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Eight
She was tidying up his office the next morning when Marcos halted at the doorway. The sight of Virginia fiddling with the coffeemaker froze him, then heated up his blood.
As she poured a cup—black, as he liked it—the plain buttoned-up shirt she wore stretched across her breasts in a way that made watching feel like purgatory.
“Good morning.”
She glanced up with a soft gasp. “Marcos—Mr. Allende.” And there went her breasts again, swelling, pert and lovely as she took a little breath.
His heart thudded as they stared at each other, the words lingering in the air. Mr. Allende.
A word meant to erase everything that had happened in Monterrey, Mexico.
Having never expected she would make it this easy, he stepped inside and pulled the doors shut behind him. “Good morning, Miss Hollis.”
He really could do this.
They’d pretended to be lovers before.
Now they would pretend they never had been.
Black coffee mug cradled against her chest, Virginia stared at him with the glazed wariness of a woman who feared that a man knew her secrets. “Can I get you anything, Mr. Allende?”
You.
He bit off the word, pulled off his jacket and tossed it onto the L-shaped sofa before he started
for his desk. His head buzzed with thoughts of her. Her, smiling up at him from her place on his lap. She had an obsession with tidiness, and it showed. His office was pristine. She was a tidy little box, his Miss Hollis. Who would’ve known she’d be such a wanton in bed? So uninhibited? So sexy? So addictive?
“I hear you arrived home safely,” he said, his groin stirring at the memory of their lovemaking. Dammit, don’t go there, man.
“Yes, thank you.” She flashed him one of those smiles that made his thoughts scramble. “And I caught up on my sleep a little.”
“Excellent. Excellent.”
His body clenched at her admission, for he hadn’t had a wink of sleep since their return. He kept remembering her, innocent, cuddled up against him.
Diablos, he had never imagined he’d once again look at Monterrey with longing. Now he did.
He longed to be there with his assistant for another week where he knew exactly what to do with her.
Lips thinning in disgust at his own erotic thoughts, he took the coffee cup from her hands when she passed it to him and dismissed her with a wave. No use in delaying their parting. “That will be all. Thank you, Miss Hollis.”
And with a painful wrench of mental muscle, he tore his eyes away and pushed her from his mind.
He had a business to take over.
Chicago felt different. The wind was the same, the noise, the traffic, and yet, it felt so different. She’d had to face Marcos at the office again today. Yesterday, their nonchalance toward each other had been so borderline pathetic she’d felt nauseated by the time she got home.
This morning, unable to stomach coffee, she made her way down the hall. The door to the extra bedroom where her father had been sleeping for the past couple of months was shut, and Virginia pressed her palm against it for a long moment, wondering if she should wake him. Let him know she was leaving for work. That everything had been taken care of and his debt absolved.
She decided she would call later instead and carried her small black duffel bag outside where the taxi waited, remembering Marcos’s offer to give her father a job.
It had been easy then, to accept anything he’d wanted to give her. They’d been…involved. Now, Marcos Allende could calmly forget about it, as he’d forgotten the rest.
Worst of all was it hurt.
Even when she’d expected it.
