Chapter 5

Nash

Bonnie Calhoun was dressed in a way that I had never seen her before. In some sort of tight gray dress with sharp formal shoulders and quarter-length sleeves. But her breasts looked huge in that dress, juicy and well-proportioned, and I couldn’t stop staring.

I didn’t mean to. Not when her fingers were clutching my pen tightly, hovering over the dotted line of the contract in front of her. I noticed the way a few strands of golden wispy hair had come loose from her tight bun. She looked like she was trying to wish it away. She was focused so hard on it, I was almost afraid that she would make the papers spontaneously combust.

Her breath softly blew those fallen strands of hair off her face in a lulling sway. There was a deathly silence in the boardroom. Not one of my people were speaking, and her partner, Peter, was glaring at her. He was willing her to sign, while Bonnie was taking her own sweet time with it.

I clenched my jaw. I wanted her to sign, for the sake of my company. For strictly business reasons. But personally, I didn’t want to have to do this to her. She was struggling against it. When she challenged me about the plan, it made me uncomfortable. I wanted to stand up, walk around the table and just give her a big hug. Stroke her back and tell her it would be all right. But I knew it wouldn’t be all right. Nothing could console her. Bonnie Calhoun didn’t like to fail, and she had done just that.

“Just do it, Bonnie.” Peter’s somber voice floated through the room. He was trying to be gentle, but she had already spent the past five minutes just staring at the papers.

She shot him a look that made him back down. I nearly smiled. I had never met a woman as fiery as Bonnie before I met her in college. And I hadn’t met one since. It was good to see that she still had that fire in her, despite the circumstances.

“If you would like some time alone, we have a separate meeting room that we could move you to,” I said, breaking the silence.

Both Bonnie and Peter looked up at me. She was shooting daggers at me with her baby blue eyes. While Peter just looked grateful that I had said something.

“Thank you for the offer, Mr. Preston, but I think we should just get this done. There isn’t anything to discuss anymore,” Peter said in a resigned deep voice. Bonnie shot him a look again, but he looked away from her. The poor man.

She was still struggling. Breathing in deeply and then out. Her breath shook strands of her hair. The tips of her fingers had turned a bright red from the pressure she was putting on the pen in her hands. She licked her lips. Her small bubblegum tongue stuck out, and I felt something move in my pants. How amazing would it be to have that mouth on me? On my cock. I cleared my throat, and our eyes met again.

“Bonnie?” I said, trying to hide the thought I’d just had. I shouldn’t have been thinking about her body, undressing her with my eyes, while she was in the middle of the biggest crisis in her life. But I couldn’t help it. Our time apart had made me forget how much I’d wanted her in college. How she made me hard at night when I thought of her. I hadn’t expected to see her again.

“I’m doing it! Just give me a minute,” she snapped at me, licking her lips again.

I stared at her some more. Why did she think she was better than me? Why had I never been able to impress her? Was it because she hated my family and what they stood for? Because she was secretly attracted to me? I knew I turned her on.

The scratching sound that the pen made on the paper jerked me out of my fantasies. She was signing it.

Bonnie chucked the pen away from her after she was done. It went rolling down the length of the table and then fell with a soft thump on the carpeted floor.

“Bonnie! Seriously!” Peter rebuked, before bending down to pick the pen up.

She was staring at me, her blue eyes narrowed and darkened. Her plump pink lips were pinched. Her cheeks were blossoming to a red like a rosebud. She was pissed. Again.

“That’s done then. Shall we shake on it?” I asked, standing up.

Peter stood up beside her, while she remained seated, refusing to comply with anything that I had to say.

“Excuse her,” Peter apologized for her, and extended his hand to me. We shook and then I turned to Bonnie again. I didn’t want to acknowledge what this meant. The possibility that I might never see her again. I wanted her so bad. I wanted to fuck the living daylights out of this woman. I had wanted to do it since college, and now there was an opportunity again. Or was there? She looked angry enough with me to kill me if we were alone. I didn’t think she was in the mood for fucking. She never had been.

“Bonnie?” I said. This time, she stood up resignedly. I noticed the way her eyelids fluttered as she caught one of my people pulling the file toward them.

“Congratulations, Nash. You now own my company,” she said and finally extended her hand to me.

I couldn’t smile. I couldn’t bring myself to. I nodded my head as gently as possible and stuck out my hand to meet hers.

Our skin touched. Her hand was small, delicate, almost too fragile for me to grasp. How could a woman who had that mouth have such a delicate hand? It threw me a little.

She was looking at me a little defeatedly as well. Like she was unsure of what to say, where to look. She was embarrassed in her failure. And there was no other choice but to concede to me. It made me uncomfortable, seeing her like this. Seeing her suffer. But it had to be done. I had done her a favor. Nobody would have offered them that much money for that sinking ship.

Bonnie pulled her hand away and I felt a sudden disappointment, because I wasn’t touching her anymore.

“Your company is in safe hands,” I said, as confidently as I could, buttoning up my suit jacket. She was following my every movement with her eyes. With those same piercing blue judgmental eyes that I was always so aware of. There was never any way to escape that look.

“Ready to go?” Peter asked beside her, but she didn’t turn to look at him. She was busy trying to suffocate me with her sharp gaze.

“Bonnie, do you mind if we have a word in my office?” I said, just in time. Just when she was about to look away from me.

“Why? What else do you want to take from me?” she asked, and it made me smile.

I shook my head and breathed in deeply. “I just want to catch up, in my office? Please?” I said, walking toward the door. My people had begun shuffling out of the room, and Peter looked like he was desperate to leave as well. Bonnie and I were the only ones still lingering for some reason, for the most obvious reason. She couldn’t hide her desire for me. It was burning her up. Just like it was burning me up. She didn’t want to agree to go with me, but I knew she wouldn’t be able to stop herself.

“I’ll catch you later then, Bonnie,” Peter said, and neither of us looked at him as he walked out of the room, leaving us alone.

Alone with Bonnie Calhoun again. I could barely control myself. I wasn’t sure how long I would be able to keep my hands off her. Some decorum needed to be maintained, surely. All her life’s work, her sweat and blood, now belonged to me.

“Lead the way?” she said, arching one brow. Of course, I was going to lead the way. I was going to have her in my office, alone.