But if I see you outside, I’ll be the whore who sold her soul for your story.
I shake my head, not turning around to see him following me to the elevators. “I need to go.”
“Rachel. See me for drinks tomorrow,” he says.
I press the “down” arrow several times and thank god the elevator door opens right away. “I can’t . . . Saint,” I say, and slip inside.
“Malcolm!” he calls back gruffly as I board the elevator.
I’m numb on the way home.
Malcolm.
I can’t even think his name; it seems so intimate, after what we did.
What did we do? He touched my hand. He kissed the corner of my mouth. And then he kissed me, tongued me, put my arms around him, and he felt so strong, tall, solid, powerful, and I felt so weak, so liquid, so vulnerable that I wanted him to do more things to me, things that make me feel both more and less whole, that make me feel like air, like a pool of desire
We didn’t have sex, but we hardly even needed to; I basically let him eat me up alive.
Exhaling noisily, I try to focus on the buildings ahead, on the people walking down the sidewalk. Get out of your head, Livingston. No, get out of your hormones. Use this for the exposé. Saint is challenged or intrigued by you, and soon it’ll be over and you’ll have everything you need, everything the world wants to know.
I pep-talk myself all the way home but nothing gives me peace.
The best work I’ve ever done in my life, I lost a little piece of myself. I can’t bear to think what size chunk I’m gonna lose by the time I’m done with the exposé.
I’m horny, and my horniness is due to the fact that Saint wants to have sex with me. It’s so obvious: his body was vibrating and his eyes were heavy-lidded, and against my body I felt the way he wanted me. Clearly he’s a playboy. He uses sex for . . . something. I can’t be used like that. I’m a professional. I need to keep barriers up—things like that can’t happen. As long as I put up the walls between us again, it’ll be good. It has to be.
During cocktails the next evening, Gina is outraged over Wynn’s anecdote.
“I’m telling you, he stepped into the store and asked me to pose for him,” Wynn assures us.
“Why, Rachel? Tell me why Wynn has a boyfriend and now has another guy hot for her. On her tail. And she did absolutely nothing but ask him if he was looking for any particular oil or candle from her shop!”
I sip on my cocktail, my brain all over the place. Maybe not all over the place; it’s just not here. It’s back in the top-floor conference room at Interface.
“Rachel? I mean, seriously, why does Wynn attract all the men? And let it be clear that I do not want one, but it would be nice if one wanted me, you know?”
God, he. Kissed. Me. HARD. I kissed him just as hard. We made out.
“So was he hot, at least?” Gina asks Wynn.
“Oh, he was definitely hot, but I’m with Emmett—I couldn’t possibly!”
Okay, so the guy can kiss. He’s a player, of course he can. But that doesn’t mean it will happen again. In fact, it means that I really should not allow it to happen again.
“Really, Rachel, are you listening?”
Because my friends look so puzzled, I try to pull myself back to the topic at hand. Wynn, yes. And her ability to attract more and more men even while happily in a relationship with one. “Like attracts like, I guess. Rich people become richer, the poor poorer, isn’t that how the saying goes? Give a poor guy a thousand dollars and he comes back with a pair of designer jeans; give a rich guy a thousand and he comes back with ten thousand.”
“Give a thousand to Saint and he comes back with a million.”
Saint, well, yes. “He does have the touch,” I admit.
“And you know this touch?” Wynn prods with a little smile.
There’s no way I’m divulging my darkest office-kiss secret, so I sip my cocktail.
“Oh, I know that look, the look of ‘she’s been dreaming of his touch,’ ” Wynn says.
I zip my mouth and throw away the invisible key, then I tease, “We all know you jinx your dreams if you talk about them.” I shrug. “Plus, the dreams need to stay in bed because it’s not happening. I mean, it’s ludicrous to think of giving up a great career opportunity just for a fling with a known womanizer. Right?”
“Found anything extra juicy?”
“You mean other than him?” I arch a brow. They laugh, but inside, I’m aching. My body’s aching in places it shouldn’t even ache. I didn’t know that your breasts could ache like this and it could have nothing to do with PMSing. Deep inside, between my legs, where I want him, I ache.
“I’m cutting tonight early,” Wynn says with a quick glance at her watch, reaching for her coat from the back of her chair.
“No, come on, it’s girls’ night, we don’t see you anymore,” Gina complains.
“Well, because I have Emmett. Relationships need to be nurtured. Like little plants!” She grins.