Chapter 29
Bennett
Fuck it.
I jumped off the highway at the next exit.
I swear, I’d showered and dressed with every intention of meeting my buddies for drinks downtown. But halfway to O’Malley’s, I decided on a change of plans.
And now that I got closer, I started to second-guess myself again. Bianchi Winery wasn’t just her parents’ place—they were also clients.
Then again, that seemed par for the course. Annalise was the last person I should be chasing. So why not track her down at a client’s house? What could possibly go wrong?
Everything.
Anything.
But……fuck it.
I was invited. Annalise had told me herself that Margo had extended an invitation to me. At least I wasn’t crashing the party.
I pulled down the long dirt road just as the sun started to set. A dozen or so cars were parked along the front of the winery, including my car’s twin. I parked and checked my phone one last time. It was going to suck if she was here with a date. But I couldn’t imagine she was the type of woman who’d be out on a date a few nights after sleeping with another guy.
Hell, I was that type of guy, and I couldn’t have done it after the night we’d had.
I walked into the retail store just as Margo Bianchi came up from the wine cellar.
“Bennett! I’m so glad you’re feeling better and decided to join us after all.”
Feeling better? I went with it. “Turned out to be just a twenty-four-hour thing.”
“Annalise and Madison are downstairs. I’m just going to grab another tray of cheese. Go on down. Everyone’s loving the new harvest.”
“Let me give you a hand with the tray first.”
“Nonsense. You go enjoy yourself. I’m sure my daughter is going to be delighted to see you.”
I wouldn’t be so sure of that. “Okay. Thank you.”
The wine cellar had four alcove tables on one side and a long, stone bar on the other. I scanned the tables and saw faces I didn’t recognize. But I definitely recognized the exposed back of a woman sitting on the second-to-last stool at the bar. Facing away from me, she had no warning I was here.
I blew out a deep breath and started toward her. The woman sitting next to her caught my eye and watched me approach. I held one finger up to my lips as my other hand touched Annalise’s back.
I leaned in to whisper near her ear. “I was feeling better, so I thought I’d join you after all.”
She spun around so fast she wobbled and nearly fell off her chair. “Bennett?”
The woman next to her raised a brow. “Bennett? As in the hot guy from the office?”
I extended my hand. “One and the same. Bennett Fox. Nice to meet you. I’m guessing you’re Madison?”
“I am.” Madison looked back and forth between the two of us. “Well, this is a nice surprise. I didn’t realize Bennett was joining us tonight.”
Annalise looked frazzled. “I didn’t either.”
Madison smirked and looked to me for a response. I went with the truth.
“She’s been avoiding me for two days. I also have a pair of her underwear in my pocket I thought she might like back.”
Her friend laughed and leaned in to kiss Annalise on the cheek. “I like him. I’m going to go find my date. You two play nice.”
I slipped into Madison’s seat beside Annalise, keeping my hand on her back. “So you talk about how hot I am with your friend?”
“Don’t let your head swell any bigger. It was the only compliment I gave you.”
I leaned in. “Really? Even after the other night?”
Her cheeks turned pink. God, why did I love that about her so much? “I like your dress.”
“You don’t even know what it looks like. I’m sitting.”
I ran my knuckles along the exposed skin of her back. “It lets me touch your skin without having to sneak my hand up your skirt. So it’s one of my favorites already. Seeing the front will just be icing on the cake.”
Her cheeks darkened. God, I wanted to fuck her in broad daylight so I could watch every color her skin turned. I bet it was better than fall foliage.
“What are you doing here, Bennett?”
I took the glass of wine in front of her and drank from it. “Margo invited me. You told me that yourself the other day at lunch, remember?”
“Yes. But you didn’t mention you were coming.”
I held her eyes. “I would have, if you’d returned my call.”
She looked away.
Matteo noticed me for the first time and made a big fuss about my arrival. He set me up with a flight of different wines from this year’s harvest and stuck around talking for a while, until Margo pulled him away with a big smile—claiming to need his help with the icemaker upstairs.
Annalise traced the rim of her glass with her finger. “We don’t even have an icemaker.”
I chuckled. “Seems like I’m not the only one who thinks we need a few minutes alone to talk. Your friend disappeared the minute I got here, and your mom is trying to give us some privacy.”
She lifted her glass to her lips. “Maybe your presence just repels people.”
I smiled. “Maybe. But what does my presence do for you?”
Annalise swiveled her chair to face me. She looked around—I assumed to see how private our conversation would be—then leaned closer.
“I had a really good time the other night.”
I’d used that opening line enough times to know where this conversation was going. “But…” I said for her.
“But…we work together. Or actually, we’re pretty much competitors working in the same company.”
I leaned in to whisper in her ear, even though I knew no one could hear us. I just wanted an opportunity to get closer.
“Are you afraid I’ll fuck your trade secrets out of you?”
She mimicked my move and leaned in to whisper in mine. “No. Are you?”
I chuckled. I probably should’ve been afraid. Because I was pretty sure I’d show her whatever she wanted in order to get her to come home with me tonight.
“Look, I’m gonna put all my cards on the table. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about being inside of you for two days. You’re still getting over the asshole. I’m not looking for anything serious. We have an expiration date in our future whether we like it or not—one of us is getting shipped off to Texas. We can either spend the next month or so being frustrated and pissing each other off at the office, or we can spend that time being pissed off at Foster, Burnett and Wren for putting us in this situation while taking our frustrations out on each other in a productive manner at night. I vote for the latter.”
She sucked in her bottom lip while she kicked it around for a minute. “So during the day, if a client we’re both pitching gave me some inside information on the direction they wanted to go, and then you found out I didn’t share that with you…you wouldn’t be pissed?”
“Hell yes, I’d be pissed. But that’s the beauty of our situation. I’d be pissed as shit that you got an advantage over me. So the next morning, you might have a little trouble walking from me taking out that frustration on you. Let’s face it, it would give me an excuse to paddle that ass I’ve been dreaming about paddling since the first day I saw you. But I’m competitive, not an asshole. So you can bet I’d make it work for you, too.”
Annalise swallowed. “And if the situation were reversed? If I find out something you did that upsets me?”
“Then I’ll lick you until you’re not pissed off anymore. And probably try to piss you off again the next day.”
She laughed. “You’re making this sound so simple. But it’s way more complicated than that.”
I took her hands in mine. “Well, there is one catch.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s going to be difficult for you not to fall for me.”
“God, you’re such an ass.”
I leaned in. “An ass that you have a shitload of chemistry with, like it or not. So whadda you say? By day we fight like enemies, by night we fuck like warriors?”
She looked me in the eyes. “I really hope I don’t regret this.”
My eyes went wide. I hadn’t expected her to say yes, though I was prepared to wear her down. “At the end of the day, we only regret the things we missed out on doing. So I’ll make sure we do it all.”
Annalise’s friend walked back over. “You two look cozy.”
“Now you come interrupt? Where were you five minutes ago when I had a temporary lapse of sanity and agreed to the crazy deal this lunatic just proposed?”
Madison smiled at her. “You need a good dose of insanity. Plus, we’re running out of stuff to talk about after twenty-five years of friendship. This will give us all new material for our weekly dinners.”
Annalise leaned over and kissed Madison’s cheek. “It certainly will.”
***
I’d wanted Annalise to myself from the moment I’d walked in. Not that I didn’t have a good time—because surprisingly, I did. Her friend Madison was a straight shooter, and her date was a decent guy, too.
But now they’d just said goodbye, and Annalise and I stood outside the winery, just the two of us, as they pulled away. The dirt that kicked into the air from the tires hadn’t even settled yet when I had her face in my hands. I kissed her softly at first, but I couldn’t stop myself, and it didn’t take very long before it turned hard and heated.
She moaned into my mouth, and I had to force myself to pull back before it was too late and I ended up fucking her against a tree for her parents to walk out and see.
I brushed my thumb over her swollen lips. “Come home with me.”
“I can’t.” She frowned. “I told my mom I’d stay over tonight. Tomorrow morning I take the ride with her to go deliver free bottles of the new season’s wine to some of her biggest customers. Matteo cooks a huge brunch, and all the pickers and workers come to eat. We started doing that the first year they bought the place, and it stuck as a tradition.”
That sounded nice, but I was selfish, so I couldn’t even hide my pout.
“Awww…” She stroked my cheek. “You look like I used to at Christmas when I opened all my new toys and then my mom made me put them away because company was coming over.”
I locked my hands behind her back. “I definitely want to play with my new toy.”
“I think we should establish a few ground rules anyway,” she said.
“Uh-oh. Rules always get me in trouble.”
She smiled. “I bet they do. But I think we need a few.”
“Like what?”
“Well, like I don’t think we should make it public at work that anything is going on between us. Not even to our friends.”
I nodded. “Makes sense.”
“And when we’re together outside of the office, no talking about work projects where we’re competitors.”
“Agreed.”
“Okay. Well, that was easy. You’re not usually so agreeable.”
“I also have a few of my own ground rules I’d like to establish.”
Annalise raised a brow. “You do, do you?”
“Yep.”
“Okay…”
“Unless one of us ends things before the expiration date, we’re monogamous.”
“I guess that was a given for me. But good, I’m glad you put it out there anyway. Anything else?”
“Are you on the pill?”
“I am, yes.”
“Then let’s get rid of the condoms. I had my annual physical a few weeks ago. Clean as a whistle. If it feels that good inside of you wearing them, I need to find out what the hell it feels like without.”
She leaned in and pressed her breasts against me, looking up.
“Bare…okay.”
“What time is brunch over tomorrow?”
“Probably by three.”
“Come straight to my house after. I’ll make us dinner and eat you for dessert.”
She looked up from under those long eyelashes and ran her tongue across her top lip. “What about my dessert?”
I groaned. “You’re killing me, Texas.”