Ella

He left me standing in the hallway, my body practically vibrating with desire for him, my flesh swollen.

He had an evil smile on his face as he left me, knowing full well how I would be feeling. It was fair game, considering he had a delicious-feeling erection. Had just the sight of me in the elevator done that to him?

If so, it gave me a real thrill and made me want him even more.

I went to my office and sat behind my desk, the file folder that contained several new manuscripts from the mailroom tucked beneath my arm. I placed it on my desk and tried to catch my breath, needing a few moments to collect myself and recover from the feel of Josh's body pressed against mine, his kiss and his words.

My hour with him at the Ritz-Carlton had left me wanting more time with him, and now, with the offer of a trip to Bali the following weekend, I was happy that I would get it. The idea that I would be fulfilling his fantasy of a fuck-filled weekend at a tropical resort where he didn't have to worry at all about his businesses made me exceptionally aroused.

Although I had a rule about office romances, given my experience with Jerkface, Josh was so high up there in the corporate ladder, he didn't really feel like my boss.

Not really.

At least, that was the way I justified -- okay, how I rationalized running away to an exotic tropical resort to have sex with him.

I squirmed a bit in my chair, my flesh still swollen. I would have liked to go into the staff washroom and masturbate, but there was no way I would because it was too busy. I'd have to suffer until I could get home. Later tonight, when I was alone in my tiny apartment, I'd have a date with B.O.B. He'd have to do. Only thing was, B.O.B. didn't have a mouth or tongue that had given me so much pleasure the other day.

JOSH: Damn, woman. I have this problem I wish you could come to my office and take care of.

ELLA: Sorry, but I have ten minutes to get my coverage of this book done before my meeting with Sharon. Believe me, I'm suffering, too. You could come and visit me and we could find a broom closet, or we could meet at your apartment during my coffee break...

I smiled and sent the text, wondering if he'd take me up on the offer.

JOSH: Oh, God... I can't or believe me, I'd be there under your desk, my tongue on your...

I waited for the text to finish but it didn't. I glanced at my computer screen and then at the manuscript on my table top, and then finally, back at my cell, but he hadn't finished his thought.

ELLA: ...waiting with bated breath for the body part you were going to name...

Nothing. I waited and waited but that was it. I finished my work and then left for my meeting with Sharon. For the next hour, I sat there trying to pretend I was listening to Sharon talk, all the while imagining meeting Josh for a quickie, but sadly, each chance I had to check, he never wrote back to tell me if and when and what part he was going to lick, although I had a pretty good idea.

Finally, after I finished up for the day and reluctantly left the office, I heard a ding on my cell while I was sitting on the subway back home.

JOSH: So sorry. On your hard little...

I waited but nothing.

ELLA: !!!?

ELLA: Are you doing this purposely to drive me insane?

Then he made me wait again for fifteen minutes.

JOSH: Actually, I was in a meeting and thought I could finish the statement but I was asked a question and had to take over and lead the meeting. Then I was in constant meetings for the rest of the afternoon. But in my mind, I was fucking your brains out in front of my picture window overlooking the city.

I knew he was purposely making me suffer by ending his texts where he did, so I decided to make him wait.

ELLA: That's too bad because I was so frustrated that I had to...

Ha! Let him suffer the way I had. I didn't believe for a moment that he couldn't have finished that text. It made me smile, because I liked the fact he was thinking of ways to make me aroused and needy. I liked the idea of finding a man who wanted to spend his time thinking of ways to drive me wild with desire.

I got off at my subway stop, deliberately not checking my cell to see his response. I stopped at the local sandwich shop close to my apartment and picked up a pastrami on rye with a pickle for my supper and a take-out container of chicken soup. Then I walked up the stairs to my apartment and entered the space, glad that I finally had enough room to at least have a tiny table and chair near an actual window.

I sat at the table and watched the street below, which was busy with pedestrians as the six o'clock crowd walked home from work. I dug into my sandwich and took a slurp of soup when my cell dinged for a third time.

JOSH: You had to what? Don't leave me hanging...

JOSH: ???

JOSH: I see what you did there. Honestly, Ella, I was not doing that on purpose. I truly was in a meeting, surrounded by my staff and I had to stop in the middle of a text. Besides, I figured it would fill your head full of ideas about where you would like my tongue to go...

I smiled. Yeah, right... Like I believe that the ellipses weren't strategic. Hell, I was more convinced than ever that they were tactical rather than accidental. And now, he'd done it again by mentioning his tongue and where I wanted it to go. Now, I couldn't help but remember our hour in the Ritz-Carlton and where it was so located on my body and what it was so expertly doing.

I texted him back after about ten minutes.

ELLA: Sorry. I was just in the bathtub, having a nice long soak. Now, I'm just sitting here, wrapped in my little towel, wondering what I'll write tonight. Something racy. Maybe about the hot business mogul who enjoys teasing his lover until she can't stand it anymore. He might tie her hands to the bed posts with silk scarves and blindfold her and then drive her crazy with sensation... Something along those lines.

I waited to see what he'd say in response. After a few moments, my cell dinged and I checked what he'd written.

JOSH: Kinky little thing, are you? I like it. If you need help figuring out positions and the steps involved in a scene like that, I'd be willing to come over and assist.

I laughed and replied to him. I was smiling as I wrote my text, my body warming to the thought of that exact scene with Josh in control over me.

ELLA: I'm just thinking of what my audience would like to read. Besides, I have a very good imagination. I have a short timeline for this particular story, so I'm afraid I can't entertain you tonight. As a newspaper man, I'm sure you know all about those pesky deadlines!

I waited to see how he'd respond, wondering if he'd give up or keep trying to get me to invite him over.

JOSH: Well, if you need more inspiration for your stories, there's a nice four poster bed in the room I booked in that all-inclusive resort in Bali that could handle some scarves used as restraints. There's also a private outdoor pool in the yard and the beach is only steps away. Much potential for interesting erotic storylines.

I had already imagined it in my mind's eye after I found the new tickets on my desk earlier. He really wanted me to go to Bali with him and fulfil his fantasy weekend of sun, sex and surf. I wasn't sure if I should encourage him any further than we had already gone.

You'd think that the two of us would know not to get too close to each other. It was a mistake to get involved with a superior, even if he was sex on legs.

But still...

I deliberately didn't respond to his comment about Bali, not sure I would go, even if I really wanted to. I'd wait and see how things went over the next few days before I committed.

ELLA: Gotta say goodbye. Story isn't writing itself. Sleep tight. Don't think too much of me writing my erotic story, or what my mogul is doing to his helpless lover, tied up and blindfolded, waiting for him to do with her as he desires...

JOSH: Not a hope in hell of that now...

I laughed and put my phone in my bag, not wanting to see what he might say next to distract me. I really did have a deadline and needed to finish a short story I'd written for an anthology my writer friend Samantha was putting together. And so, for the next two hours, instead of entertaining a real live hot man in my tiny studio apartment, or in his much more luxurious one on Fifth Avenue, I wrote about a fantasy lover who very much resembled the genuine article.

Then, just to be a real tease, I sent Josh a text with the first couple of lines of my story, hoping to make him want me even more.

ELLA: I thought I'd send you the first paragraph of my new story for the collection. It's called "The Room".

ELLA: When you go through that doorway into the room, you're mine. Outside the four walls, on the beach, in the restaurant, or when we visit the town, you're your own person, but when we're alone inside the room, you'll do what I tell you, when I tell you. I'll own you. Every inch of you. Don't worry. I promise you that the room is all about pleasure -- for both of us. If you're good, you'll have more orgasms than you've ever had in your life over the course of the weekend. If you're bad, you'll have even more...

I smiled as I sent it off, wondering how he'd respond. In a moment, I got a new text.

JOSH: Oh, God...

JOSH: I guess I can forget falling asleep any time soon. You are very bad. Very bad. You need to spend some time in the room.

I laughed and a thrill went through my body at the thought he was sitting alone in his apartment, his cock hard, wishing he had me there so we could pleasure each other.

ELLA: Gotta go. Got a story to write! Sweet dreams.

JOSH: If and when I ever get you alone again, I'm going to make you...

He deliberately left the sentence unfinished. Bastard! I guess two could play that game.

I didn't bite this time and respond or ask for more. Instead, I put my phone away and went back to writing the story, still not sure I'd actually go to Bali with Josh, despite how much my body told me that I wanted to. My mind kept saying don't. My heart was still afraid of getting too close to a new man, especially one who was my boss.

I'd decide when the time came.

For the next hour and a half, I wrote my story, easily producing another twenty-five hundred words of my fantasies of being alone with a very dominant Josh at a very expensive all-inclusive resort in Bali. I was tempted to send him the rest of the story so he knew what my fantasies were about the possibility of a weekend alone with him, but it was his fantasy. I wanted to know what he desired. How his mind worked when it came to living out one of his fantasies.

What would he be like? Would he be all alpha and dominant, like I fantasized? Or would he want the roles to be reversed, with me on top? I had no idea, seeing as the two times I'd been with him, we either didn't have time or we were living out my fantasy.

Would he be kinky or controlling?

When I went to bed, I lay in the darkness and tried to imagine what he'd be like if he had total control over me.

It made it very hard to fall asleep...

The next day, I got up bright and early and went through my usual routine. Today, I'd work late, helping Sharon get ready for her big meeting with her editors on Tuesday. I was so busy, writing coverage for several of the novels I'd selected so Sharon could pick her favorites and develop a plan for them that I barely had time to think about Josh and the following weekend.

On my way down in the elevator, I saw him once again as he was going down from one floor to another.

"Ms. Carlson," he said as I stepped on and stood in front of the control panel.

"Mr. Macintyre," I replied and smiled to myself. He was on the other side of the elevator and there were two people in between us, so there was no way he could do anything to me in the short time I had between floors. I was disappointed, for I would have liked some interaction with him, but sadly, my floor arrived and I left the elevator, feeling his eyes on me the whole time.

I sighed as I went to the mail room and picked up the mail, stopping in the photocopier room to make a copy of my coverage letter for my own files. Before I could leave, the door to the room opened and in came my boss.

"Mr. Macintyre," I said as I took the copy from the machine. "What brings you to the photocopier room? I thought you had staff to do administrative work for you."

"Stop talking," he said and closed the door. Then he pushed me against the wall, his body pressed against mine. He kissed me, his hand groping my body, squeezing a breast. When the kiss ended, he pulled back and met my eyes. "God, I can't stop thinking of you. Are you going to come or not?"

I bit my bottom lip, trying not to smile.

"Mr. Macintyre, given both our histories with office romances, I'd think it would be a very bad, inadvisable thing."

"This isn't an office romance," he said, his voice filled with a combination of frustration and humor.

"What is it, then?" I said and cocked my head to one side. "Just so I know."

He smiled. "It's pure."

"Pure?" I asked, confused.

"Pure unadulterated lust. Nothing more. Nothing less. I think that's a good thing. Neither of us wants to make the same mistake again, so we won't."

"I certainly don't want to make the same mistake again," I replied.

Then he leaned down and kissed my neck before squeezing my breast and kissing the flesh that swelled under his hand. He made a point to lick my tattoo and it sent a thrill right to my core.

"Then we won't," he replied, his voice husky. "So are you coming?"

He leaned against the wall, his arm beside my head and waited for my answer. I stared into his blue-gray eyes and tried to read him. He obviously wanted me to go to Bali.

"I thought you were going to California next week."

"I changed my plans."

"That seems rather unprofessional. Changing business plans for a dirty long weekend."

"My doctor says it's important for mental health to take regular vacations. I haven't had a real vacation for a long time. Years, in fact."

I smiled. "Me, neither."

"All the more reason for you to come," he replied. He leaned closer and kissed me softly. "I promise you won't regret it. We'll be completely professional while we're at work, and completely unprofessional in private."

"You haven't shown very professional behavior with me recently, kissing me in photocopier rooms and hallways..."

"I needed to clarify what was happening between us."

I stared into his eyes, trying to see if he was being honest. If he was going to be my Mr. Big, I didn't want it to interfere with my work.

"I need this internship, Josh. I don't want anything to hurt my position here."

"It won't. I'm going to appoint Keith as manager of Macintyre Publishing. I'll no longer have a role here. I'm focused on the Chronicle anyway. That's all I really care about and it would lift a load off my shoulders to no longer have any management function with the book publishing side. So technically, I wouldn’t be your boss at all."

I nodded, thinking that might solve our problem.

"So, is that a yes?" he asked, impatient.

"I'll think about it."

Then he kissed me again and turned away, opening the door, checking the hallway before he left.

I stood alone in the room and tried to catch my breath. I wanted to go to Bali with Josh. It would be the first real vacation for my own personal enjoyment I'd taken in years. I decided that I would wait and make a decision at the last minute, based on how I felt, but part of me wanted to go so badly, fantasizing already what it would be like.

I just hoped if I did go, I wasn't making a big mistake.