Naughty Little Secret
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Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
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Naughty Little Secret
Copyright © 2006 by Shelley Bradley
ISBN: 1-59998-162-9
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: August 2006
Naughty Little Secret
Shelley Bradley
A big thanks to all the Ladies of the Forum for your support, encouragement and love. Lora, Susan, Janine, Gloria, Connie, Joy, Natalie, Sheila—all of you are the wildest, sweetest bunch of ladies!
Special thanks to Annmarie for reading. Multiple drafts. Answering questions. Many of them. And not losing her patience or enthusiasm once. You’re a gem!
Naughty Little Secret
“Lauren?”
His voice haunted her… So deep it vibrated inside her, heating her libido up faster than anything requiring batteries. Low and controlled, like he was murmuring to a lover, making sure she knew everything he planned to do to her body. She could hear him now in her head.
I’m going to strip you down to your skin, sugar, and kiss you until you
can’t remember taking a breath you don’t share with me. Then I’m going to
test just how wet you are. With my tongue. Before I spend the night inside
you, making you scream my name…
“Lauren?”
Oh, his voice… The man could make her wet with a simple hello. His killer voice had a hint of gruffness that suggested he was coming off an all-nighter of sweaty, amazing sex.
Then again, maybe he was…with his endless string of twenty-something Barbie dolls.
“Lauren?”
She blinked, coming back to his cluttered office and her hour-old coffee. The recurring fantasies of Noah Reeves had to stop. She wasn’t his type—at all. At thirty-six, Lauren had given up on Miss Clairol and let her faux golden streaks turn a natural caramel. Her infrequent trips to the gym probably weren’t enough to keep her ass from spreading.
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She sighed. Somehow, in the last ten years, she felt like she’d become Barbie’s frumpy Aunt Gertrude.
Men like Noah didn’t desire Gertrude. Or sleep with them. She needed a serious reality check if she thought for an instant that he’d seen her as anything but an employee for the past year. To him, she was just a staff manager for the growing chain of upscale steakhouses he owned with four other men.
And his old buddy’s ex-wife.
Too bad she was having a damn hard time thinking of him as anything other than a fantasy.
She glanced again at Noah. One little peek couldn’t hurt, right?
Big mistake. Sin on a stick. Calendar hunky with spiked dark hair, eyes somewhere between blue and gray, ruthlessly carved cheekbones, and shoulders so wide they induced drool. The whispered rumors about him did nothing to cool her down. She’d heard the man was a serious powerhouse in bed—big, built, and not afraid to use every inch God gave him. Dominant. Noah was seriously hot.
Once. Just once, she’d like to know what it was like to get down and dirty with a man like him. Wine-drenched fantasies of Noah ordering her to the bed, demanding she spread her legs, then becoming master of all he surveyed… Lauren could get off to that vision in about three minutes.
She’d timed it.
And if she didn’t stop mooning over her boss and start focusing on her job, she was going to be unemployed.
“I asked if you have the site visit reports.” He frowned, concern softening his gaze. “Are you okay?”
“Fine. Just fine.” As long as she kept the heavy breathing to a minimum, anyway.
“You sure? You look awfully flushed.”
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Damn, why wouldn’t the earth open up and swallow her whole? She’d been imagining him naked and aroused and ready to claim her. She’d even worn her sexiest short skirt and a sheer blouse that showed a hint of cleavage. His reaction? He’d spent most of the day looking elsewhere.
And now, he was thinking about a report she generated yesterday.
Why had she thought it was a good idea to test Noah’s reactions to her charms? Again?
She’d kidded herself a few weeks ago that maybe she’d been too subtle in her attempt to get his attention. Her second attempt had gone largely unnoticed, as he’d had off-site meetings most of that day. The fifteen minutes she had seen him, of course, hadn’t been enough time for him to notice her. But today, closeted in his office, just the two of them, she wore a damn near see-through blouse and total fuck-me shoes, and he was still determined to look anywhere but at her. Lauren sighed. Time to face reality. All signs pointed to Noah being immune to her.
“Sorry,” she murmured, mentally slapping herself. “I’m not feeling very well.”
“You need to lie down for a minute?”
Lauren held in a groan. She’d love to ask if he’d mind lying down with her and helping her out with the cobwebs surely lining her vagina since she’d been divorced and without for two years…but she just wasn’t up for the humiliation of his polite refusal.
And it would be oh-so-polite. Noah was not just yummy but nice. The total package, in fact. Looks, brains, kindness, a sometimes shy-boy sparkle she’d always liked.
The concern on his face was so genuine—a furrow of brow, a sharp assessment of those wintery blue eyes. He reached out to touch her shoulder, then apparently changed his mind.
The man couldn’t even bring himself to touch her? Ugh, humiliating!
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She shook her head. “I’m fine. I have copies of the site reports on my desk. I can run and get them…”
Noah raised a tanned forearm, visible under the rolled-up cuff of his dress shirt, and checked his watch. “I didn’t realize it was so late. What do you say we break for lunch?”
We?
Lauren perked up. Was he asking her out to lunch?
“I know a great little place a few miles from here. Awesome sandwiches. I can drive.”
Noah hesitated, and Lauren nearly cringed at his considering expression. Lord, he hadn’t been asking her out. When would she get a clue? He’d merely been suggesting they needed a break from work.
“I was just thinking that we could bring some of our work with us and keep talking, but we can reconvene at two, if you’d rather.” She shrugged with affected nonchalance.
And hoped to hell he bought her indifferent routine.
“Meeting back here at two works for me, actually. I have…an errand to run.”
Hmm. She’d bet his “errand” was named Misty, a bombshell in her mid-twenties he’d started dating a few months ago. Misty was, of all things, a professional cheerleader. It was all Lauren could do not to snort. Professional cheerleader. Yeah, no doubt Noah was going to spend his lunch hour shaking her pom-poms.
“You’ll be okay alone?” he asked gently.
Sure. She’d been alone for the last two years—longer, really. Tim, her ex, hadn’t been with her for the last five years of their marriage. Noah, his old college pal and her current boss, wasn’t likely to volunteer to fill the void. First, men had that “buddy” line they didn’t cross. Sisters and wives were off limits. She was learning the hard way it apparently applied to ex-wives, too. Second, even if he had been interested, she wasn’t in the
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market for a relationship. Happily ever after just wasn’t in the cards for her, and she wasn’t in the mood to endure the pain and humiliation of a break up again. A tidy little fling would be just fine, thank you very much. Except Noah wasn’t cooperating.
Probably just as well. Noah was the kind of man she could seriously fall for—even if she didn’t want to. And he was all about lovin’ èm and leavin’ èm. She didn’t want to be left. Been there, done that. Hell, she’d made the T-shirt.
And Noah would definitely break her heart if she let him.
“Fine. I have some phone calls to return and…stuff to do. I’ll see you back here in an hour.”
Before he could say another word, Lauren rose, tugged on her embarrassingly short skirt, and hustled out of his office.
Back at her desk, she took a deep breath and squeezed her thighs together. So much for mere friendship. Being beside Noah for the better part of four hours had made her achy and wet, despite the fact they’d discussed nothing more exciting than ongoing construction and possible new restaurant sites. If the man ever talked dirty to her, she’d probably flood her panties. And have an orgasm from his voice alone. The fantasies she’d been spinning of a naked Noah hadn’t helped. A glance down proved her nipples stood straight out, in full salute. He couldn’t have missed them.
Lauren sighed. No, he’d noticed. She’d seen him glance in her direction once or twice. But he’d looked away quickly. They hadn’t mattered.
She
didn’t matter, not sexually. Not to him.
Just her luck.
Lauren had no one to blame but herself. It never failed. She’d taken an interest in a man who just didn’t want her. Men who asked her out,
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like the new guy in Accounting, Gary, never interested her. Never. What the hell was wrong with her?
She wasn’t going to solve that riddle in the next sixty minutes, so she grabbed her keys and her purse and headed out of Tender Fork’s offices, through the building’s shared lobby, then out to her car.
Noah’s parking space already sat empty. Apparently, he couldn’t wait to do his “errand”—or rather, to do Misty.
Lauren held back unexpected tears.
Rah freakin’ rah
…
Z Z Z
An hour later, Lauren returned to Noah’s office. He sat waiting for her, looking a little disheveled, a forgotten sandwich at his elbow.
Apparently, his little cheerleader had spent the last hour with her hands mussing up his hair while he, no doubt, had completely sated her. After such great sex, who cared about something as mundane as turkey on wheat with sprouts?
When she sat at the small round table on the other side of his office and dragged out her folder, Noah’s head shot up.
He smiled, clearing his throat, then quickly looked away. “Good lunch?”
Fabulous. I met four marines in the parking lot at Denny’s and we
went for it. You?
“Um, fine.”
“Feeling better?”
“Fine. Let’s just finish this. I know you have another meeting, and I promised Emma I’d be on time tonight so I can take her to her dance class.”
Surprise furrowed Noah’s brow. “On a Wednesday? I thought Emma’s class was on Saturday.”
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It was Lauren’s turn to be surprised. He’d remembered the day of Emma’s ballet lesson after a passing comment? Well, why not? The man was a genius, and his mind frankly amazed her.
“The kids are with Tim this weekend, and he’s planning to take them up to the lake. This is Emma’s make up lesson.”
“What are your plans this weekend?”
Lauren paused. Did Noah want to know as a man or a boss? Had to be the latter. Why would he be interested in her when he had Misty and her pom-poms?
“I’m going to try finishing laying the tile in the bathroom floor. I’m close now. It’ll be nice to have that chore done.”
She would not ask him about his plans. No doubt it would be something involving Misty and satin sheets. Lauren would rather not know.
Sad, really. She hadn’t always been this way around Noah. When she’d been newly married to Tim, before the high-powered job and the kids and the PTA meetings consumed their lives, she’d enjoyed Noah’s great company and sharp wit, and hoped he’d find the right woman someday. Now, she suspected if he announced he’d found the right woman, Lauren would feel an irrational urge to break her legs. She’d never even met Misty, and already she didn’t like her.