I was enjoying too much of it altogether.
I was paying him to be here. Once his job was done, this would be a distant memory.
Unless you make it infinitely memorable?
I turned away sharply, the potency of that temptation taking me by surprise. Under the guise of taking the laptop to the Faraday Cage to transfer my latest work, I couldn’t stop thinking about the possibilities.
Caleb and me.
Doing the dirty.
Last night he’d given me the green light. This morning in the elevator, he’d all but begged me to third-base him.
What was stopping me?
The discovery that Scott was just a pawn strategically placed in my life and not just a guy I’d met at a party and subsequently dated had left a huge deficit in my trust bank, not to mention a gaping vacancy in my sex life. This might be my chance to balance the sex part without the messiness of wondering about authentic emotions.
Plus, if our three brief encounters were an indication, the sex would be off the charts.
“Lily.”
God, that voice. Would he sound like that when he was deep inside me, pounding my brains out?
“Lily?”
I snatched in a breath, schooled my expression and turned. “Yes?”
“You done?” he asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Uh-huh.”
“Good. Time for lunch.”
As we entered the elevator, I remembered other fragments of our conversation upstairs. “You said you had questions.”
He was watching me with hooded eyes as if he knew the thoughts running through my head. “Yeah,” he replied absently.
“What kinds of questions?” I asked.
He slid his hands into his back pockets. “Different kinds. Personal and professional. Wanna start with the personal?”
My breath caught. “I—”
“Great. When was the last time you had sex?”
Caleb
“YOU’RE GOING TO have to answer me sometime.”
After a sharp intake of breath and a furious blush, which took all my severely tested control not to trace with my fingers, she’d clammed up.
To be fair, having a couple of SDM employees join us in the elevator had put the brakes on that conversation.
But she’d maintained silence in the SUV and all the way to the restaurant.
I parked in front of the Japanese restaurant, ignoring the valet waiting for us to exit the vehicle.
“I’m happy to repeat the question if you want? Sex, Lily. When—?”
“I heard you the first time,” she snapped, puffing out an annoyed breath as she reached for the door.
I stepped out, a little annoyed with myself, too. Truth be told, I didn’t intend to ask her that. Not immediately.
But as suspected, with every revelation of her brilliance, I grew more attracted to Lily Gracen. I’d come within a whisker of calling bullshit on my own rules and kissing her in the Faraday Cage room. After that little cock-teasing incident in the elevator, who the hell would’ve blamed me? Shit, I was getting hard just thinking about the way she’d worked me between her legs.
And yes, I was a little peeved that she managed to get herself under control before I did. All the same, this was a subject that needed addressing, so why the hell not?
I made eye contact with the two-man security team I had Maggie send ahead, and escorted Lily into the restaurant. The waiter showed us to the private booth I requested.
“Lily.” Maggie called this my rumbling volcano voice. “This will go a lot faster if you didn’t stop to dissect every question or take offense at it.”
She barely blinked at my don’t-fuck-with-me tone, studied the menu for a minute before she closed it with a snap. “What has sex got to do with anything?” she hissed.
I shrugged. “Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. I thought you were in a hurry for this to be over?”
“I am, but—”
“How old are you?” It was another pertinent question I hadn’t yet asked. She was over the age of consent but the flashes of innocence I spotted every now and then demanded investigation.
“Twenty-four,” she answered with a frown. “How old are you?” she tossed back.
If she didn’t know then she’d told the truth about skimming my past. That put a plus tick in her favor.
“I’m asking the questions here, but if it’ll make you cooperate, I’m twenty-nine. I’m six-foot-four. I have all my own hair and teeth. Oh, and I’m single.”
A hungry little expression flitted across her face but she hid it well. “How long have you been a fixer?” she returned.
“You must have missed what I just said about questions.”
“I’m supposed to trust you with my safety. I deserve to know a little bit about you, don’t you think?”
Fair point. In her shoes, I would have a few hundred questions, too. She wasn’t a blind follower. Another turn-on. Still... “You get three questions. After you answer all of mine.”
That earned me a sarcastically raised eyebrow that somehow managed to connect straight to my cock. Fuck.
“What’s your deal with SDM? You said you had history,” I said.
Her face immediately shuttered. “They put me through college and hired me straight after.”
Interesting. “And college was?”
“MIT.”
“You’re from the East originally?”
The waiter arrived at our table. Lily ordered a soda and six bite-size platters of assorted dishes without consulting the menu.
“I’ll have what she’s having but with a beer,” I said.
The waiter nodded and hurried away.
“Why does it matter whether I’m from the East or not?” she asked warily.
“Is that one of your questions for
