I drum my fingertips on the table impatiently. After getting a dressing down from security guards like I was six years old, I was shoved out the front door and not allowed to go down to the Creaking Maple conference room – god, their conference rooms are just as bad as ours – where the buyout of Atlantic Trading Group was being discussed.

I was…not happy. I’d done everything I was supposed to. I’d brought business to Carter Jeffries, something she cares about. I’d offered to take her out on my yacht, something she cares about. I’d even learned how to do a couple of dance moves, despite being born with two left feet, and my leg muscles now ache from three weeks of dance lessons every night by a local hip-hop dancer. Guaranteed to impress her, I’d paid an ungodly amount of money to learn these moves straight from a master.

And yet, she’d lied, fucking lied, when the security guard showed up. This is twice that I’ve gotten into trouble over her, and she doesn’t seem to give a good goddamn. When she shows up, I’m going to give her holy hell for that stunt. I’m going to—

"Hi," she says, sliding into the chair across the table from me.

"Hey," I grump at her. Because that’s really the only way to describe that syllable that I just said. "Brittney, I cannot believe you just did that. Right now, I’m missing the buyout meeting because you lied to the security gu—"

"You can’t believe I did that?!" she interrupts me, hissing and leaning across the table to glare at me. "I can’t believe you did that! I am on my way up at Carter Jeffries, there Wonder Boy, so I have to watch my Ps and Qs. You may own your own company and can do whatever the hell you want to do there, but I can’t. I have a boss, and a boss’ boss. They watch my every move ‘cause I’m a woman, and I’m trying to play in a boy’s world. 

"And then you waltz on back into an area clearly marked for employees only, where proprietary info is kept, and think that I’m going to cover your ass when you get caught! When you showed up at my desk, I thought you’d received permission to go back there, or at least had greased some palms. But noooooo, you thought I would cover for you. Well, you thought wrong!"

The waiter shows up at just that moment, menus in hand.

"Should…should I come back in a minute?" he asks, gaze darting back and forth between us.

"No, I’m not hungry after all," she says. "Billionaire here who thinks that rules don’t apply to him can stick around but I’m done." She shoves her chair back, slings her purse over her shoulder, and brushes past the waiter who is standing there awkwardly, leaving just him and I sitting there, staring at each other.

"I’ll just leave these right here and check back on you in a minute, sir," the waiter says apologetically, and, laying down the menus, disappears.

I stare at the menus, my eyes seeing but not caring. God, she was right. Every word of it. After all of the research I’d done, I’d forgotten to take into account the fact that she’s a very real human with very real concerns, like the future of her job. How her coworkers see her. How her bosses see her. I’ve been my own boss for so long, with only Gweny who dares to say a cross word to me, that I’d forgotten what it was like to have to watch what you do and who you do it with, because it matters on your yearly evaluation.

I have the realization that this isn’t a game. And I need to tell her that.

Ignoring the menus on the table, I head back out the door after her. I see her weaving her way down the sidewalk, walking head down, shoulders hunched, ignoring the world, and I know that she’s bloody pissed at me.

And I damn well deserve it.

"Wait," I call out, dashing after her. I swear her strides are only getting faster, although she doesn’t look up, so maybe I’m just deluding myself.

"Wait," I say when I’m touching her shoulder, whirling her around to look at me. The color is high in her cheeks and she looks ready to spit fire at me again. "I’m sorry," I say, heading off her verbal attack. "You’re right. You’re absolutely right. I didn’t look at it like that. It didn’t occur to me that you could get into trouble for it. I’ve been my own boss for so long, I did forget what it’s like to have upper management to report back to. I shouldn’t have put you into that position.

"I care about you, Brittney. A lot. I haven’t been able to get you out of my mind for the last three weeks. I’m buying a damn company that I know almost nothing about, just so I can use Carter Jeffries. Just so I can be near you. Please forgive me for being an arrogant ass. I shouldn’t have done what I did."

She stares up at me, and I can see it written so clearly – she wants me to make beg for her forgiveness. She wants to humble me. I start to drop to my knees, figuring that if dropping to my knees in the middle of Manhattan doesn’t get her to forgive me, nothing will, but then she reaches out and grabs me and pulls me to her instead and then we’re kissing.

Oh god, we’re finally kissing.

I know that we’re in public and it’s not, strictly speaking, appropriate, but what I really want, more than anything, is to shove her up against a wall and fuck her. Or at least wrap her legs around my waist...

But I force myself to draw back. I’d just told her that I knew that she was under a lot of pressure to keep her nose clean for her job. I can’t go and ruin that by shoving my tongue down her throat and my dick up her pussy on the corner of 52nd and 2nd Street.

She looks up at me, her eyes hazy and a little cross-eyed. "Wha…what’s wrong?" she says. Her lips are swollen and I’m sporting such a large tent in my slacks, I’m probably going to get charged with public indecency just for that. It’s hard to remember why that’d be such a bad thing at the moment...

"We…we can’t kiss like this on the street," I say, forcing the words out of my mouth. Forcing myself to say them even though my body is screaming for more, more, more, nothing but more. "I want you to know that I respect you. And your job."

"Oh. Right. Well, how about this? How about you respect the hell out of me back at your place?"

I immediately whip out my phone and text my driver, not even spending the time to say yes to her. That’s three seconds longer until I can have her in my bed.

And that’s three seconds too long.