Catching Avery Read online

  I turned towards her and put on the happiest face that I could muster. “Thank you for all your help, Lesa.” She smiled back at me like she wasn’t helping lead a lamb to her slaughter. It’s a wonder how she’s able to sleep at night.

  Not being able to put it off any longer-without Lesa catching on to my aforementioned nervous breakdown-I put one black heeled foot in front of the other. I eventually made my way to the big oak door, and just like Lesa said, there on the door was a nameplate that boldly read ‘Nicolas Savage’. I took a deep breath and knocked lightly as I opened the door.

  In my head, I was striding across to Dee like a confident business woman, but I’m sure in reality I looked more like a newly born calf on untried legs. That’s how nervous I was. My legs were actually trembling.

  She spoke before I could. “Hello, you must be Ms. Ellis.” She was already coming out from behind her desk to shake my hand, and I assumed, escort me to Nicholas.

  I took her hand and gave her the most professional hand shake I could assemble. “Yes, I am. It’s very nice to meet you.” I didn’t know her last name and I wasn’t going to just call her Dee. We weren’t cool like that yet.

  “Right this way, please.” I followed her through a mini hallway right adjacent to her desk to come upon another large, oak door. She gave the door a good and steady no nonsense knock.

  I heard ‘come in’ from the other side of the door and I fought the urge to wipe my now sweaty hands on my black pencil skirt. Dee walked in as she opened the door, silently commanding me to follow. “Ms. Ellis, sir.”

  Nicholas stood up from his chair behind his desk. “Thank you, Mrs. Williams.” And as she was shutting the door, his next words had me ready to knock Mrs. Dee Williams out of my way and run for safety. “Make sure we are not to be disturbed and should this meeting run into overtime, there’s no need for you to stay. I will personally see Ms. Ellis out.”

  With a simple nod of her head and a, “Very well, sir,” she closed the door behind her, leaving me alone with Nicholas

  Nicholas~

  I had to be the dumbest motherfucker on the planet.

  I spent all week fighting the urge to invade the fourth floor and drag Avery to the nearest empty room, in front of God and everyone, and now I had summoned her to my office. Alone.

  Did I mention the dumbest motherfucker on the planet?

  She silently stood in the middle of the room and I realized she wasn’t going to make a move until I explained why she was here. “Relax, Imp. I only asked you up here because I thought you might want to know that we spoke with Lucy Alister.” I could see her body physically relax and it bothered me that she was uncomfortable around me. She gave me a small, sheepish smile and finally took a seat. She opted for the couch, so I followed to sit next to her.

  She angled her body to be able to face me, but also be able to keep her distance. Here I was trying to figure out a semi-legal way to get my hands on her during work hours, and she was busy making sure our bodies didn’t touch in anyway. Christ. “Is she okay? He didn’t do anything to her, did he?”

  “No,” I reassured her. “He was forward enough to make her uncomfortable, but he never actually touched or harmed her.”

  Avery let out a deep breath and gifted me with a smile so genuine and so beautiful, I almost dropped to my knee and proposed. I’ve been a witness to her drunk self, nervous self and quirky self, but never her caring self. She looked so magnificent in her sincere concern for someone other than herself that I couldn’t imagine how glorious she must look when she showed her love for Quinn or Isabella. “We gave her this week off, paid of course, because we didn’t want her to be around in case Spillner caused a scene tomorrow when we fire him.”

  She took her lower lip in between her teeth and my disobedient cock started to twitch. “So are we to report to Mr. James in the interim?”

  “We’ll be making an announcement tomorrow afternoon on how everyone should proceed in the wake of the vacancy.” I leaned back in the crook of the couch to give myself some distance from her. The subtle scent of her perfume was driving me crazy. I really needed to get this slight obsession of mine under control. “We actually have someone in mind to promote. It’s really just a matter of working out the little details of their promotion package.”

  “Hopefully, he’s happily married and has some marginal respect for women,” she quipped.

  “She is and she does.” Hopefully this clarification will put her at ease. I stood up and walked over to the oak bar I had in the corner of my office. “We’re getting rid of Cynthia Emerson tomorrow as well. Upon some further investigation, we found out that she was aware of his behavior and she chose to look the other way.” I poured two tumblers of scotch and held one out to her.

  She surprisingly walked over and took the glass from my hand. “This is all so unreal.” Avery sighed as she took a good healthy drink of her scotch. “I mean, usually the little guy doesn’t win, you know.”

  “It doesn’t mean they shouldn’t.” I felt like shit that we had missed this and several of our employees had been subjected to Spillner and Cynthia’s treatment. Chase, Julian and I were still working on a way to make it up to everyone. “If you and Quinn would like to take tomorrow off, we’d be fine with that and we’ll make sure H.R. knows they are approved days off.”

  Avery placed her glass on the bar top. “Thank you, Nicholas, but we’ll be fine.” She chuckled a bit. “Besides, I don’t think Quinn would want to miss any of the fireworks.”

  Giving Quinn some thought, I agreed. “Well, hopefully there aren’t any.”

  She smoothed her skirt with both hands and I knew that was a sign that she was getting ready to leave and go back to work. “Thank you for sharing this obviously confidential information with me, Nicholas. I would have felt horrible had he been really abusing her.” She seemed to be fighting an internal struggle, but then she looked at me with a new found purpose. “I won’t keep quiet if I suspect someone of any wrong doing again.”

  I couldn’t help myself. The idea that she was blaming herself for some of this mess was unacceptable to me. I came around from behind the bar, grabbed her upper arm and yanked her towards me. She must have been feeling really awful, because she didn’t fight me at all. I raised both my arms to hold her face in my hands and brought her eyes to look into mine. “Imp, if anyone is to blame it’s me, Julian and Chase for not paying closer attention.”

  She looked so serious and I didn’t like it. The corner of her mouth took a small upturn. “How could you guys? You’re too busy ruling the world.”

  Still holding her perfect face in my hands, I brought her closer. “There’s only one thing I want to rule right now, baby, and that’s you,” I whispered and despite the look of shock on her face, I slammed my lips down on hers. Dumbest motherfucker, yeah, I know. But when she actually opened up and allowed my tongue access into her sweet scotch flavored mouth, I realized this kiss alone was worth any future sexual harassment court dates I was going to have to attend.

  I moved one hand behind her head to hold her lips to mine and I lowered my other arm to wrap it around her waist and pull her closer to me. I wasn’t going to give her any wiggle room where she could escape my hold on her. I wondered what she tasted like for six days and she was everything I imagined she would be and more.

  Her tongue darted out to tangle with mine, and when she moaned, I was certain my cock was going to rip through my slacks to get to her. I knew without a doubt she could feel it digging into her stomach, but she wasn’t giving any indication that it was bothering her. On the contrary, I felt her run her hands up my stomach and fist my shirt in her hands.

  I turned her body so her back was up against the bar. I managed to tear my arm from around her waist and pull out one of the bar stools. I placed both my hands on her hips, and without breaking the kiss, I hoisted her up on the stool and stepped in between her legs that she willingly opened for me.

  I pulled back from our kiss to remove my
suit jacket, and as I was tearing it off, Avery went for my tie. Total honesty here…I wasn’t sure if she was going to remove it or strangle me with it, but I almost broke out in The Good Lord’s Hallelujah when I realized she was removing it. She wanted me and now that there wasn’t any doubt about it, she was going to get me.

  I placed my right hand on the side of her neck and ran it up through her hair until I had a fistful of silky ink in my hand. I gave her head a vicious tug to grant me access to her mouth again. She spread her legs wider and I was sure I was going to cum in my pants like a fourteen year old boy. This kiss was hotter than our previous one two minutes ago, and I would have sworn that wasn’t possible. I had one hand in her hair and the other gripping the shit out of her hip that I knew I was going to leave her bruised. Her fantasy demanded force and dominance, but this wasn’t a fantasy for me and I wasn’t playacting. She said she wanted to be owned, but I was going to make sure she changed that to be owned by me and me only.

  I had to touch more of her, her lips and velvety strands of hair weren’t enough. Since she took it upon herself to remove my tie, I didn’t think she’d mind undressing each other, so using both hands, I seized the collar of her blouse and ripped it open down the front, sending buttons flying everywhere.

  She let out the sexiest sound I had ever heard, “Nicolas.”

  I rested my forehead against hers and got a heavenly view of her resplendent tits encased in a simple white bra. Her chest was heaving, giving me an idea of just how turned on she was. I wrapped both my hands around her neck and the moan she elicited made me want to squeeze, but instead my hands progressed down her collar bone until they ran over her heavy mounds and I was holding each one in my hand. I inched my forehead back enough to be able to look into her eyes. I needed confirmation to continue no matter what her fantasy. She had her eyes closed and her face was pure ecstasy. “Avery?” I questioned.

  Her eyes fluttered open and she had trouble focusing on my eyes. When she finally did, she brought one of her small, delicate hands to my face and caressed my cheek and passed thumb across my lower lip. She inched up to kiss me again and that was all the green light I needed.

  As I returned my gaze back to her flawless tits, I curled my fingers around the top edges of her bra cups and pulled them down. I was so focused on the view that the tearing of the fabric was a distant sound in the background. I wanted to be affectionate and start with a trail of kisses from her neck and work my way down to her delicate pink nipples, but the site of her bare breasts threw all possibilities of soft and slow right out the window. Instead I went straight for her left tit and wrapping my lips around her hard peaks, and I bit down. Hard.

  Avery let out a borderline scream, and all it did was spurn me on. I took my hands and placed them on the inside of her thighs, moving them upwards to give me access to what I hope would be her very soaked pussy. I could smell her arousal and I couldn’t decide if I wanted to eat her pussy, finger fuck her pussy or just bend her over my desk and fuck her raw. This woman had me losing my goddamn mind.

  Avery appeared just as lust drunk as I was. “Nicholas, please.”

  While the sound of her begging me had me hotter than hell, we both knew she didn’t need to beg me. In this moment, I’d have handed over anything she asked of me. Unfortunately, we were so consumed in one another, neither one of us heard the door open.

  “Yo, Sav, we still on for…oh, shit!” I heard the door slam shut, but I’d recognize Chase’s voice anywhere.

  “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” Avery screeched, and pushing me away from her, jumped off the bar stool. To my disappointment, she pulled her skirt back down and tried to right her blouse, but with the buttons all missing, she wasn’t very successful. She looked up at me like I was the sole cause of world hunger. “You’re the goddamn S in SMA! Who in the hell would think it’s okay to just walk into your office?!”

  I ran my hands through my hair and pull hard hoping it would squelch my frustrations. I knew I was going to add to her humiliation with my next words, though. “The only people who are allowed to enter my office without permission are-”

  Her beautiful silver eyes rounded. “Chase and Julian,” she whispered. I knew she was a shattered mess, because she was still trying to button up her blouse even though it clearly had no buttons. I walked over to the loft room knowing I had extra shirts in there. When I walked back into the office, I found her stapling her blouse back together. She had me pretty close to declaring my undying love for her right then and there.

  She frantically glanced up at me in between staples. “Could you, I don’t know, maybe make yourself useful here?” She went back to stapling.

  I stopped in front of her and stilled her hands. After removing the stapler from her hands, I pulled the ruined blouse up over her head. “Are you kidding me?” she thundered. “You are out of your mind if you think that interruption didn’t bring me back to my senses!”

  I silently slipped my shirt on her and once she realized that I was redressing her instead of undressing her, she quietly let me roll up the sleeves and button up the shirt. When I was finally done, she looked down to check my work and it gave me the opportunity to kiss her on the top of her beautiful, neurotic head.

  I heard her sigh, but I didn’t stop her when she practically ran for the door. I envied the way she could just walk away from me because I wasn’t so sure I could walk away from her if I had to.

  I was going to kill Chase.

  Chapter 9

  Envy: Because I know I can do more for her than that stupid putz.

  Avery~

  I kept looking at the clock all morning, willing it to speed up. By the time I fled Nicolas’ office yesterday, everyone had already left for the day, and thank God, because I was sure anyone who looked at me would be able to see the glaring red letter A on my forehead. I mean, what else would they think seeing me in a man’s button up that was a million sizes too big for me? And Quinn, bless her little backstabbing, traitorous heart, had left a post-it note on my keyboard with a smiley face. Of course, since I couldn’t bask in my humiliation alone, I received a text from Izzy last night of a thumbs up emoji.

  Quinn ambushed me first thing this morning for all the ‘juicy details’, but I gave her the G rated version of what went down…much to her disappointment. Plus, after she couldn’t stop laughing when I got to the part where Chase interrupted us, I decided she didn’t deserve all the dirty details. I really needed to look up Friend 101 refresher courses, because she obviously needed them.

  I also seriously contemplated sending Chase a bottle of whiskey with a huge Thank You helium balloon attached to it, but I didn’t think Nicholas would find that amusing. I was a mess when I had left Nicholas yesterday, and even once I got home and polished off a half bottle of wine, I was still a mess. I couldn’t believe I almost let him fuck me in his office. Hell, there was no ‘almost’ about it, it would have happened, if not for Chase.

  I had laid in bed last night doing my best to get some sleep, but whether my eyes were opened or closed, all I saw was Nicholas’ face and I could still feel his kisses on my lips; his mouth on my body. I even considered sleeping in his shirt, but the only reason I didn’t was because it smelled laundered and not like him. I could recall every touch of his lips, hands and body, and Jesus, Mary and Joseph, what a body it was. When I ran my hands from his stomach up to his chest, I felt exactly how dedicated that man was to his health. He was all hard ridges.

  I spend most of the night trying to un-confuse myself, because let me tell you…I was certifiably confused. I knew it was wrong to get involved with Nicholas. That was a no brainer; he was my boss. That part wasn’t the part I confused about. The confusion came with this dangerous game I was playing where I was uncontrollably attracted to him, but I wanted him to force the issue to absolve me of knowingly making a bad decision. Plus, it played into my fantasy for him to coerce me and give me no choice. So, here I am experiencing the excruciating pain of waiting for th
ree-thirty to come around, so I could give myself a couple of days away from work, him…everything, and hopefully clear my head. At least it was already lunch time and that meant half the day was already over. All I had to do was get through the one o’clock meeting about Spillner without jumping Nicolas’ bones and I’d be okay.

  Quinn and I rarely went out for lunch. We both knew how to pack our own lunches and why waste money if you didn’t need to. However, I needed a breather from this building and the occupants in it…okay, one particular occupant…so I decided to hit Aunt Stella’s Café again this week, because it was easy and fast.

  As I was walking through the front lobby of SMA, I was digging though my purse to make sure I had some cash on me for lunch. While my ATM card would work, I hated balancing my checking account so I always tried to have cash on me for the little things. It’s because of this insistence to have cash, I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going and I walked head first into a very male stranger.

  Okay, so he wasn’t a stranger, but that made this ten times worse.

  I was vaguely aware of his hands on my arms, steading me upright. “Wow, VeeRee. This is great. I thought I was going to have to fight my way through the receptionist to find you.”

  “Er…Eric?” I uttered, stunned. And, yes, that would be the same Eric who lied and cheated. “What are you doing here?” Had I not been so shocked to see him, I would have shrugged his hands off of me, but I was too stunned to do anything other than gape at him.

  He gave me a tender smile, as if we hadn’t ended things with me walking into his apartment as he was getting his dick wet by his skanky neighbor. “I was hoping you’d be free for lunch.”

  I hadn’t seen him in months, and while that online voodoo priestess swore he’d be covered in warts and gets an incurable STD, he was still as good looking as ever. I needed to get a refund from Madam Louisa.