The things that I’d collected over a few months of working at Apptitude didn’t even need a banker’s box to carry out. It all fit in my laptop bag.

Every day that I worked after giving Gage and Susan my two-week notice was harder than the one before. Every day I went back and forth over my decision to leave so I could commit myself to trying a real relationship with Gage. Every day his expression was a little more hangdog, a little more mournful. The look on his face tied my stomach in knots, but for once I decided not to let myself be wishy-washy.

In the end I didn’t even have to work the whole two weeks. Susan let me know that they would manage without me but I would still get two weeks of pay, and I got the bum’s rush out of the office.

Before I left on my last day, I allowed myself one solid hour of necking with Gage on the black leather couch in his office.

“Are you sure about this, Madeline?” he drawled in my ear. We were curled up like baby cats on the couch, my back against the armrest and my former employer deliciously crowding me into the corner.

Even someone whose decision was carved in stone would wobble a little with Brian Gage’s five o’clock shadow brushing over their earlobe. I fought a shiver, not wanting to show any hesitation. I wasn’t strong enough to withstand a full-on siege, and we both knew it.

“Yes? Oh god, right there.”

His lips curved into a smile against the side of my neck as his fingers deftly undid the buttons of my tailored white shirt. “Really sure? You won’t be able to do this every day,” he reminded me.

“I’m sure I’ll survive.” I might self-combust, though.

My tongue ventured out to taste the divot at the base of his throat. His skin had that end of the day smell—the pure masculine scent left on him after the veneer of shampoo and soap had worn off. It was intoxicating to me. Maybe all this attraction was just pheromones. “I’ll live.” Probably.

“But I won’t,” he groaned as I untucked his shirt. “Really, Maddie? A black lace bra under this shirt that just screams businesswoman?”

My fingers were practically itching to undo his zipper and… no! I was an adult, and I had more self-control than that. “There’s always after work.”

“The first time she makes a decision, and it takes her away from me,” he complained under his breath. Of course, I heard him since his breath was practically on my own lips.

My mouth sought his in a passionate attempt to stop him from making me doubt myself. His tongue helped, but it was his hands on my breasts that really bolstered my self-confidence. I had to stop making out with him at work, so that I could get naked with him outside of the office.

“What else does my shirt scream?”

He tilted his head. “I can’t hear it very well, since it’s all the way over there on the floor now.”

So it was. My nipples hardened in the cool air of the office, rising to meet his urgent touch.

“You sure you don’t want me to try to train the temp?” I hadn’t heard much about my replacement, but assumed that he was getting somebody from the temp agency through which he’d found me.

“Hmmm?” He was twisting a lock of my hair with one hand and teasing a circle around my bellybutton with the other. Heat built in my core, but all my spare underwear was packed, so I reluctantly stilled his fingers before they ventured lower.

“Training?” I repeated.

“Right. Unneeded for now.” With a frown, he flopped back against the couch beside me. His erection was on full display, but he showed not one iota of shame or embarrassment—just a whole lot of tenting. “Susan’s going to help me out for a while.”

Pretty man say what? “Explain?”

“She took a course in business communication and wants to work on her skills, so she offered to work with me until we find your replacement.” He grabbed my hand and kissed my palm. “You’re a hard act to follow.”

“She wants to follow your ‘hard act’,” I muttered. Susan was probably already imagining late nights on this very couch. She was a relatively nice person, but a little too flirty with my man.

I traced an outline of the bulge in his trousers with my fingernail, making him hiss in pleasure. There was a sexy tendon in his neck that was calling my name as well. Decisions, decisions.

“So what are you going to do with your time now? Other than me, of course.”

Gage waggled his dark eyebrows in a manner I’m sure he thought was seductive. On anyone else it would look ridiculous, but I found pretty much everything about him irresistible. I rolled my eyes and tried to escape my little corner of the couch, but he pulled me across his lap instead—ass end up.

“Hey!” I twisted around to glare at him.

His hands splayed across my backside, exploring the center seam on my leggings. “I believe I owe you a spanking.”

“That was just playing. Goofing off.”

“I never just ‘goof off,’ Madeline. Now it’s time for you to get off.”

Party pooper. “Okay,” I sighed. I squirmed to move off his lap, but let out a delighted yelp as his palm stung my skin. My neck tweaked as I jerked my head around, but he just smirked at me.

“Different kind of ‘get off.’”

Oh. In that case… I wriggled to get more comfortable, but there was a good chance that my sudden breathlessness had more to do with his intentions than my ribcage pressing into his thighs.

“Isn’t it time we had a safe word?” I asked.

“Do you feel unsafe?”

“Not exactly.” Nervous, maybe? I’d never been spanked before, and I was surprised at how damp the idea made me.

I was spread over his lap like a napkin at a nice restaurant, my knees and arms on the couch on either side of him. My back was arched due to the angle that my hips were pressing against his thighs, pushing my ass further up. The leather of the couch cooled my heated face.

Gage walked his fingers up the back of my thigh and over my ass to hook them in the waistband of my leggings.

“Can’t you be spanked through clothes?” I asked him.

“Of course.”

Without hesitation he peeled my leggings down to expose my cheeks. Then Gage snapped the top of the thong I wore to avoid a visible panty line.

“Hey!” I gasped, resting my face on my hands to look back at him. His expression was intense and amused at the same time. With one hand he massaged me and with the other he reached over to touch my face.

“I can’t wait to make these cheeks as pink and warm as this one.”

Oh god. I was going to die of embarrassment and arousal while sporting a raspberry-lace whale tail. “Gage, you can’t say things like that to me.”

He gave me a raised eyebrow, as though to say “Have you met me?” I was pinned by his disbelieving stare. And then he smacked my ass.

“Ow!”

The sudden flick of his fingertips startled me, even though I knew it was coming. He didn’t even use his whole hand—just stunned me with the whiplash of his first three fingers. It was the kind of slap you’d give a child on the hand for trying to sneak cookies before dinner—or at least the kind I got in one foster home.

“Am I supposed to be counting these or something?” I asked him.

The lascivious gleam in his eyes filled my heart and broke my courage at the same time. God help me, but I was up for anything with this man.

He frowned. “Do you think I’m punishing you?”

It was a good question. “You’re still mad that I quit,” I pointed out.

“Disappointed, not mad.”

It was my turn to raise an eyebrow.

“Okay, I’m a little mad.”

“But you get why, right?” It was important to me that he understood why I couldn’t work for him anymore if we were going to pursue a real relationship. I was ready to take that leap of faith and commit my heart to him, which was a hell of a lot scarier than committing my working day to him.

He was silent, one hand on the small of my arched back and the other slowly petting me.

“Gage? Look at me.” His head tilted. If I craned my neck anymore around, I would look like I was possessed. “I want you.”

“You’re half naked and bent over my knee. I should hope you do.”

“Smart ass.”

Once again his hand came down, lighter this time but with no less of a sting. My ass actually smarted, which I supposed I had asked for. My whole body was heating up, and I was glad that my leggings hobbled me at the knees, because it made it a lot easier to squeeze my thighs together.

“Uh uh uh,” he scolded me. “I see what you’re doing, Madeline.” He dipped between my legs, making me gasp as he traced along my crack to the moist darkness below. He spread his fingers, preventing me from clenching my upper thighs together for relief.

“Gage…” It was a plea for mercy, a request for more, and a warning not to destroy me, all rolled into one simple utterance of his name. But as he circled my entrance, I barely remembered my own name. “Ohhh.”

My shiver turned into a pained hiccup when he brought his palm down this time, fully spanking me across both cheeks. Holy fuck.

“You’re dripping, Madeline.”

“Brilliant observation, sir.”

I turned my face back to the smooth surface of the couch. I couldn’t watch him anymore, couldn’t handle the lust in his eyes without exploding myself. “Am I a-allowed to come?” I asked with a tremor in my voice. Considering what I had done to him on this very couch, I definitely needed to ask.

“What do you think?”

I hated when he did that—turned my questions around on me. If I knew, I wouldn’t have asked him! Either I was right and looked like an idiot for asking him in the first place, or I was wrong and potentially made him angry. No matter what I did, it was hard to win. Speaking of which, I felt the length of him harden under my stomach where I lay on him.

“I think this turns you on a little,” I said, arching my back to press my belly into his erection.

“I’m not the only one.”

He gently slipped one finger into me at the same time as spanking me again.

“Oh god!”

Then he withdrew his hand and I heard him say, “You taste like a mimosa, Madeline. Bright and sparkly and dangerously easy to drink.”

The low thrumming in me cranked up, until I was squirming on his lap. “Can I come, sir?” I repeated my question, jerking my head up as he rained a small shower of smacks all over me, from my sacrum to the crease at the back of my upper thighs. He’d better freaking say yes, because I was going to lose it anyway.

“Oh Madeline, your skin is all bright and blushing.” The reverence in his voice was admiring, not creepy. I was surely blushing all over, but a part of me delighted in pleasing him.

“Do you like it?” I asked shyly.

“I love it.”

I could tell. I was feeling a little like I was between a rock and a hard place—literally. All of a sudden I felt as though we were too far apart, disconnected despite our position. Bending my elbow, I reached my hand back and he twined our fingers together.

“I want you to come, Maddie.”

That was all the permission I needed. Our fingers still locked together, he brought his other hand down on my ass and I flew apart.

“Yes!”

I closed my eyes against the roiling swells of pleasure spreading from my belly. My climax was sharp, swift, and left me boneless over his hard body. I didn’t get to enjoy it for very long, as he scooped me up into his arms and cradled me against his chest.

“Ouch!” My ass was a little tender as it rubbed against his pants, and the erection he sported underneath.

With a gentle hand he tilted my chin up and turned my head to face him. “Good girl,” he said succinctly before kissing the breath out of me.

I felt ridiculously proud of myself. I’d taken another chance and it was okay. I felt like I was flying in his arms, and he was holding out my wings for me.

“I’ll miss you at work,” I admitted, his nose nudging mine in an Eskimo kiss.

“You’ll do great. Maybe I’ll get more done without your ass distracting me.”

Well, there was that as well.