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But we are met with silence and when I reach the office he’s set up and see the door is open and the room empty, I’m grateful we haven’t interrupted anything. God knows he and Lauren like to get up to enough kinky shit around the place. I definitely don’t need to see that.
I pull Penny inside and toward one of the chairs facing Jack’s desk. “Sit,” I tell her, letting go of her wrist as I grab the first aid kit from inside the cupboard next to the filing cabinet. I turn back to her, grabbing the other chair as I pull it close and sit down, my legs on either side of hers.
“Tommy, it’s fine,” she says, as I reach for her hands, laying them across my thigh. “I can take care of it.”
I flatten my palm across her wrists as I look up at her. “Anyone ever tell you you’re stubborn?”
Penny fights a smile, biting her bottom lip as she feigns a smirk and says, “Oh hello pot, I’m kettle, nice to meet you.”
A chuckle falls from my mouth as I turn back to her hands. “Just sit still and behave yourself.”
She shuffles in her chair, moving a little closer as she gets comfortable. “And if I don’t?”
I lift my gaze, looking at her from beneath my lashes as the corner of my mouth lifts in an evil smile. “Try it and find out,” I dare.
Her cheeks flush a little, but she doesn’t look away, a daring glint in her eyes as she watches me, almost as though she’s actually considering it. The room falls silent as the two of us sit here, locked in a strange kind of stand-off that feels laden with tension that definitely feels of the sexual kind. At least on my end.
I realize how close we are, how easy it would be for me to lean forward and kiss her, taste those lips that seem to have been a regular feature in my nighttime fantasies ever since I started talking to Wine Queen. I’m still not sure why my brain keeps merging these two people and I’m certain I’m not ready to try and process the whys of it either.
Eventually I look away, letting out a hard exhale as I remind myself that Penny is off-limits, no matter how hot she is or how much she intrigues me, especially lately.
It’s not like Penny and I have ever had a bad relationship, we’ve just never really had any relationship, at least one that isn’t of the strictly work variety.
We’re co-workers, nothing more. And even if I were willing to look past that little fact, there’s still the issue of how she’s ten years younger than me. Why the fuck would she even be interested in an old guy like me, especially with the likes of Dylan and the other guys roaming around the place?
Someone like Penny does not become interested in someone like me and she sure as shit doesn’t think about hooking up with someone like me.
I reach for the antiseptic and some cotton balls. “This is going to sting,” I murmur as I gently start to dab at the blisters and raw skin on Penny’s fingers. She winces, her hand flinching a little as it rubs along my jeans.
I force myself to ignore the way my body reacts to that tiny movement, to the proximity of her hand to my dick or her breasts to my mouth. My heart pounds inside my chest and in the silence of the room, it sounds deafening.
“You need to keep these clean and covered,” I say as I start to unwrap some band-aids and wrap them around the worst ones.
“Okay,” she breathes out and I feel her warm breath feather across my skin.
When I’m done, I let go of her hands, but she doesn’t move them from my thigh. Looking up, I find her watching me again, that same unreadable expression on her face. Her mouth is slightly open and when my eyes dip, I can see the hard beat of her pulse at the side of her neck.
I’m overcome with a sudden urge to press my mouth against it, to suck and taste her skin, to feel that beat against my lips. Blinking, I look back up and find her dark eyes still watching me. Up close I can see she has incredibly long dark lashes that frame the most amazingly deep blue eyes. They’re the kind of eyes you could get lost in and the longer I look into them, the more I feel myself giving in, my resolve wavering as my body moves slightly closer to her.
“Jack?”
Lauren’s loud voice cuts through the silence, ending whatever this is as Penny and I both spring apart like we’ve been jabbed with a hot poker.
“Jack, are you here?”
Her voice is closer now and needing to not have her walk in here and overthink whatever it is she thinks she sees, I stand, moving the chair back toward the desk as I call out, “Only us, Lauren.”
Her head pops in the open office door, a smile on her face as she takes in me and then Penny, who is still sitting on the chair where I left her, her bandaged hands now resting on her thighs.
“Oh shit, what happened?” Lauren asks, her smile falling.
“Nothing bad,” I say, waving a hand at Penny. “Pen just got some blisters and I was cleaning them up for her.”
“Blisters? From what?” Lauren asks, confused.
“We’re um…we were digging a pond for the bees,” I say, practically groaning out loud at how ridiculous that sounds.
Lauren’s smile reappears and I can tell she’s trying really hard not to laugh. “I see,” she says. “And why would you be doing that?”
