Skye looks up at me, her luscious lips slightly parted, and it takes a long few seconds for my words to register. They’re evidently not the ones she expected because her eyes go dark and her cheeks turn an even deeper shade of red. Not a pleasant shade this time. One that looks like shame.

All I want in the entire world is to pull her closer to me, to keep breathing in the light, floral scent of her shampoo, but she steps back. The space between us widens, and I drop my hand to my side.

“No, of course not,” she says, and then laughs nervously, her hands rising to her dark hair like she’s in the habit of patting down every stray lock. Only there are no stray locks. She looks fucking flawless, as usual, and here I am, giving her a stinging rejection just like every other asshole on the planet. “Oh, my God, I’m—” Skye shakes her head, smiling through what has to be utter mortification. “I don’t know what I was thinking, coming in here. I’m sorry.”

She looks at me for another long second. My hands ache to be touching her again, this woman who was bold enough to come in here and offer herself up to me. She’s probably wasted on being a secretary. Any woman with guts like that deserves something better than merely sitting at a desk outside my office answering the phone and scheduling meetings.

You could give her that.

The thought is tantalizing, almost too tantalizing, and I push it away, shoving it down into the deepest part of my mind.

Don’t go there, Matt. Don’t go there. 

Skye turns on her heel, whirling around toward the door. She’s almost through it, almost home free, when I finally force the word out of my mouth.

“Skye.”

She spins back around, her eyes wide. I’ve never called her by her first name before. It tastes sweet in my mouth. I want to wrap my tongue around it a hundred more times today. And then wrap my tongue around—

“What?” There’s no more cool, professional front. Her face is the picture of confusion, the picture of embarrassment, and I can tell she can’t fucking believe that I’d say anything else to her. I probably shouldn’t. I should just let her go back to her desk and drop this topic. We can move on. We can forget it ever happened.

“I’m not sorry.”

She gives me one nod, a sharp incline of her head, then disappears through the doorway.

* * *

I am totally, completely screwed.

I can’t get Skye’s offer out of my head.

When I came out of my office at five, she was already gone. The dark computer screen had a sticky note attached to it. She must have known I’d come looking for her. Who wouldn’t after a conversation like that? I snatched it off the screen. “Stepped out early for an appointment. -S.” I read it three times, tracing my eyes over her handwriting, then crumpled it up into a ball, destined for the wastebasket.

“It’s over,” I said out loud as I made my way down to the main lobby and out into the parking lot. I drive a five-year-old Honda—I’ve invested every last cent into Hunter Housing—and it was waiting for me, as loyal as always.

She was on my mind all the way home, through the traffic, all the way through my workout at the gym in my building, and all the way through dinner with my best friend, Kevin. He called me out on it.

“What’s on your mind, you asshole?” He’d taken a swig of his beer and leered at me from across the table. “A woman?”

“None of your business.”

“Have more beer.”

“I’ve had enough.”

“You never have enough.”

It’s fucking true. I don’t have enough—enough of anything. I always want more of whatever it is. And it’s my fucking mistake that I admitted that out loud to Skye.

I’m back at my apartment—a penthouse in one of my first buildings, so it sounds fancier than it is—when the guilt finally catches up to me.

I never should have touched her. I never should have said those things to her, about how much I want her, no matter how true it is. And I shouldn’t have let her overhear any of the conversation between me and my father.

She shouldn’t have been listening in the first place...

I’m alone, the muted light of the TV illuminating the living room, and at that thought, my mind spirals into a fantasy. Skye has only ever been perfectly professional, perfectly prim, always put-together. I’d like to see her stripped down, bent over, her back arched, ass raised to meet my hand. It’s unbelievably naughty to listen in on a private conversation. I could teach her a lesson. It would probably be the first one she’s ever had to learn, given those big green eyes, and the way she’s always so careful to be perfect.

And when I’m done, I could slide my fingers between her legs and lick her juices off of them. She’d be soaking, fucking wet. Because I have a sense that Skye could be a bad girl for me. I saw it in her eyes how much she wants it. 

I have my zipper down before I realize what I’m doing, and the next thing I know I have my fist wrapped around my cock. I don’t need to think about anything other than her perfect lips, the curve of her ass, the way it would be so white when she bent over my desk and so red when I was finished with her. And then, even hotter, the sight of her belly rounding out with a baby inside it, her breasts growing fuller every day. Not just any baby. My baby. The baby that would unlock the rest of my life.

I get a tissue from the holder by the sofa just in time to shoot rope after rope of come into it, my mind blanking.

When I’m finally spent, my head is clear for the first time all day.

First things first, I’m going to clean up.

Then I have to find Skye and apologize to her.

It can’t wait until tomorrow.