to find Natalie’s family photos. In a copy-machine manual? Still, my heart squeezes at the shots of her and her kids. She really did want her pictures back. For some reason, I flip over a cute shot of the family, and I go still. There are numbers, like codes, written on the back, taking up every bit of white space. I check every shot, and they are all filled with similar code. Heart racing, I shove them back in the folder and I look up Terrance’s cell number.
I know you’re in the meeting with Damion, but I need you now. Please don’t tell him why you have to leave. I want to solve the problem for him if we can.
His reply is almost instant. Your office or mine?
Yours.
Ten minutes later, he meets me at the elevator on his floor and leads me to a private office. I sit down in the visitor’s chair and he leans on the edge. “Talk to me.”
“I think Natalie stole donations to the charity event, but … I think it might be bigger than that, too.” I open the folder and pull out a photo and show it to him.
He studies it and runs a hand over his face. “Fuck me,” he grumbles. “Yeah. This is a problem, and it’s too big to keep from Damion.”
My heart sinks. “I knew he had to know. I just hoped it could be after we fixed it.”
“While the idea of fixing it first is admirable of you, this is too big to take that approach. There’s an inner circle involved in a breach. We have a good idea who is behind it, but not all of the players.”
My mind goes back to the message-pad incident with Dana. “Dana was at my desk the other day, looking for something.”
“More than once,” he adds. “We have a camera at your desk, and the phones are all monitored. Natalie called Dana, crying about her ‘pictures.’ Dana is just young and naïve and wanted to help.”
“There’s a camera?” I ask, my mind racing, trying to think of anything Damion and I might have done that was inappropriate, that might have been filmed. “At my desk?”
“Only I see it. Your secrets are safe with me.”
My stomach rolls. “You know.”
“Yes. I know about you and ‘Mr. Ward,’ Ms. Miller. And you should know that I’ve been here three years and Damion has never crossed a line with an employee. I’ve never seen him give any woman more than a night and a credit to the buffet. You have him by the balls, sweetheart. Try not to break them. They’re delicate little guys.”
I grip the arms of the chair, trying to process what he’s just told me. How it makes me feel. Good. It makes me feel good. And confused about my job and my decisions.
He lifts a hand. “No comment?”
“Ah, well, if I had balls, he’d have me by mine, too.”
He barks out laughter. “Good answer.” His cell beeps and he glances at a message, sobering instantly. “That would be Damion wanting to know why I’m not in the meeting.”
“Don’t—”
“I’ll wait until after his meeting,” he assures me. “Do you have an accounting of what you believe was stolen from the charity event?”
“The accounting manager has it, or I can send it to you.”
“I’ll need to talk to her, anyway. Our insurance will cover the theft, and the shelter will still get the money.”
Relief washes over me. “Oh, good. I was worried about it.”
“Damion would write a personal check before he’d let the shelter get screwed.”
“It’s important to him.”
“Yes, and since I can read the unasked question, here is your answer: It’s not my place to share his story.”
A story I want to know. I stand up. “Thanks, Terrance. For more than you know.”
I don’t wait for his reply. I leave, determined to tear down the walls with Damion, and with a plan: I have to give him the freedom he gave me by offering me a job in PR. Funny, days ago I didn’t appreciate what he’d been trying to do.
I head to the bank and ask for a notary. Once I’m in the notary’s office, I ask her for a sheet of paper and handwrite my statement.
I will not sue Damion Ward, or any connected organization, corporation, or entity, for sexual harassment unless I give him written warning that I no longer wish to be intimate with him. I consider what I learned just being a fly on the wall with Kent and my father, and I add, I will deliver any warning by certified mail.
I start to hand it to the notary, but first I fold it so she can’t read it. Fifteen minutes later, I stuff it in an envelope and seal it, then scribble Damion’s first name on the front. I leave it on his chair.
* * *
Two hours later, Damion appears at my desk and motions me inside his office. “We should talk.”
“Yes, I know.”
Dana buzzes through to my phone as Damion heads into his office. “There’s a Kent Smith here to see you,” Dana announces.
I suck in a breath and almost choke on it, snapping up the receiver. “What do you mean he’s here to see me?”
“He’s at the front desk. He wants to be allowed up.”
I am suddenly on my feet and I don’t know how I got there. “I’ll go down to him.” I slam down the phone and stare at it.
“Ms. Miller.” I whirl around at the sound of Damion’s voice and find him standing in the doorway with the letter I left on his chair in his hand. Ms. Miller. He has the letter and he’s still calling me Ms. Miller. My world is spinning. Nothing is going right. I have failed at … everything. “I’ll be right back,” I announce, and round the desk.
“Kali!”
I stop dead in my tracks at his use of my first name, which he has not spoken softly, and turn around. “Please come talk to me,” he says, and I see the tenderness in his eyes. I was wrong. I have not failed. The letter does matter to him. I matter to him. But I can’t do this now. “Delivery downstairs,” I lie, and I hate lying to him but I do not know what else to do. Kent poisons everything he touches. “It’s important. I’ll be right back.” I turn to leave and almost run into Terrance, and I know I’m saved. I sidestep him and dart out to the elevator, determined to make my past go away.
* * *
Seeing Kent again is like someone holding a shotgun to my face and pulling the trigger. For a few moments I feel as if my identity, my confidence in who I am, which I’ve worke
d hard to create, has been violently blown away. I want to be sick. And, yes, I want to run.
He turns, though, and sees me, all Mr. Perfect in his blue suit and silver tie, his blond hair finger-rumpled, his body as athletic and toned as ever. I know his body. I lived with him for a full year. Had plenty of sex with him but never experienced the kind of all-consuming desire I feel for Damion. Never got aroused just being near him, talking to him, looking at him. But I do with Damion. I didn’t finish Kent’s sentences—or he mine—but in only a short time Damion and I do. Kent was comfortable. He was supportive of my career. He worked for my father and fit into my life. But I did not love him—I guess in the way a friend would, maybe, but I wasn’t in love with him.
He starts toward me, and I steel myself for his touch, which I know will come. He pulls me into an embrace and my skin crawls. I shove back from him, breaking the connection. “What are you doing here? How are you even in Vegas?”
“Some guy named Terrance called to do a security clearance, and I put two and two together. Clearly you aren’t in Miami like you told us you were.”
My belly clenches and I want to scream with the injustice of it all. “Does my father know?”
He cuts his gaze, and that tells me everything before he meets my eyes again. “Yeah. He knows.”
“But he doesn’t care.”
A muscle in his jaw clenches. “I did this to you, Kali. I know I did. It’s eating me alive how I tore the two of you apart.”
“What you did was shitty, Kent. As shitty as it gets. But you didn’t tear my father and me apart. You laid the groundwork, but he got out the butcher knife.”
“No—”
“Yes.”
He inhales and tries to touch me again. I jerk back. “Don’t.”
“Is there a problem?”
Damion’s voice ripples down my spine a moment before his hand rests possessively on my lower back, and I squeeze my eyes shut, willing my now-racing heart to slow. “What are you doing?” I whisper, turning my gaze on him.
“Who the hell are you?” Kent bites out.
Damion’s eyes shift sharply toward Kent. “The CEO of the casino you’re standing in. And, as I said, is there a problem?”
“You,” Kent bites out. “You’re the problem.”
My head is spinning and I stare at the floor, trying to make sure I don’t end up flat on my face.
“Kali,” Damion commands softly, gently flexing his fingers where they still rest on my back, willing me to look at him.
I turn to him, and my eyes land on my hand, which now rests on his chest. Some part of my mind knows that we are touching each other in public and that means trouble, but I can’t seem to move away from him. He is strong and—illogically, considering the short time I’ve known him—right in ways no one ever has been.
He takes my hand, lacing his fingers with mine. “Let’s get out of here.”
“No. Not yet. I need a minute.” My eyes lift to his, and I see true worry in them. I see that this man does not consider me a conquest. He has let me in as I have him, and it matters. “Just a minute.”
He reaches up and brushes the hair from my eyes. “You’re sure?”
No. “Yes.”
“You’re not sure.”
“She’s fucking sure,” Kent growls, and I sense the defensiveness, the jealousy, he has no right to feel. He doesn’t own me any more than my father does.
Damion’s head snaps up, and he levels my ex with a lethal stare. “Don’t test me. You won’t like the results, Kent.”
Kent’s shock at the use of his name flashes in his eyes, and I see the uncertainty that follows. “What is this to you, man?”
“Do the math,” Damion says, and then refocuses on me, his voice softening. “You still need a minute?”
I nod.
He brushes his knuckle over my cheek, and I shiver with the touch. He notices. I see it in his eyes and I don’t care. Somehow, just by being him, he makes it okay for me to need him. Inhaling, I steel myself for more Kent and turn to face him, aware of Damion backing away.
“You’re fucking him?” Kent demands. “Are you fucking him?”
Emotion explodes inside me. “Don’t even start on who’s fucking who, Kent,” I hiss, pointing a finger at him, shaking inside and out. “Don’t even go there.”
He shrinks back as if I’ve hit him, stares at me as if I’m some creature he’s never seen. Cursing under his breath, he runs a hand over the back of his neck. “This isn’t what I meant to happen. I only … I wanted to tell you I’m sorry. If I could take it back—”
“Stop, Kent. This changes nothing.”
“I still love you.”
“Go back to Texas. Just … go.”
“The holidays are less than three weeks away. We need to be together. We’ll get our families together. We can be a family again.”
“Oh, please. You were the catalyst that destroyed what family I had left. This is my home now. This is where I’ll spend Thanksgiving.”
“Your father—”
“Is a bastard.”
“He’s never gotten over losing your mother. He uses Elizabeth—”
“Damn you, don’t say her name. Don’t. This conversation is over.” I turn to leave.
His hand comes down on my arm, and somehow Damion is there, his body shielding mine, his warmth easing the icy chill that is everything to do with Kent and my old life. “Let her go,” Damion orders, his voice a cool command laced with a threat.
I squeeze my eyes shut for several beats, waiting for what will happen next. Kent lets go of me, and in the same instant Damion pulls me close, his arm is around my shoulders, and we are walking toward the elevators. For a dozen or more steps there is only him and me, and nothing else matters. Kent is gone. This nightmare walk down memory lane is over.
Reality comes to me with a hard slap at the sight of Terrance walking toward us. Damion and I are touching each other in public, and Terrance is the one who called Kent. Those two things represent another chapter of this nightmare.
“Make sure he doesn’t get back on the property,” Damion tells Terrance as we meet up with him, and I take the momentary distraction of their conversation to dart under Damion’s arm and around Terrance.
“Kali!”
I hear Damion shout, but I do not stop. I spot an open elevator and slip inside moments before it closes. I hesitate only briefly, then punch the button for the office floor. If I go to my room, Damion will follow, and I will cave and let him in. I can’t talk to him until I figure out what I’m feeling. Not right now. I won’t talk to him right now.
Hugging myself, I wait for my floor, trying to stop the shaking. Damn it, I’m weak. I don’t want to be weak. The elevator dings for my floor and I exit. Dana is on the phone and waves at me, giving me a smile I just can’t return. At my desk, I all but fall into my chair and will myself not to cry. I grab a stack of mail and start opening it, trying to stay sane.
I know the moment Damion is in the lobby, the scent of him blistering my nostrils. He is like a drug. I think I’ve become that to him, too. He is risking too much for me. I have to leave here, and him, and it’s going to destroy me.
Suddenly he is standing beside me, towering over me. “Let’s go talk.”
I don’t look at him. “No. Not now.”
“Kali—”
I turn to him and snap, “Not. Now.”
“Yes,” he says, turning my chair to face him, his hands on the arms. “Now.”
“Write me up, Damion, fire me, but I am not ready to talk.”
“Hey, Kali—”
The sound of Dana’s voice makes me cringe, and I can’t even look at her. “I, uh,” she stammers from behind me, and I hear her departing steps.
“Either come with me,” Damion warns tightly, “or I’ll pick you up and carry you.”
“Don’t even think about it.”
He pulls me to my feet and drags me into his office, shutting the door and locking it.
I try to escape and at least put distance between us. His hand comes down on my arm and he turns me to face him.
I blast him. “You just told the whole damn place that we’re together when we haven’t even really been together. Why would you do that? Why?”
He maneuvers me against the wall, framing my body with his. “We are together, and if you didn’t believe that, you wouldn’t have signed that notarized letter.”
“We aren’t together, and now we won’t ever be together. I have to leave. I can’t stay. I can’t let you get fired over me.”
“I won’t let you go, and I won’t get fired.”
“I had a right to privacy. Terrance should have asked permission to share my personal affairs, and don’t tell me I signed a form or I might hurt you right now. Kent and my alcoholic asshole father—who thinks if he puts ‘functional’ before the ‘alcoholic’ it’s actually acceptable—weren’t supposed to know I’m here. If I wanted them to know, I would have told them.”
“Kali—”
“And I didn’t run away from those people, like you accused me of. I chose to shut them out and be happy. This was supposed to be my place and now it isn’t. Now they know I’m here and everyone here knows about us.”
“This is your place, Kali, and I’m not letting you go without a fight.” His fingers twine in my hair, tilting my head back, forcing me to look at him. “We might be new, Kali, but we’re damn good together.”
“What about—”
“We’ll figure it out. Together, Kali. We’ll figure it out together.” And then his mouth closes down on mine, his tongue stroking past my lips, his palm molding me close to him. I try to resist, but it’s more because I feel I have to, because I should. Only I don’t want to resist this man. Not now and not since the moment I met him. I cave to my need for him, moaning as I sink into the kiss. I know we are headed for trouble, and I’ve had enough trouble. But I have not had enough of him.