“You can pretend you went back to your office. You can pretend I’m not here.” I gesture to my extra chair across from my desk.
“It’s impossible for me to be in the same room as you and not look at you,” he says.
If I were a swooner, I’d have just fallen flat on my back. As it is, I fall ungracefully into my seat.
“I feel the same way,” I say boldly. I want to tell him how I find excuses to look at him, justify those stolen glances by any means necessary.
Now, we boldly memorize each other like we’ve never been able to before.
I lick my dry lips and carry on. “Pretend you went back to your office. Pretend you did the right thing. Wh-what would you be doing?” I ask.
If his eyes burned before they were now practically illuminated as understanding settles in. His nostrils flare and a switch is flipped. The muscles of his jaw clench tight as he walks slowly to the other office chair. He sits down and the wheels are visibly churning behind those stormy eyes.
We can’t touch. We can’t risk it. But could we do this?
He leans back and spreads his knees out wide. “I’d pretend to work for a few hours. Try not to think of you. Try not to find excuses to come talk to you.”
I swallow and nod.
He holds my gaze. “Then I’d probably go home and think of you more.”
My skin is pure nerves; the air coming on could send me over the edge with its caress. I’ve passed a point of no return. It’s an understanding that there’s no more game playing, no more pretending that this thing between us isn’t a wild animal demanding to be fed.
“I think of you too. Almost every night,” I say on a whisper.
He hears me. His body goes rigid. We sit facing each other with only the desk to separate us. He bends forward, elbows on his knees, high color in his cheeks. His focus never leaves my face. “Tell me what you think about.”
A soft breath escapes out of me.
“I think about this actually.” My heart beats wildly with so many emotions. These are thoughts I’ve never shared. Thoughts that have only ever lived in my imagination. I trust him to see the depths of my wanting. “I think about you coming into my office. Locking the door.”
My legs cross and I squeeze them tightly as lust shoots through me.
He swallows. “And then what?”
“I-I imagine you coming to me. You’re looking at me like that, actually,” I admit.
His nostrils flare and he sucks in his lips.
“You tell me …” I stop. I can’t say it. It’s too much. My deepest fantasies. Heat burns my cheeks. I don’t know if this is normal, if this is how people learn each other.
And yet somehow, as always, he understands what I need, my hesitations. He continues for me, “I tell you I can’t stop thinking about you.”
I nod once.
He goes on. “I tell you that I dream about tasting you. I imagine all the different ways I want to bring you pleasure. I tell you that I can’t take it anymore.”
“Yes,” I whisper.
One of the legs he’s leaning on bounces up and down, causing him to shake. I dig my nails into my palms. I fight so hard to keep it together.
“You grab me,” I say. “You move the hair off my neck and kiss me.”
“I inhale you. You smell amazing. My lips graze the skin of your neck.”
“You give me goosebumps,” I say as actual chills spread down my arms and harden my nipples. I let the shawl drop back and arch my back. I watch him as his gaze takes in the sight.
His jaw clenches before he says, “I watch the tiny bumps spread over your skin in awe that I can do that to you.”
