“You were bound to have one and it wasn’t so bad that you got fired, so that’s a win, right?” Mia sighed. “Yeah, but it’s not just the absolute fool I made of myself,” she said. “It was watching Liam work and the way he just seemed to know exactly what to do. It was…Geez, I can’t even explain it. Have you ever just watched someone work and the way they did things, with complete competence and confidence, was more impressive than what they were doing?” “Competence porn? Oh yeah. It’s my favorite kind.” “Right, so here I am after having completely fluffed up in front of Darius and Frankie, and Liam just walks in and bibbity-bobbity-boo he fixes it. And he was explaining what he was doing while he was doing it but I couldn’t even listen to the words because I was too mesmerized by him in his element. I realized there will never be a time when I am as confident in myself or my abilities as he is. There is no way I can do the job he does and I’m an absolute fool for thinking I ever c
“Are you talking to me as an investor?” Liam asked. Jonathon and his friends were all silent investors in The Playbook. Carter hadn’t told anyone of their involvement until a few months ago and Liam still didn’t know how he felt about it. There was a whole convoluted story involving secret societies and brotherhood that Liam wasn’t really sure how to absorb. Had Jonathon gotten involved with The Playbook because he knew Liam was his brother or was it totally coincidental? Jonathon assured him it was purely fate, but Liam still wondered. And if indeed Jonathon had known about Liam prior to Liam tracking him down, why had he never said anything? “No,” Jonathon replied with a frustrated sigh. “I was just…shit, I don’t know what I was trying to do, make conversation I suppose.” Liam let a little of his resentment go. “Yeah,” Liam said. “Darius could potentially be a problem but we’re hoping his coaches and managers have him in line. He knows another scandal could end his career. We’re
Liam shrugged. “Yes, no, maybe. I don’t know. I just know that I didn’t expect it, especially not from her, and it pissed me off and then there were tears, and, shit man, what are you supposed to do when they cry? She looked like that GIF of the cat with the big eyes, you know the one I’m talking about?” Jonathon was looking at Liam with a raised eyebrow. “What did you do?” “I told her to suck it up and get back to work,” Liam groused and then shook his head. “No, I didn’t do that. Not exactly, anyway. I told her she had two choices. She could give up and go home or she could learn from it.” “Sounds to me like you handled it okay, so what’s the problem? Did she quit?” “No,” Liam said. “Is it bad of me to wish she did? Fuck. That makes me a bastard. I don’t really wish she’d quit. She’s talented and she’s got all this potential, but it’s complicated, you know?” “Complicated how?” Liam swallowed and cursed under his breath. He hadn’t meant to say that but now it was out ther
“We have the proofs back,” Liam said. He stood in the doorway and watched as Mia approached him with a coffee cup from the cafe downstairs in her hand. “Were you out?” he asked. Mia smiled and lifted the coffee cup toward him. “I was having coffee with Darius. Here I brought you one.” “You met with Darius?” She nodded. “After the debacle last week, I just wanted to go over a few ideas I had. He was in the city and we met at the cafe downstairs.” She frowned at him. “That was okay, wasn’t it? You said I could go down there to work if I needed to.” He nodded sharply as he took the proffered coffee. He shouldn’t have felt the irritation he felt at her spending time with her client but he did. “Did you say something about proofs?” she asked when he just stood there staring at her. “Oh yeah, right. I got the proofs back and I thought you might like to go through them with me so we can choose which ones we want for the blog,” he said. “Oh, yeah, that would be great.” Liam tu
The only thing that would make it better would be if there were no clothes separating her skin from his greedy fingers. His brain lit up with bells and whistles and buzzes when she bit his lip and tugged. He growled, intending to return the favor when the ringing noise he thought was in his head grew more obnoxious. He lifted his head, breaking the kiss. The ringing was his phone. They both seemed to come back to their senses at the same time, but for a fleeting moment, he got to see Mia’s dazed, lust-filled gaze as she looked at him like she wanted to lick him all over. He would definitely be down for that except… “Fuck,” he breathed softly as Mia scrambled off his lap and straightened her shirt and then her hair, turning away from him and escaping out the office door before he could say a word. The phone rang again. “Fuck,” he said again, reaching for it. “Speak,” he growled.Mia ran like a bat out of H-E-double-L to the women’s bathrooms…okay, maybe run was the wrong word
He took a step closer but kept his hands in his pockets although it looked like it pained him to do so. “I’m not sorry for kissing you, Mia,” he said, his voice rough. “I’ve wanted to kiss you since that night. I’ve dreamed about kissing you. I’ve dreamed about that night over and over again. But I am sorry that I did it without your consent and in our place of work. If you want to go to Carter and make a complaint about me, I won’t stop you.” Mia put her hands on her hips and gaped at him. “You want me to report the kiss to Carter?” “No,” he said, shaking his head and taking another step closer. “I want to kiss you again, but I won’t, not unless you tell me I can.” Mia stepped toward him until there was barely any space between them. She tilted her head up to him, her eyes coasting over his lips before reaching his eyes. “And if I want you to?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “What does that mean for us, for the job?” Liam pulled a hand from his pocket and li
They reached for each other’s clothes as Mia dragged him toward the bedroom. She managed to get the buttons on his shirt undone and took a second to admire the smooth expanse of his chest as she ran her hands reverently over it. He shrugged the shirt off his shoulders and reached for hers. Mia leaned forward and ran her tongue over the solid mass of his left pec and up his neck. She could feel the throb of his pulse on her tongue and she shivered in anticipation. He pushed her away so he could free her from her shirt and her bra and then fell to his knees in front of her. She threaded her fingers through his hair as he buried his face between her breasts and breathed her in. “I’ve missed you,” he mumbled. “Me or my ta-tas?” He chuckled. “Ta-tas? You can say boobs, Mia. Or breasts. Tits work too.” He took a breath and sobered. “But I meant you,” he said looking up at her. “And these too, of course.” He looked back down at her breasts before cupping them and suckling one nipple
Liam rolled to his side and watched Mia as she caught her breath. His fingers drew soft circles on her skin; his need to keep touching her was something he really didn’t want to examine. He hadn’t intended to attack her like that as soon as he walked through the door, but he wasn’t sorry. Things had been building between them since she had walked back into his life and it was inevitable they would end up here and yet it didn’t diminish what had happened tonight. She opened her eyes and turned her head to look at him. Her face was soft and satiated and her lips were tilted up in a smile. He leaned forward and kissed her; he couldn’t not. She rolled toward him, her body fitting against his with ease. Bare skin slid against bare skin as she pressed closer, her arms twining around his neck and one luscious leg draped over his hip. He thrust against her, not entering her, but sliding his hardness through her warm, wet softness. It was heaven and yet not nearly enough. He skimmed