He dragged his eyes away and looked up at her smile. “Carly,” he said, the word raspy from a mouth that had just gone dry. He cleared his throat and straightened in his chair. “What can I do for you?”
“I was wondering if you were through with my book. I need to take a look at it.”
“I put it back on your shelf yesterday.”
Her brows arched and those soft lips formed an O, the way they did in the fantasy he hadn’t been able to shake since he’d seen those two blasted survey answers yesterday. Except, in his dream it was the look she had after he drizzled caramel syrup on her breasts and topped his Carly sundae with a dollop of whipped cream.
“Stupid me, I didn’t even look.” She shrugged her shoulders and chuckled nervously. “I get distracted and lose half my brain.”
He knew the feeling. It was the same thing he’d been dealing with since it had sunk in that his available and most desirable coworker had a secret fetish for kinky sex. It had culminated this morning around two o’clock, when he’d been startled out of a dead sleep by a hard-on and the echoing sound of Carly Abrams’s orgasmic screams.
And he’d been walking bull-legged ever since.
It was difficult enough trying to focus on the job this morning; that she’d picked today of all days to make her maiden voyage to his side of the floor had to be some sort of cosmic joke.
She leaned against his desktop and casually crossed her long, slender legs. Her silky flowered skirt reminded him of a cottage garden, and he tried hard to restore the longtime image he’d had of her. The safe image. The one that allowed him to forget the sexy body and concentrate on getting ahead at the firm. Mary Quite Contrary, the sunny, friendly girl-next-door who always referred to Brayton as Mr. Hall, brought in plates of homemade zucchini bread and gave people rides to the mechanics when their cars were in the shop.
“Well, um, since I’m here…” she said. “About yesterday—I was out of line and I wanted to apologize.”
He blinked. “Yesterday?”
“You know, about the survey, you having to compete to get the Singles Inc. job.” She fidgeted with the edge of his desk, trailing a finger along the grain of the fake oak veneer. “You caught me at a bad time. I was cranky and it was rude of me to take it out on you. So I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”
Matt tried hard to rewind the whole incident. Yes, she’d popped off in a way that had had him questioning her stability, but he knew he’d been the one to start it by teasing her about her survey answers. If anyone should apologize, it should be him.
“I hadn’t exactly started the conversation off on the right foot,” he admitted.
“But that was no excuse for attacking you like that, so…” She let go of the desk and held out a hand. “Truce?”
He stared at those slim fingers, those perfectly polished nails, and found it ironic that she’d come here seeking exactly what he’d hoped to accomplish yesterday. His attempt at broaching a friendship had failed, but if things went his way, she’d be his employee very soon, and he should thank the stars for this second chance.
Taking her soft hand in his, he gave it a welcome shake, trying hard to ignore his body’s reaction to the sizzling warmth of her touch. “Forgive me and I’ll forgive you.”
“It’s a deal.”
She slid her palm off his and smiled brightly. “So did you choose to fill out the survey?”
Straightening in his seat, he cleared his throat and said, “Yeah. I figured, why not?”
“So that makes everyone, then. I’m surprised. Some people don’t like working on the bigger projects, but I guess it was the intrigue of the survey that had them going along.”
“Hall did say something about everyone getting some sort of results.”
“I heard that, too.” She tucked a strand of brown hair behind her ear and nodded while she spoke. “I don’t know what, though.”
“Me, either,” he replied.
Then an awkward silence fell between them. She glanced around his cube, trying to appear casual but not pulling it off, and the longer she stood there tapping a fingernail on his desktop, the more Matt began to wonder what she was really doing there.
He opened his mouth to inquire, but she cut him off.
“It sounds like Mr. Hall has an interest in movies.”
He pursed his brow. “I didn’t know that.”
“Well, those code names we all got for the survey seem to be characters from films. At least that’s what we’re guessing.” Grinning, she added, “Mine was Gidget.”
Matt couldn’t hold back his burst of laughter, though it occurred to him too late it might destroy their newfound truce—and the quirky look in her eyes said it might have.
“I’m sorry,” he quickly shot out. “It’s just so…perfect.”
She shrugged good-naturedly, making Matt feel like a cad.
“I can’t argue with that. I suppose some people might see me as…”
“Bubbly?” he offered.
A faint blush colored her cheeks, and he wished like hell he could learn to keep his mouth closed. For some reason, whenever she was near, he ended up either tongue-tied or blurting the wrong thing. It was the main reason he’d gone into Frank’s office and asked to handle that first project on his own. He’d wanted to make a good impression at the new firm and he’d quickly discovered that wasn’t going to happen in proximity to Carly, where his cock forever vied for attention and his brain wouldn’t shift into gear.
Apparently, two years later, nothing had changed.
“Anyway,” she said, “we’ve been comparing code names around the office. Do you know what Neil got?”
Matt shook his head.
“Patton!” She laughed more heartily than the situation warranted. “Is that a riot?”
“Yes, that’s a good one.”
“And who else?” she pondered, holding her chin and staring wistfully off into space. “Oh, Bev got Scarlett, and Brian got Hal. We’re guessing Hal’s the computer from 2001: A Space Odyssey.”
Matt nodded and smiled, trying to will himself to stay relaxed, keep his mouth shut and not inadvertently embarrass her again. If she agreed to work for him, he’d have to get past this magnetic field between them that continually garbled his thoughts and had him chewing shoe leather. But it wasn’t easy when those breasts jiggled as she laughed or that flowery scent swarmed his nose, or those Caribbean eyes sparkled with such sweetness he wanted to scoop her up and take a bite or—oh, hell. Maybe they were better off hating each other.
Her smile slowly faded and she returned to the awkward fidgeting that had left him suspect before. Okay, so apology for yesterday accepted and a truce agreed. What was with the sudden small talk and this apparent desire to gab after two years of total avoidance?
“So what Hollywood feature did Mr. Hall put you in?”
He shook off his thoughts. “Pardon?”
“Your code name. Who did he give you?” Then she quickly held up a hand. “Not that you have to answer that. I realize they’re confidential. We were just having fun with it, you know, seeing what Mr. Hall had assigned to each of us.” Giggling, she added, “Heck, for all I know, his wife might have made them up. Or maybe he picked them off a list from Singles Inc.” She blushed again and began to back toward the entrance to his cubicle. “Mr. Hall might not have picked them out at all. I don’t think anyone asked. Or it could have been random or—”
“Rocky.”