It was kind of freaking me out.
Although really, it shouldn’t be. This had happened before. There was one tech guy, a mogul from Japan. He’d been visiting on business. He only flew in to see Hudson Pierce, and his contacts here had ensured he ended up at a party. I sat on his face for three hours and then served him lunch in Hudson’s office the following Monday. I hadn’t had a second thought about it. My smile hadn’t wavered.
But one amazing kiss from this man had me wondering about serendipity.
Seriously, I was losing it.
Okay, I could do this. “Yes, Mr. Sinclair. Right. Mr. Pierce is still finishing up with his two o’clock appointment. If you have a seat, he’ll be right with you.” I just had to remember that Nathan Sinclair had no idea who I was. I was the only one flustered.
I didn’t know why the thought made me disappointed.
“Thank you…Patricia,” he said, reading the name off of my desk tag.
“It’s Trish, thank you.” What was I doing? I never corrected anybody on my name. Hudson Pierce himself still called me Patricia after all these years. Of course, he didn’t believe in nicknames, but that wasn’t the point.
Actually, hardly anyone ever asked my name. The many rich interchangeable men that walked through my space didn’t care to call me anything but sweetie or honey or darling.
That must have been why I’d told him. No other reason. Because he’d read my name plate. Because he’d bothered to try and find out.
I watched my newly introduced stranger as he carried his portfolio bag over to the sofa, staring a little too long at his ass, my hands trembling the entire time.
Focus, Trish, I told myself. Act normal. Do things the way you normally do them.
What was it I normally did again?
“Mr. Sinclair, would you care for a drink? I have water, tea, coffee…” I would try hard as hell not to repeat the same mishap that I’d had earlier with Mr. Stoker’s hot water.
“Water would be excellent.”
I slipped into the tiny room behind my desk, opened the mini refrigerator and grabbed an ice-cold bottle of water, holding it up to my face first. Maybe if I could just cool down a little bit... But when I stood and looked at myself in the mirror that I’d hung back there, my reflection was clearly flushed and dazed.
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
I threw my shoulders back, put on my best grin, and reminded myself once more that Nathan Sinclair did not know who I was. I was the one with the upper hand, and that was all that mattered.
I grabbed a glass, filled it with ice, and stepped back out to the waiting area. In several confident strides, I made it across the room to Mr. Sinclair and handed him the water bottle and the glass. “Here you go, sir.”
I even managed to keep all the ice in the glass instead of spilling it all over the place.
“Thank you.” He was regal and professional in demeanor, but his eyes were mischievous as they darted up to my face.
Did that mean he had been checking me out when I wasn’t looking?
It was probably nothing. But it made my heart hammer faster anyway, and it was already beating as fast as I thought it could.
“Anything else, Mr. Sinclair, while you’re waiting?” Besides, you know, maybe a reenactment of Saturday night? Because I was about two seconds from losing all my hard-fought control and crawling into his lap. He was just as defined-looking in this suit as he’d been in the tux he’d worn on Saturday, and even more put together. More noble, somehow. More restrained.
And he’d been quite restrained at the party, giving in only to a simple kiss the entire night.
I can be that restrained, I reminded myself. Maybe he would show up again at this weekend’s party, and I could play with him then. And if he didn’t, I could take out all this pent-up desire on someone else. Chuck, or Kennedy, someone new, even.
“Just one thing,” Mr. Sinclair said, catching me by surprise since I’d nearly forgotten I’d asked him anything.
I perked up, giving him my full attention.
“I was wondering how you could have possibly gotten an invitation.”
In my world, the only invitation that mattered was to the Open Door. It threw me for a second, when my mind went immediately there. I was thinking as hard as I could, scouring my brain, trying to come up with some other event that he could be referring to, but I came up empty.
“Invitation?” I asked innocently. Because there was no way he was referring to the party.
“The Open Door.”
Well, shit.
I took a step back and pivoted, and then another step, this time forward. I was practically dancing, making tiny little movements with my hands, as I tried to work out how I was going to handle this situation. I’d never had anybody bring up the Open Door to me face to face, outside of the parties, and certainly not at my place of employment.
I finally sank into the armchair next to him.
“You can’t tell anyone about that. How did you know? I’m not supposed to go there. I’m not supposed to have those passwords. You can’t tell anyone. How did you figure it out?” I realized immediately that I’d probably given away more than I should have. I should have played coy, but he had me so flustered, so dazed. He had me so damn torn up and twisted.
“Your ears,” he said, evenly. Lucky him, with no reason not to remain calm. “You’re wearing the same earrings you wore on Saturday. Even if those earrings were common, I like to think that profile belongs only to you.”
I was blushing now. I wore these earrings all the time, short, dangly gold and diamonds. Nothing too gaudy or bold. But they were unique, and vintage. They’d belonged to my grandmother.
And for the first time in ten years, someone had noticed them.
I swallowed and peeked behind me at the door to Hudson’s office. It was still shut, thank goodness, but I had to be sure. Then I looked back into Nathan Sinclair’s mischievous green eyes.
“I keep my business life and my private life very separate, Mr. Sinclair. I hope you understand that.” I had to bargain with him somehow. It was evident he had the advantage, but I had to try and regain control. In the last ten years, I’d only slept with a handful of people from the Open Door, and all before I’d made my list of rules. After that, I’d made sure that the only men I’d slept with were people I knew through friends, or work, or people completely disassociated with the club. “But I could make an exception if I had to,” I said aloud.
“If you’re suggesting we barter,” Mr. Sinclair said, leaning forward, his elbows on his muscular thighs, “I think I could agree to something.”
“I’m off at five. I could meet in the bathroom, or there’s a hotel just down the street…”
Mr. Sinclair shook his head. “I’m not asking for anything that complicated. I’m not in the habit of forcing women into seduction.”
Huh. That was disappointing for some reason. “Then what did you have in mind?”
Under his beard, the short, boxed style that George Clooney made sexy, I caught the hint of a smirk. “I’ll take your panties.”