“You’re enamoured by me,” he stated slowly. “I can see it in your eyes. You lust for something new, different. Maybe I’m the same.”

I swallowed, unwilling to acknowledge his statement. “Why am I here, Mr Borden? Just cut to the chase.”

“You’re different,” he quietly remarked.

“Different how?”

“Just… different. I see colours when I’m around you.”

Colours. What did that mean?

My chest tightened at the fleeting shadow of sadness lurking beneath the surface of him. Something wasn’t right. The cocky, arrogant man from two seconds ago had disappeared, and I wanted to speak to this man in front of me now before he bottled it up again. I opened my mouth to respond when his phone rang. Snapping out of whatever bubble we allowed ourselves in, he sighed and pressed a button on the screen of his phone and put it to his ear.

“What?” he demanded.

He listened intently, and I could already feel the shift in the air. He was pulling away, back to the man from before.

“I’ll be on my way in a few minutes,” he said before hanging up and looking back at me. “I’m just going to cut to the chase in our job interview, Miss Warne.”

I froze, my breath knocked out of me. Job interview? “What? What are you talking about?”

“I like you, and I think you would be a wonderful asset to my business. Thank you for expressing interest –”

“I didn’t express shit. I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about right now.”

He stared at me evenly. “You’re a bookkeeper by trade, are you not?”

I didn’t respond. I was too lost to understand.

“My club is in need of one as soon as possible, and the job is yours. You’ll be working alongside me –”

“No,” I cut in, catching up to his words in my shock. “I won’t be taking any position with you. I don’t even know what you’re talking about!”

He tucked his phone into his pocket and leaned back in his chair. “It’s a good paying job, more than what you’re making at the place you’re at currently. You should be thanking me right now. It’s not often I like someone enough to hire them on the spot.”

“I don’t want to be hired. I’m happy where I am.”

“You’re happy to live in poverty? Somehow I find that unlikely, and anyways it’s done. You’ll be taking the position, or you’ll end up unemployed, which I know you don’t want to be. That would mean crawling back to your grandmother’s little house, putting stress on that poor fragile thing after she thought you were handling yourself so well on your own. It’d be a shame, wouldn’t it?”

My heart nearly stopped. “You’ve been combing through my life.”

“Every inch of it.”

“Why?”

“Because I can.”

I paused, trying to understand this man. “Why me?”

“You already know why.”

You’re different. He’d said.

We stared at each other for several moments, neither of us unwilling to look away first. What started out as anger had now weaned to me curiously exploring his unnaturally attractive face, wondering exactly what thoughts inhabited his crazy mind to justify doing this to me.

“You’re deluded,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m not working for you, no matter what you say, Mr Borden.”

“Oh, come on,” he whispered to me, the corner of his mouth lifting. “Think of the fun we’ll have.”

I felt a hot thrill shoot down my belly, and my sex tightened. Fuck, he was getting to me. I couldn’t work alongside him. That was madness, and very unhealthy for Horny Emma, who was already trying to do a jail-break from the cage I’d locked her in.

“You said you didn’t want me anywhere near your establishments,” I reminded him.

He leaned forward, licking his bottom lip as he stared at my mouth. “That was before I sucked your tongue.”

My ovaries exploded.

Breathe, breathe, breathe.

Amusement flickered in those eyes as he took in the state of me. Then he rose up to his feet and my body tensed at the movement. He was leaving? Would he take me with him? Would I even say no to this dangerous man?

“Where are you doing?” I asked him, and I sounded like a needy moron.

He smirked at me. “As much as I enjoy your company, I have some business to get around to. Enjoy your plate, alley cat. I added extra scallops for you.”

I let out an unsteady breath, hating the disappointment I felt, both for him leaving me and in myself for humanizing the asshole.

He has just forcefully hired you, Emma!

I felt ashamed in that moment for the satisfaction that emerged at the thought of him liking me enough to hire me.

What the fuck was wrong with me? How could I be feeling two opposing emotions at the same bloody time?

I expected him to just leave, and I was desperate for him to so I could calm down and clear my thoughts. But he just stood there for several more seconds. I managed to look at him, shaking in my confusion, and yet feeling a thrill I couldn’t pinpoint. With eyes focused on mine, he put his hand into his pocket and pulled something out. I was too busy looking at him to know what it was, until the cool object touched my chest, and I jumped, going still at the familiar feel of my switchblade.

I didn’t move as he sensually trailed it in between my breasts, his tongue caught between his teeth, before securing it in my bra. Then he leaned over and I felt the brush of his thumb on my lips. He stroked it lightly – dotingly – and my breath thinned and my heart raced. He had just effortlessly reduced me to a puddle once again, because that’s the affect he effortlessly had on women, including me: a hard-ass. Once again, I drowned in those eyes that looked far more human than I’d ever witnessed in him before.

“Red doesn’t suit you,” he quietly stated, his eyes narrowing. “Never put on red lipstick again.”

Then his hand dropped, and the tension broke as he turned around and walked out of there. I watched him as my body pulsed with a lust I wasn’t familiar with. Head held high, back straight, legs moving fluidly, he confidently walked as if he owned the ground he walked on and…

Well, shit, he kinda did, didn’t he?

*

I stripped off my clothes in the bathroom and stared at the small mirror over the sink. I violently rubbed the red lipstick off my lips, telling myself that I was trying to remove the touch of him from off of me. Only my body was saying otherwise.