Claiming What's His (16 page)

             
Sam handed Dom the keys and headed to the office.  He nodded his head once and muttered, “I’ll take care of it.”

             
They finally made it to the office.  It was 9:47 a.m.  Almost two hours late.

             
Yikes!
              Sam turned wide eyed to Maggie, seeing she had the same expression on her face.  After a beat, she shrugged as if it wasn’t a big deal and she wasn’t worried in the least bit. 

             
Typical Maggie.

Easy for her to say, it was her family’s business.  Sam was just an employee who could have easily been fired on her first day at work for being late.

Alex should be in the weekly morning meeting that Maggie mentioned the managers were in every Monday morning.  This should give Sam a slight breather and think of a good excuse. 

Although, at the moment, she couldn’t think of anything.
  It wasn’t like she wanted to lie.  She didn’t want to get fired on her first day when technically she and Maggie were being of service for a good cause.  If something wrong had happened to Cozy’s, all hell would break loose.

It wasn’t the best excuse, but it was the truth. 

Sort of.

Sam released a breath of air.  She barely turned towards her desk when Alex’s office door opened.
 

Sam jumped.

              Crap!
              He wasn’t angry. But he did not look too happy either. 

             
“Talk. Inside. Now,” he clipped, reaching out to grab her wrist before adding, “And Maggs, Dad said he left a folder on his desk for you.”

             
“Yes, Sir,” she said, mock saluting him then ducking into George’s office. 

             
He dragged her into the office and just as she cleared the threshold, he shut the door and pressed her back against it.  She felt his warm breathe gliding across her neck and shoulders as he lost his face into her neck. 

             
He stated the obvious, “You’re late.  And it’s your first day.  Tisk, tisk.  That’s not good, Samantha.”

             
Sam rolled her eyes and shoved at his waist.  “You saw where I was.”

             
“You didn’t call.  I waited for you.  And I only found you because Nick wanted Cozy’s coffee.”

             
Her brows came together, confused as to why he would wait for her.  “Waited?  Why?”

             
“So I could do this.” 

             
His head came up and he brought his mouth down to hers, giving her a heck of a good morning kiss.  It was so good that Sam slid her hands and clutched his shoulders, pulling him closer to her.  It was as if she couldn’t get him close enough. 

             
So much for keeping it professional
, she thought.

He released his lips but kept his head pressed against hers and said, “Good morning.”

              “Good morning.  Sorry I’m late.  I would’ve called but Nat was swamped and we didn’t get a break until you came in.”

             
“You’re forgiven this time and you’re still going to make it up to me.”

             
“What did you –”

             
Sam didn’t get to finish when he bent at his waist and hoisted her onto his shoulders, his arm wrapped around her thighs.

             
“Alex!  Put me down!” Sam shrieked, pushing against his back.

             
“You’re making it up to me for being late and because I waited all morning for you.”

             
He
had
to be joking.  They were at work.  There were people outside.  The walls were
not
soundproof.

             
Sam hoped he was joking, but she needed to be sure.

             
“Here?  Right now?  Are you nuts?”  She hissed, slapping his ass upside down.

             
He retaliated and slapped her back.

             
She yelped.  She decided to try another technique. 

             
“Uh, we need to get started on work,” she tried.

             
“Don’t worry, we’ll get started.  First, we need to break in my couch.”

             
This got her a tingle between her legs.

             
Nope, he wasn’t joking.

             
Oh God.

             
Sam knew it was a bad idea to be doing this at the office where anyone could walk in, especially Maggie, Nick or George.  So she was starting to get desperate, mainly because she didn’t want to do it here in the office and get caught by anyone else.  Plus, she still wasn’t sure what she wanted to do it with him again (just yet).  At least not until she sorted out her feelings for him.

             
“We should really pick back up from where we left off,” Sam suggested, hoping she could get him to back away which didn’t work as he set her down on the couch and came down on top of her.

             
“The last place we left off was this morning before I left you satisfied in bed,” he reminded her.

             
Sam blushed.

             
But still trying to hide her embarrassment, her hands slid to his chest, giving it a shove as she whispered loudly, “I didn’t mean that and you know it.”

             
“You’re cute when you blush,” he told her.

             
Sam growled low in her throat and rolled her eyes, as she pushed against his chest.

             
He ignored her growl, his lips went to her ear, “We’re not finished.”

             
She shivered at his intention.

             
A knock came.

             
Relief.

             
Her chest deflated and a smile spread across her face.  “Yes we are.”

             
“I could just ignore them or tell them to go away while we… finish,” his seductive voice rumbled against his skin.

             
She swallowed, worried, fear, and a little excitement in her eyes.  Her heart pounded faster and she knew he felt it.  Worse was that she knew he meant what he said.

             
She felt movement against her neck and was sure that he was smiling as he said, “Fine, we’re done.  For now.”  Then he nipped her ear.

             
She yelped and quickly scampered away.

*******

              “What do you need at Mitch’s house?” Alex asked as he drove on the freeway heading out of the town. 

             
After their close call on the couch, she managed to focus on her new assignment without thinking of what could have been on the couch.  It took a lot for her to focus and with her core aching again for him, she managed to do so for about an hour when Mitch called to inform her that he needed to get out to the lake where the bass fishing was on fire.  She stuck her head in his office and announced that she needed to run an errand, but before she could say anything else, he declared that he was taking her and literally dragged her out.

             
At this rate, with all of the interruptions, she was never getting her work done.

             
Now they were in the car with him asking her a question as she stared out the windshield wondering where on earth her dad kept all his fish and how many freezers he had since she moved out.  Before she left, he had only one freezer and the thing was full to its capacity!

             
This was when things got interesting.

             
She replied, not glancing away from the windshield, “I need to pick up the kids.”

             
The car immediately came to a stop in the middle of the street where cars skidded to a halt behind them and honking as they swerved around.  She jerked in her seat, causing her hand to extend out onto the dash board to halt her whiplash which was helped by the locking belt.

             
Luckily, they weren’t on the freeway yet.

             
“What the hell!” she shouted.  “Why did you stop?”

             
She felt the air in the car shifted and it was so thick that it seemed difficult to breathe.  And then she felt his eyes on her.  She turned to face him, but she couldn’t read his face.  It was the half blank, half anger look mixed with the
are-you-fuckin’-kidding-me
look.

             
He didn’t say a word, but he kept staring.

             
“What?” she finally asked, breaking their silence.

             
“You have
kids
?”

             
“Yes.  Two.”

             
But, obviously, this was the wrong thing to say.  If she thought his look was scary then, she hadn’t seen anything until now.

             
“
What the fuck!
  When was this?  How come I don’t know?  Why the fuck didn’t Maggie tell me?” he roared.

             
Sam opened her mouth to answer, but before she could, his eyes flared and he growled, “Who the fuck is the father?”

             
Her brows came together wondering why he asked a bizarre question like that.  She couldn’t even answer that because she never knew who the father was. 

             
Alex continued to stare at her, her face blank and confused. 

             
“Why don’t we get to Dad’s first then I’ll answer your questions?” Sam suggested, hoping this would calm him a bit.

             
“Fuckin’ answer now!”
he barked.

             
Oh, he was pissed alright, but she was more pissed than him.  And she wasn’t going to act out of proportion without him getting all the details and him seeing first hand that he had it all wrong.

             
“Either drive now or I will get out and walk,” she threatened.

             
She heard him inhale a deep breath and she knew that he was trying to tone down his temper. 

             
As calmly as he could, he demanded with a hint of a small growl, “Just answer.”

             
“No,” she said stubbornly, facing forward and crossing her arms across her chest. 

             
This was the position Sam used often, especially when they were going up together.  Each time she was pissed she crossed her arm and it indicated for the other person to shut up and do as she says, otherwise all hell would break loose.  And he needed to get a move on to get to her dad’s place, unless he wanted her wrath there and then.

             
Alex put the SUV in gear and drove to Mitch’s.  Throughout the entire ride the air was so thick you could cut it with a knife.  She noticed that his hands tightly gripped the steering wheel.  Any tighter and he was sure he’ll end up ripping the material off. 

*******

              The Suburban pulled up to Mitch’s front yard to see him climbing the front porch with a rake in his hand.  Off to the side was the lawn mower and edge trimmer.  The yard was clean and there was a big pile of grass, weed, and tree branches.

Mitch turned around to look towards them as the Suburban came to a park.

              Before Alex could come to a complete stop, Sam hopped out and stomped towards Mitch.  It was probably a good thing she did because it gave them both a moment to get their tempers in check.  Worse thing about it was that their tempers were for two different reasons.

             
Alex opened the door just in time to see Mitch tense up and asked Sam, “What’s wrong, baby girl?”

             
Without hesitation, she responded, “Alex thinks I’m a slut!”

             
Alex could imagine the gasp that escaped Mitch’s mouth as he stepped out of the SUV and shut the door.  Without moving, he rolled his eyes to the sky and silently prayed that he had strength not to strangle anyone within the next few minutes.

             
His eyes returned to find Mitch’s wide eyes settled on him.  Before Mitch could get any word out, Alex spoke first.  “Mitch, don’t listen to her.  I asked her a question and she refused to answer,” he explained.

             
“What did you ask her?”  Mitch asked him then turned to Sam.  ”What did he ask you?”