Page 2 of Playing with the Boss
I’m going to be out of a job. Hell.
“I’m sorry, I don’t remember what your name was.”
Of course, he doesn’t—I never gave it to him last weekend, and if he’s anything like me he wasn’t exactly listening earlier. I turn my head to find the suave and dapper Mason leaned across the boardroom table, hand outstretched. Oh my God. He smells so good.
“Lisa.” I ignore his hand, unsure if I can manage to shake it without wanting to climb in his lap and grind myself against him.
He thrusts his hand forward anyway, drawing my eye to the ink on his forearm as he rests it on top of the table.
Tentatively, I slide my palm against his, horrified at the goosebumps that ripple across my flesh. Can he see them? Does he know the effect he has on me? Of course, he does. Men like him, they always know.
“Pleasure to meet you again, Lisa.” He pumps my hand firmly twice, his fingers lingering a little too long for it to be normal before he pulls back.
They did linger, didn’t they? Gosh. I don’t know what I imagine and what is real anymore. Somebody crack a window because that man’s aftershave is hallucinogenic in its sweet sinful smell.
“You work in finance?” Mason asks, leaning back in his seat adjacent to mine.
I cast my gaze across the room and note the last two people stroll out the door, deep in conversation. It’s just him and me. My sex-starved libido and this walking, talking fantasy that was only ever supposed to be one brief moment of madness.
Nothing could go wrong, right?
“No, I was merely helping out today. I make sales in advertising. I manage two of the top ten accounts, and I canvas for new customers.”
“Must be a hard job,” he muses with a smug tilt of his lips.
I narrow my gaze at him. “I don’t think so. I quite enjoy it.”
“You can’t be very good at it, though.”
Excuse me? With one comment, he halves his sex appeal—thick, muscular thighs be damned. Arrogance is never attractive. “What makes you say that?” I can’t believe I let this ass touch me.
“If you were good at your job, then the customer ledger wouldn’t be eighty percent of what it was last year, sixty-five of what it was the year before.”
“Given the circumstances, I think I’m pretty good at my job, actually.”
He smirks, and damn him if that doesn’t redeem him right there. “Prove it.”
“Pardon?”
He rolls his left sleeve down, buttoning the cuff. I track the action, horrified to find the reason he pauses in his movements is that he watches me, watch him. Mason’s lips kick up at the corner before he repeats the action with the other sleeve… deliberately slow.
“A few of us were headed into the city tonight for a meal,” he informs me. “But I have a proposal for you.”
“What kind of proposal?” I shift my legs under the table to ease the ache the simple action of him redressing those beautiful forearms has caused.
“We both know business dinners are boring, so let’s cut the bullshit.” He pushes from his seat to then lift his jacket from the back of it. “I’d rather give it a pass and spend the time doing something better. Something”—his eyes roam my body—“more enjoyable. The company is in the red—bad. There will be losses.” He slides his arms through the sleeves and then grabs the lapels to do that distinctly manly shrug to seat the jacket better. “You’re a pretty face, Lisa. I think you realized that’s how I felt when we met last weekend. Pretty faces get noticed. And as shallow as that sounds, a nice piece of ass in a tight skirt will always get twice the chance to sell her product than a woman who prefers to act demure.”
I’m not sure if I should be insulted, or flattered.
My breath hitches as he leans forward and pinches my chin between his forefinger and thumb. “I’d like this pretty face to survive to see another day when the ax falls. Join me for a meal and drinks, and we can talk about what you can do to keep your job here at Leyton.”
“Where?” I whisper, my face still in his grasp.
He gives the flesh beneath my bottom lip an almost imperceptible sweep with his thumb as he pulls away. “Where, what?”
“Do you want me?” Oh, shit. Totally not what I meant to say.
He inclines his head, disbelief in his gaze. “You want a repeat performance of last weekend? Here?”