Couldn’t kissher.
Not only was she my pairs partner, and my position on this team relied on not fucking up this exhibition, but she was Fairbanks’ daughter. She expected all the best things from life.
Notme.
So I straightened and swallowed down my first urge—and my second,fifth, twelfth—urge and nodded to her.
“Again?”
Her smile was a little watery when she stepped back, pulling my hands from her hips.
“Again.”
Chapter Five
Lila
I was not fine.
Oh, outwardly, I was doing all the right things, hitting all the correct metrics, leading the meetings I needed to, connecting with the organizations Fairbanks Enterprises needed me to connect with…but inside, I kept thinking about that night in the apartment, and the dozens of times since then, when Kardok’s gaze landed on my lips, and I felt somethingzingfrom my nipples to my lady bits.
It was an inconvenient reaction, especially when I was trying to charm shareholders or wine and dine a potential donor.
What’s more, I couldn’t help but think…
Look, my father didn’townthe Teal Terrors, but part of his real estate empire was the complex where they practiced—whereI’dpracticed. I hadn’t exactly grown uparound orcs, but I knew enough about them to know that their senses were like four times more powerful than humans’.
And I wondered if there had been some way that Kardok had…hadknown. Had recognized my arousal, and if that was why he hadn’t kissed me.
No, that’s stupid.
Right. This wasKardok the Wicked. He wasknownfor his kisses, and that thing he did with his tongue. There’s no way he’d turn down a kiss from a willing female, right?
So yeah, my thoughts kept going in circles.
He’d known. He wanted to kiss me. He didn’t want to kiss me. He was clueless.
It was incredibly unprofessional, and by the following week, I was ready to put that part of me in the corner with a stern talking to. I needed to bein control, not totally racked with obsession.
Besides, it wasn’t as if we’d done anything I hadn’t done dozens—hundreds!—of times before. His hands on my waist, his strength as he lifted me effortlessly. The way we meshed, the way we worked together, the way he looked at me as if he was wondering how I would taste?—
You’re doing it again.
Right.
I decided that the sensible interpretation of said events is that they meant nothing. We were just rehearsing.
However, I was well aware of the fact that I’ve alsodecided this seventeen times already, and I kept having to decide it again.
Gah.
But in terms of obsessing, you know what was giving me the most grief? I wasn’t sure which version of Kardok I was the most in trouble with.
Was it Kardok the Wicked, the fierce enforcer who fought like he didn’t have anything to lose and could drive a crowd into a frenzy? The male I’d been secretly drooling over for years?
Or was it the Kardok who sat at my table and talked about his brothers and nephew or who went all quiet and soft when he spoke of his mother? The male who stacked dishes without being asked.
Which one was my body reacting to?
