But then I heard, “Ahh,” and that . . . well, I definitely wasn’t expecting that.

“You look so bloody gorgeous.”

I knew that voice. I’d spent the last six months with my ears straining to hear him step out of the elevator and onto my floor, to speak during meetings. For him to speak to me. This was Niall, and he was . . . I think . . .

“Go slow. I want your tongue to play with me before you show me what you look like when you beg for it.”

OH MY GOD.

I blanched. Had I somehow stumbled onto something I wasn’t supposed to have? Was this even Niall? It seemed impossible that he would record anything like this, let alone give it to me to hear.

Unless he didn’t know it was being recorded. Was he . . . with someone? Should I tell him I had this?

“Did you think about this earlier?” he said through the tape. “When you licked your dessert from your spoon, or sucked the sauce from your thumb, did you imagine you had my cock between your lips?”

Dessert? Was he talking about . . . ?

I straightened and glanced toward the conference room, not sure if I was surprised when I found him already looking at me. I didn’t know how long he’d been watching, but when he nodded, slowly, I was certain he knew exactly what I was listening to, and that he’d orchestrated this entire thing so I could.

“You want it?”

“Like that.”

“Oh, sweet girl . . . suck me . . .”

He was getting himself off, thinking about me going down on him . . .

He must have done this last night after dinner—Holy shit!

It was sixty-eight degrees in that office, and I was sweating.

Niall didn’t look away from me once, and I swear this situation could only have felt dirtier if he’d had me spread out naked on the floor. And then, only barely. How did he do that? We’d hardly touched, and yet it felt like he’d touched me in ways that nobody else ever had.

“I’ll never get this sight out of my head. Never.”

I crossed my legs and pressed them together, shifting in my seat. I could feel how wet I was, how ready my body felt to do exactly the things he was talking about.

“I’m coming. Ruby. Ruby. Please . . . please let me come inside.”

When the group broke for lunch, I noted the way Niall hesitated to leave. He’d have to face me now—now that I’d listened to his hit single—without the safety net of twenty feet, a wall of glass, and fifteen engineers and transit authority workers between us. He was nervous, and fuck if it wasn’t the most endearing thing I’d ever seen.

Unable to put it off any longer, he gathered his things and stepped out.

“Hungry?” he asked.

“Starving,” I told him, wondering if—hoping—he got the implication of my words.

Judging by the way he reached up and began to fidget with the knot in his tie, I was guessing he did.

I tilted my head toward the hallway. “Walk with me?”

I led us out of the office and down a slowly emptying hall. A man from the meeting stopped us on our way.

“There’s lunch on the floor above us. It’s National Taco Day or something, if you’re hungry. Should be . . . interesting.”

Well, the most interesting thing this guy was going to have happen today, anyway.

“We need to touch base with the London office,” Niall said smoothly. “But we’ll be up as soon as possible.”

And I had to admit, I was impressed.

With a nod, the intruder was off and we continued on, down one hall and then another, until the sounds of voices were just a hum in the opposite direction.

“We’re calling London, are we?” I asked.

“Not exactly.” He glanced over at me, smiling. “I assume you’re taking me somewhere quiet to talk?”

“Talk?” I said with a little smile.

He pursed his amazing lips. “Perhaps.”

“Speaking of ‘talking,’ here are your notes,” I said, handing him the notebook.

“Ah. Thank you.”

A dark room stood at the end of the hall, and I led him inside, closing the door behind us. Then, leaning back against the cool wood, I said, “Your messages were very . . . engrossing.”

“Engrossing, you say?” He took a step closer.

“They affected me,” I said through a giggle. “Deeply.”

Tilting his head and wearing a smile that tilted half of his mouth deliciously, he murmured, “How so?”

I moved to answer, to give him something playful and coy, but when our eyes met, every coherent thought left my brain. My heart started beating so hard with the sudden, surreal understanding that this wasn’t a fantasy, this wasn’t just flirtation. I wasn’t sitting in the middle of a Thursday meeting imagining all of this.