The words swam on his screen. Just a few more minutes. How could he work when those words echoed through his head? When he could still feel the heat of her body pressed against his. He was only flesh and blood for heaven's sake!
He had almost blushed when he finally made it to work. The last to arrive rather than the first. People had stared at him in shock. As far as they knew he had already been in his office, working away. Perhaps they had thought him involved in a car crash. Abducted by aliens. They wouldn’t believe that a beautiful creature like Christine had wanted to keep him in her bed. He could barely believe it.
Sex had always been satisfying. He readily agreed he needed it on a regular basis. It helped him to function, helped keep his mind clear. But it had never been this… wonderful. But as much as he enjoyed being with Christine, it certainly didn’t keep his mind clear. No. He could barely function after being with her. All he wanted was to run back to her, to be with her again. To take her over and over until he was satisfied. But he didn’t think that would ever happen. He wasn’t sure he could ever get his fill of Christine, and it scared the hell out of him. He didn’t feel this way about females. He didn’t get silly and act lovestruck. But damn it if he didn’t have a crush on his wife.
His wife. She was already his. Shouldn’t he have feelings like this for her? Even if they probably weren’t reciprocated.
Maybe he was overreacting. They had only been together a few days. He just hadn’t been with a woman like her before – warm, sweet, perfect… He was getting carried away. He wasn’t used to a female who acted as if she cared about him. That included his mother and grandmother.
He looked up abruptly as Linda entered. He scowled at her. She ignored him. She was far too efficient to take any offense when he grumbled or growled at her.
“There is a woman here to see you,” she said in a crisp, disapproving voice. “She doesn’t have an appointment.”
His heart thumped erratically. Christine?
“Sabrina Longthorne.”
He deflated and humphed. Linda and Sabrina didn’t get along – particularly as the few times Sabrina visited him at work she made demands on Linda to fetch her lunch and drop off her dry cleaning. The dry cleaning was duly dropped down the stairwell. Sabrina had been livid, demanding Linda be fired. Harold merely retorted that she should get her own assistant if she wished to make demands on anyone – Linda was there for his demands. Though, if he gave her dry cleaning, she may do the same thing anyway.
“I’m very busy today.” Catching up on the work he should have been doing last night when he was watching Christine sleep, and this morning when he was sleeping with Christine. “Did she indicate the reason for her visit?”
Sabrina was one of the pack lawyers. A junior member of the team, but she did need to come to his floor of the building now and again, so it may be work-related.
Linda looked like she was sucking a lemon. “She would not tell me.”
Harold sighed and glared at his watch. With all the extra work his father was slowly pushing at him, it was a miracle he even managed to find time to get married in the first place.
“I have four minutes before I have a conference call. Tell her to come in and make it quick.”
Linda nodded and walked away as slowly as possible – trying to limit his time with ‘that woman’ as she called her.
“But interrupt us in three minutes,” he added.
She smiled at that.
Moments later, Sabrina barged through the door, calling out loudly for the rest of the floor to hear, “Harry, darling.”
He didn’t bother to get up as she swept in wearing a tight suit and four-inch heels. For some reason, she had opted to put a streak of white into her black hair. She looked like a less nice version of Cruella De Vil.
He thought of the little t-shirt Christine had been wearing earlier, the green one that set off her vibrant hair so beautifully. She looked like the cartoon princess – the Scottish one with the bow and arrow. He forgot the name, but he knew his little sister and youngest brother loved the movie – they were always watching it while holding hands – they were always holding hands.
Princess. Villain. Huh.
Sabrina really couldn’t hold a candle to his wife. Not that he was much of a prince. Harold cleared his throat and tried to rein in his wandering thoughts.
“Sabrina, don’t call me Harry… or darling. How can I help you?”
Her ruby lips spread into a wide smile. “My boss sent me over with these documents.”
She placed them with a flourish on his desk. They were the rejected requests to add Christine to the deed to his house and to his bank accounts. Sabrina looked thrilled to be delivering them. He would talk to Graham about keeping his private life private.
“Thank you,” he muttered dismissively.
That was her cue to leave. As expected, she didn’t.
“How are things with your little wife?”
“Fine, thank you. May I help you with anything?”
The reaming his father had given her over her repeated phone calls the morning after his wedding didn’t seem to give her any pause. It was one of the bits of business he had to attend to on Sunday. Perhaps not worth leaving Christine for, but he wanted to make sure Sabrina knew her place before she managed to upset Christine in any way.
“Are the two of you getting along okay?”
“Of course.”
“Despite your differences?”
“I’m very busy…”
“I don’t suppose you have much in common. Not like you and me.” She looked at him through her eyelashes, giving him a wounded look.
“Sabrina,” he growled, glowering at her. “Remember your place.”
She sniffed and opened her mouth but was cut short when Linda entered.
“Mr. Buchanan, I have a call waiting for you. This way, Ms. Longthorne.” Linda held the door open, waving her arm through it like a flight attendant.
Sabrina twitched but managed to retain a chilly façade. “Have a nice day, Harold.”
“And you, Sabrina.”
She strode away, but Harold motioned for Linda to stay. She gave him a ‘butter wouldn’t melt’ look.
“The light on my phone isn’t blinking – I don’t seem to have a phone call, and that was only two minutes.”
Her eyes widened innocently. “Indeed, sir? I must check my watch, and perhaps I will have to work on my telephone skills.”
“Thank you, Linda.”
She gave him a triumphant little smile before frowning. “You know, sir, when I got married my husband didn’t think a wedding ring was a good idea. He said that since we were shifters we didn’t need them, and they were a waste of money.”
She paused. He wasn’t really paying attention as he scribbled a note on the documents Sabrina had left him, but he let out an interested noise.
“Of course,” she continued, “when my husband realized that men still hit on me left, right and center, he soon changed his mind.”
Harold looked up, and she blushed to the tips of her silvery hair. “Of course, that was forty years ago. But, my point is that wedding rings are like shields. When I started wearing one, they virtually made me invisible to men. They show others that you belong to someone. They show that you are committed.” She shrugged. “Just something to think about.”
He gave a brief nod, and she left.
Would a wedding ring stop Sabrina from being a pain in his ass? Probably not, but it couldn’t hurt. Plus, a ring on Christine’s finger sounded mightily tempting. Yes, he would definitely consider it.
*
Christine sighed as the hold music started all over again.
Most of her boxes had arrived, but two were missing, and she was trying to find out just where the hell they were. Sadly the helpline for the courier service was about as easy to navigate as the Bermuda triangle.
She was tired and irritated and just wanted her damn boxes.
Harold’s mother was exhausting. She spent money like it was going out of fashion and she was just so… embarrassing. The dismissive and rude way she spoke to shop assistants made her cringe. Christine tried to pretend she wasn’t with her, though given the scowls they also leveled at her, she hadn’t been successful.
Marguerite bought dozens of new items, all the while encouraging Christine to buy something too. Finally, she relented and picked out a sundress. It cost five times the amount of money she would normally spend on a dress, but it was pretty. She wandered over to where it rested in the closet and smoothed out the skirt. Marguerite hadn’t been impressed. It was black with lemons all over it. She guessed that sleek Marguerite wouldn’t be caught dead or alive in it, but Christine liked it. Marguerite had tried to push many garments onto her, but Christine wasn’t interested in spite of Marguerite’s not-so-subtle hints that she could look better if she just tried.
But Marguerite wasn’t the only reason she hadn’t enjoyed the shopping trip. There had been something else, something that Christine couldn’t explain. It was instinctive. Something her inner beast sensed. Wherever she went, she felt like she was being watched. Perhaps she just felt out of place – until now she had never left Texas even for vacations. Maybe she was just getting used to being somewhere else, but she had felt so uneasy all day.
The phone beeped – call waiting.
She was sure that she would still be on hold for the next, ten… possibly twenty years, so another phone call couldn’t hurt. Besides, it might be Harold – it could be important.
She flipped to the other line. “Hello?”
“Is Harry there?” asked a cold, female voice.
“Harry?” Embarrassingly, it took her a few moments to realize the woman meant Harold. “Not right now, can I take a message?”
The woman snorted delicately. “No.” Then she hung up.
Christine flipped back to the hold music – still going strong – and allowed a ripple of unease to course through her.
Harry? Since when did he like being called Harry?
She thought of the text message Harold got the other day. Was this Sabrina? She could be anybody; it could be nothing. She should ask Harold. But what if she did and it was something? She was already feeling lonely; this really would make her unhappy.
It was early days, and a text message and phone call were nothing.
As her phone call finally connected, she forgot all about Sabrina and began a long drawn out argument with the courier service helpline.