Chapter Two
JORDAN
“Hey Jordan,” Brad’s deep voice said from behind me at my desk. “A few of us are going out for drinks tonight. Would you like to join us?”
I would follow that voice to the depths of Hades, if I was asked to do it. Spinning around in my chair, I turned to face him. The subject of so many of my fantasies smirked down at me.
“Sure, what time?”
“Twenty minutes or so,” he said. “We’re going to Andy’s right down the street.”
“Oh. Andy’s. Of course. I’ll see you there soon.” I hated that I always sounded so nervous around him, but I couldn’t help it.
I’d always had a bit of a thing for older guys. The only guy I’d ever dated that was my own age blew up my college experience when I found out that he was cheating on me. So, I was convinced older men were the way to go.
Too bad the only one I’d ever found truly intriguing and attractive was my best friend’s dad. But I couldn’t help it. Brad was hot.
Like hot, hot. Like Patrick Dempsey before his hair started going gray, and if his eyes had been a burning forest green, instead of those famous blues.
Brad Woods was that. He was the better, more intense, more real version of Patrick Dempsey to me. In other words, he was fucking hot, and I’d had a crush on him since the first time I’d met him.
To make things even more difficult, he wasn’t only hot. He was fun, smart, honest, and caring, with a little bit of bad boy—okay, man, at this stage—thrown in. He was kind, but tough, and he didn’t take shit from anyone ever.
At night, really, really late when I was brutally honest with myself in the cover of darkness, he was everything that I wanted in a man. Complete with the rugged dimples in his cheeks, the intense possessiveness, and the raw sexuality that he radiated.
He could be sweet and gentle, fiercely protective, but easy and quick with a laugh. Brad was the complete package, all right.
But he was also my best friend’s dad, which made my crush on him all kinds of fucked up. I knew that. And yet, Nicole herself had dated a man years older than him, so I couldn’t quite convince myself that it was totally wrong.
I finished up my work, powered down my computer, and gathered my things when I was done. My heels clicked on the marble flooring as I crossed the nearly empty office, and a dull electronic ding sounded to signal that the elevator car had arrived.
While I hadn’t been to Andy’s, I knew where it was. I pushed through the revolving doors that deposited me on the crowded sidewalk downtown, and I took a deep breath and tried to gain control of my thoughts. I’d only been working for him for two days, and already, my crush on Brad was more alive than ever before.
I locked it down as well as I was going to be able to, and I joined the flow of pedestrians hurrying down the pavement to meet the others at Andy’s. Stepping into the place was like what I imagined stepping into a local bar in Italy was like.
They served antipasti only, no main courses. Andy, the owner and chef, had painted the interior to mirror the view from the first restaurant he ran in Portofino. I’d been told that if you got drunk enough, which apparently happened often with the help of Andy’s homebrewed Limocello, it was almost like you could hear the waves lapping at the beach.
“There she is,” Zach cooed the minute he saw me entering through the large wooden door. “The girl of the hour. Surviving your first week?”
At least ten pairs of my co-workers’ eyes settled on me, but they all seemed happy and relaxed. Welcoming even. April, a programmer around my age, whipped around and held a bright green drink out to me.
“Don’t know what it is,” she said. “But the bartender promised it packed a hell of a punch.”
April’s raven hair was chopped into a messy pixie cut, with pink streaks running through it. She was wearing dramatic eye makeup and carried around at least thirty extra pounds. But in the short time I’d known her, I didn’t think I’d ever met anyone so sure of herself. Except for Nicole maybe.
I accepted the drink, sinking onto the stool next to her. “Thanks, but are you sure it’s appropriate to be drinking something that packs a hell of a punch with the bosses here?”
April rolled her eyes good-naturedly, pointing at said bosses. Zach was playing some kind of slot machine derby with a guy named Theo from finance, and Brad had already turned his attention to the pool table, challenging two guys from development to a game.
“Please, it’s because of Brad that we have these little get-togethers. This time, the excuse was to celebrate your first few days, but he just has a really laid-back management style, and he likes to catch up with everyone in an informal setting.”
I watched Brad laugh with the developers, throwing his head back. The deep rumble reached my ears over the soft jazz music. It sounded one hundred percent genuine. The whole scene was so far removed from what I’d gotten used to at my old job that it seemed unreal.
“They’re really that laid-back?” I asked.
April nodded enthusiastically. “Google has nap pods and stuff, but we have this. We get unfettered access to the top management at all times. We can take personal days whenever we need to, within bounds of course. There are squash courts and a yoga studio in basement at the office, too. Both of them frequent the courts, by the way, if you ever need to talk to them. It’s pretty great.”
“I haven’t seen them, no, but I heard they were there.”
The whole setup sounded more than great to me. I’d heard of the way Woods Technologies was run before I started working there, of course. I just never imagined that all the stories could be true.
“Tell me the truth,” I said. “All this sounds great, but are they just the type that say all these things, and then they’re never actually available?”
April shrugged, motioning toward Brad. “You tell me. You ever see a multibillionaire loosening his tie and rolling up his sleeves to play pool with two entry level app developers?”
I followed her gaze, and my jaw nearly dropped. Brad had lost the elegant suit jacket, hanging it over a nearby bar stool with careless precision. Just as April had said, he was rolling up his sleeves, exposing forearms that were still impeccably muscled and divine. His tie was loosened all the way to his top buttons, with a light smattering of dark chest hair peeking out from above them.
April sighed dreamily, her eyes fixed on Brad. “I know, right?”
I cleared my throat, shaking my head decisively. “I know nothing.”
April giggled and gave me long look. “Right. I hear you were his daughter’s best friend. It’s a shame. The man’s positively edible.”
“Edible?” I gaped. He was, but I wasn’t admitting it out loud.
“Edible,” April confirmed, giving me a once-over. “You know, he’s very private about his personal life, but there was this assistant last year. Not ours. She worked for another one of the companies in the compound. But there was a rumor about them. She looked a bit like you.”
“No,” I gasped. There was no way my crush was mutual. No way.
“Yes.” April laughed. “You want pics?”
“No. No way.” I didn’t know what I was refusing really, just that I had to say it out loud.
April laughed again, chewing at the straw in her cocktail while keeping her eyes on the pool game. “Whatever you say, chica.”
I rolled my eyes and took a long pull off my drink, relishing the burn of the alcohol as it traveled down my throat. I’d been pretty good at hiding how I felt about Brad. I wasn’t about to start admitting things now.
It was just a little crush, that was all. I’d been hiding it for years. I could keep doing it. No problem.
During the time that Nicole dated that older guy, I’d let my fantasies get out of hand more often than not, but I’d reined them in since then. Brad Woods saw me as his daughter’s best friend. That was all. Well, maybe not all. I was sure that I was also a pet project to him, given that I had my job because Nic had begged him to hire me.
It hurt to know that, but I did, and I was determined to prove my worth, no matter what. He’d saved me, but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t good at my job. I was going to make him see that.
I just had to get my pulse under control when he was near me. Then, I had to convince my core to stop aching and stop getting wet in his presence. Then, I had to get him out of my dreams. Simple.
I was fucked.
Drinking shot after shot with new co-worker after new co-worker, I didn’t see much of Brad for the rest of the evening. I heard his laugh and felt my skin prickle in awareness when he was near, but I didn’t turn around.
I couldn’t face him, or I didn’t want to. Not until I figured out what it meant that my mouth had literally gone dry when I’d watched him get dressed down for the pool game.
It was nothing good. I knew that much. Nothing that I should’ve been feeling. Those flutters down below, the ones that had woken up my lady bits? They were especially unwelcome.
A crush was one thing, but physical feelings and pondering how best to act on them, now that I had a fair bit of alcohol coursing through my veins? That was dangerous.
I was buzzing from the drinks that April kept passing me, and I knew that Brad had been pounding shots with some of the others, because I’d been keeping him in my periphery.
He looked amazing. Relaxed and sexy, he owned the room, while at the same time, making each person he spoke to shine with accomplishment. It was a work of fucking art to watch him do his thing.
Then, finally, it was my turn for his attention as he made his rounds. “And what do you think, Jordan? Your first couple of days been going well?
Those forest green eyes bore into mine, and I practically melted under them. My tongue felt like it was glued to my palate, and my breath was caught somewhere between my lungs and my throat.
Say something, loser! “It’s been fine, thank you. Everyone seems really friendly.”
“They’d better be,” he mumbled, favoring me with a grin. A sexy, private one that made my blood run hot and my panties damp. I leaned toward him, the movement seemingly unavoidable, almost as if there was a magnet pulling me to him.
He was a force of nature to be reckoned with, one that had me forgetting that my purse was balancing precariously on the edge of the counter because I hadn’t been able to decide if I wanted to set it down or keep it on me. Naturally, I destroyed the moment by knocking the purse with my elbow and sending it falling to the floor between us.
“Shit, I’m such a klutz,” I muttered, kneeling down to get it.
Brad bent down at the same time, and both our hands reached for my tiny purse. Our fingers brushed when they closed over it. His fingers lingered for just a moment too long, and my eyes leaped to his.
What I saw there was what I had been fantasizing about for years. A flash of heat, the darkening eyes of a man who was lusting after the woman he was looking at.
Me.
My lips parted of their own accord, and he was on them faster than a lightning bolt. A brush of his lips against mine, quicker than I could comprehend, soft, yet commanding. And then they were gone as we both pulled back almost instantaneously.
Breathing hard, we locked eyes for a second before he stood up straight, handed my purse to me, and strode away from me like nothing had happened at all.
As I watched his broad shoulders disappear from view, my mind was spinning while my lips were still tingling from his brief touch. It felt like someone had taken a live wire to my skin, holding it just millimeters from my flesh, enough to make my body react.
Humming, that was the only word that came to mind to describe the feeling. I’d read about it and heard about it in movies, but I didn’t know that my body could really hum.
Until now. Until Brad. It left me with just one, very complicated question echoing in my mind.
What the hell just happened?