As I triedto make myself look presentable and not like I had just had an early afternoon quickie with my secretary, I wondered if I'd made a mistake. Not that the sex hadn't been incredible. It had. More than incredible, in fact.
But any time sex got involved, it changed things. Was I ready to have my work life changed? I didn't know.
Emma stared down at the floor, looking as awkward as I felt. Damn. Maybe this had been a mistake.
"Mr. Tanchen…" she began and then stopped for a moment, pressing her lips together. "Mark, I can't afford to lose this job."
Fuck. That only made me feel like the biggest shit in the world. She thought I might fire her even after what we'd just done together?
I slid my finger under her chin and lifted her head so she looked at me. "You didn't do anything for me to fire you. After that, I should give you a raise."
My attempt at being funny and lightening the mood failed miserably. Her eyes got wide, and all I saw in them was real fear.
"I was kidding. At least I was trying to. I'm not going to fire you, Emma."
Relief washed over her, and for the first time since we finished fucking, she smiled as her entire body relaxed. "Oh. Okay. So what happens now?"
"I don't know. I didn't plan on any of this happening, remember?"
"Maybe it might be better if I go back to Mr. DeVille and ask him for a different placement," she said quietly, her smile gone. "I feel like that might be the best idea."
"No, no. That isn't necessary. We'll figure this out," I said, hating the idea of not having Emma around in the office.
The two of us stood looking around the room as a strange and uncomfortable reality set in. In the heat of the moment, sex had been the best idea since sliced white bread. Now that we'd given in to our desires, we had to find a way to work together.
"Okay. Well, maybe I'll just go back to my desk."
And with that, she left me standing there not sure what the hell to do next.
I straightenedmy tie and sat down behind my desk to get ready for my two o'clock meeting. If I could get my head back into business and not stuck in that room behind the kitchen with Emma and her tight…
Okay, get your shit together, Mark. You're running a business. This isn't high school, and you aren't a teenage boy who just lost his virginity. You're a grown man who's had sex before, for fuck's sake. Get it together!
My pep talk to myself did little to clear my head of my desire to lock the front door and take my secretary by the hand up to my bedroom. I couldn't explain what had come over me. Ever since Emma walked into the building, I'd been able to think of nothing but being balls deep in her pussy. Now that I had actually lived out that fantasy, it's all I wanted to do.
Forget work. Forget how hard I'd struggled to make this business successful. Forget it all.
I couldn't let this go on. Maybe she was right. Maybe she sound have returned to that DeVille Staffing place and gotten another position.
The problem was even thinking that made me feel sick.
That meant I had to find a way to work with her and not want to bend her over the desk every time I thought about us together. How hard could that be? I'd spent nearly thirty years of my life, almost half of it sleeping with women, and never before had I been distracted by a woman so much that I couldn't get my work done. Why couldn't I do it now?
I could. I had to. Either that or the business I'd worked my balls off to make a success would fall by the wayside. That couldn't happen.
At exactly two, Emma poked her head into my office and smiled like she always did when she interrupted my work. "Mr. Tanchen…Mark, your two o'clock appointment is here. Should I show him in?"
I nodded and hoped I'd eliminated the last vestiges of our time together an hour before. "Yes, please show him in. Thank you, Emma."
It all sounded perfectly normal that I thought for a moment that we could work together like this just fine. And then I saw how Steve Dumont looked at her like he wanted to devour her as he walked into my office and I knew I was in trouble. I'd never been jealous, but I had a feeling it didn't look good on me by the way Steve stared at me.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" he asked as he shot Emma one final leer before sitting down.
"Close the door, Emma."
I waited until I heard the click that told me Steve and I were alone and then plastered a smile on my face. "What are you talking about?"
He narrowed his eyes to slits and studied me for a long moment. "You looked like you wanted to kill me when I walked in here. I thought maybe I'd done something to piss you off, but since I haven't seen you in almost a year, I know that's not it. Did you have something that didn't agree with you for lunch?"