Page 65

I stop walking.

"I need the Evinrude service manual. The warranty claim for-"

"I'll leave it on the counter. Next time ask Marcus or Tommy if you need something from here."

I stand there for two full seconds with my heart beating so loud I can feel it in my head. Then I turn around and flee back to the office. I sit down on the floor with my knees pulled up and my head hanging down between them, forcing myself to take slow, deep breaths until I stop feeling dizzy.

It’s fine. I’m okay. I deserve that. I lied to him for weeks and slept with him while doing it and the absolute least I can do is respect a boundary about a doorway. There’s no reason to freak out about how much he clearly hates me now.

I wish Diesel would come and press his wet nose against my neck, but he hasn’t moved from the hallway threshold in three days. Marcus tried to coax him out Wednesday with a piece of jerky and the dog looked at him like he'd suggested something offensive. He just lies there. Sometimes he sleeps. Mostly he stares at the wall with the glazed expression of someone who's checked out of reality and would like to speak to a manager about getting back in.

I wonder if he’s eating when he goes home with Aiden at night. I don’t dare ask. I’m sure Aiden would take him to the vet if he’s completely off his food and he doesn’t seem to be losing weight. I miss him almost as much as I miss his owner.

All I can do is keep working. I answer the phones. I reconcile the books. I chase down a parts supplier who shorted us on an order and get the replacement expedited by Friday. I do my job because it's the only thing I have left here that I haven't wrecked.

Every morning I walk past the counter, and his handwriting is there waiting for me. My stupid heart does a stupid little skip at the sight of it, and I hate myself for that too. Most of my days are being spent compiling end-of-month handover documentation.

Soon I’ll have to leave for good and I want to make sure the office is at least set up for success. That the person taking over will know how my filing system works and where to find all the client information. I make pages of notes on every little thing I can think of. They’re probably going to hate me. I don’t care.

This morning I started doing parts inventory reconciliation. Matching the physical cage inventory against purchase orders and job tickets. Something that's been wrong since before I got here and I want it right before I go. It takes forever because I have to go to the cage to find a part, then locate it on the system and confirm it’s there.

I realize I’d lost track of time when Aiden comes walking into the office. Marcus and Tommy must have gone home already. He obviously expected to find an empty desk. Instead, he finds me walking from the cage toward my computer and the look on his face when he sees me could be classified as a lethal weapon.

"What are you still doing here?"

"Inventory reconciliation." I look away from his expression, hoping it would stop hurting. It doesn’t help, I’ve already seen it.

"I told you to be out by five."

"You told me not to come in the workshop. You didn't say anything about what time I had to be out of the office." I take a step forward. "This is where my desk is. Where I work. The job I'm finishing before the end of the month, which I believe we agreed on."

"We didn't agree on anything, you refused to leave. Refusing things is your favorite pastime after all."

That one finds its mark and I’m suddenly furious enough for the heartache to take a back seat for a minute.

"If you weren’t such a stubborn asshole you’d listen to my explanation. I didn’t own the damn insurance company, you know."

I can see the fury bloom in him.

Not the way it does when he's about to tear into somebody. Something locked and dangerous and completely controlled, his whole body tensing in the doorway. I shouldn’t be looking at him. My body doesn’t care that he hates me and it’s reacting to his presence the way it always does, with way too much enthusiasm.

One second, we're across the office from each other, both breathing hard, and the next, we've closed the space without me registering which of us moved. My palms hit his chest, and I shove him with both hands, my whole weight behind it. Hard enough that a smaller man would have stumbled backwards. Aiden doesn't move. He just looks down at my hands fisted in the front of his shirt, and then his fingers push up into my hair in a fierce grip and he kisses me.

Not the way he’s kissed me before. There’s no build to it, no asking, no softness anywhere in his mouth. He kisses me like he’s taking something he’s owed, and I open for him without meaning to. The moment I taste him something in me that’s been holding on all week just crumbles. I moan into his mouth and pull him harder against me.

He walks me backwards. Two long steps and my back slams against the filing cabinet hard enough to rattle every drawer in it. He pins me there with his weight, crushing me flat against the metal from thigh to chest.

His mouth leaves mine and goes straight to my throat. Biting his way down from the hinge of my jaw to my collarbone hard enough that I know I'll be marked everywhere tomorrow. I tilt my head back against the cabinet and give him more skin because my body knows exactly what it wants.

"Aiden-"

"Don't. We’re not having a conversation."

The words are ground out against my throat. I don't even know what I was going to say, so following his directive isn’t a hard choice to make.

His hand goes to the front of my jeans. Pops the button. Drags the zipper down. Shoves denim and cotton over my hips in one rough motion until they catch at mid-thigh, and I understand without being told what is about to happen. There’s nothing tender in his hands and nothing patient in his mouth and I want it every bit as hard as he’s about to give it to me. I have no patience for foreplay or pretending this is anything other than it is.

He turns me by the hips.