Eternally Seduced (3 page)

          “You’re Yanna Everleigh?” He didn’t wait for an answer and offered his hand instead. “I’m Constantijin Kastein, and I will be interviewing you today.”

          No wonder everyone was staring. No fucking wonder. He was a Kastein – a board member at the very least. And I had taken the seat next to him like I was going to interview the others, too, when I should have been with them at the opposite side of the table.

          Still drowning in a mental pool of embarrassment, I slowly took his hand. His hand immediately gripped mine, but what made my eyes shoot up to him incredulously was how he also managed to caress my fingers at the same time.

          He returned it with an innocent one of his own. “Since you’re the last one to arrive, I hope you understand that you will be the last one I’ll be interviewing one-on-one.”

          I could only nod dumbly. I hadn’t even known there was going to be a one-on-one. I was absolutely unprepared for it but right now, what I was most worried about was how my nipples seemed to be knocking against my blouse and begging for his attention. Worse, I also felt the heat of his gaze burn through my blouse just before he looked back at the other applicants. It was only for a second, but God! That second was something I’d never forget – just that one look and he made me feel like he was already cupping my breasts and sucking my nipples.

          I clutched my armrests more desperately. It was all I could do to control myself, knowing that if I crossed my legs, he would know I was doing so because I was becoming wet for him. Oh dear, I was
wet.
For the first time in my life I was wet between my legs and it had nothing to do with taking a shower. It had everything to do with the man still eye-humping me, and it was all I could do
not
to eye-hump him back.

          How could a pair of silvery gray eyes be so powerfully seductive?

          The nature of my thoughts made me want to drown myself longer in the pool of embarrassment in my mind, now transformed into a sauna of utter humiliation.

         
Constantijin Kastein.

         
He owned the company I was applying to and I hadn’t even recognized him. How could I be so dumb? And I was late for my interview, too. Why was I even here?

          Constantijin was still speaking, his voice deep and husky but his accent less pronounced this time. And then he was handing out questionnaires. He gave mine last, and our fingers not so accidentally – on his part – brushed. I bit back another gasp, aghast and just outright stunned at how the merest touch from him could turn me on, more so than I already was.

          How was it that I had lived 24 years without even being tempted to watch porn or masturbate and yet one look from this man was enough to make me mentally pant for his touch? If I had to be ruthlessly honest with myself, a part of me was even imagining what his
cock would look like. I didn’t care about anyone else’s – I just wanted to look at his.

          My face burned with color at what I had just privately admitted to myself.

          When he bent towards me, I tensed. “Relax,” he said so softly that I knew I would be the only one able to hear him. “I don’t bite.”

          Just as I opened my mouth to answer, he added even more softly, “Not unless you want me to. Starting with those lovely nipples of yours.”

          Ladies and gentlemen, as of 9:24 in the morning, on the 21
^st
of September, I have officially had my first orgasm – or something really close to it. Trembling, I quickly turned away, my seat swiveling completely so that he would only be able to see the back of my chair. I had no plans responding – absolutely no plan at all since I knew whatever I said, it wouldn’t be able to hide how those words excited my body, even as my mind recoiled from them.

          Constantijin Kastein was like no one I knew – or even imagined knowing. I would never have thought of any stranger saying something like that to me; but when he did, it sounded terrifyingly right.

          Ten minutes into the questionnaire and I could feel his gaze on me again, more heated than ever. We both knew I was aware that he was mentally undressing me with his gaze.

          For a second, my fingers clenched around my Barbie-pink pen like a vise – the only thing I could do to release the weird and intense pressure that the sexual tension between us had created inside of me.

          “Cute pen,” he said suddenly, startling me into dropping the said cute pen.

I stared in frustration at how that action had left an inch-long zigzag mark on the middle of my answer sheet. Great – just darn great. Whoever would end up checking this would be forgiven for thinking I might have been doodling around because I was having a hard time answering their questions.

“Thank you,” I muttered, swiveling my seat towards him as I reluctantly lifted my gaze to meet his, knowing I owed him that much. It was exactly as I feared.

Constantijin held my gaze with his bright gray eyes – and claimed me entirely through it. His seat swiveled as he faced me completely, our knees bumping as he did. I could only swallow, knowing that everything he did was a calculated move to seduce me – even though there were a dozen of other people in the room with us.

With this kind of sexual tension – none of that really mattered.

“Is pink your favorite color?” Oh, dear Lord, that accent was so sinfully sexy, too. It made me think of him with days-old stubble, arousing me as he used its rough texture to tease my brea---

Where the hell were all these thoughts coming from?

Realizing he was still waiting for an answer, I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. I wanted to turn away but knew it would be the height of disrespect if I did. He was Constantijin
Kastein
of
Kastein,
Incorporated, after all.

He inched even closer, and I tensed again when our knees bumped the second time. Unable to bear another not-so-accidental encounter, I swiveled my seat back and glanced determinedly down at my questionnaire and answer sheet.

If I had thought that would dissuade him, it just seemed to have the opposite effect. Constantijin actually inched closer – enough for his breath to fan my cheek. As he spoke, I could feel his gaze caressing my breasts. “Thank God the ink’s not pink. That would be too much.”

          I gripped my pen tightly again. Damn him. It was
him
that was too much…everything. Taking a deep breath, I prepared myself to tell him off. But when I looked up, he was already busy talking with Bottle Blonde, who – in complete contrast with how I felt – seemed more than eager to have him seduce her. Or even vice versa. You could tell by the way she was playing with the low neckline of her tight black dress, as if she was trying to figure out how to make it “unintentionally” reveal more of her already much-exposed cleavage. Any lower and she’d be showing her nipples.

          Constantijin asked us to return the Q&A sheets after a few minutes. I slid mine on the table toward him, unwilling to have our fingers touch again. I grabbed my bag, hoping I could leave right away so I would have time to compose myself before the dreaded one-on-one interview.

          When I turned to leave, I saw Constantijin blocking my way, his back to me as he firmly bid Bottle Blonde goodbye. As Constantijin turned towards me, Bottle Blonde threw me a vicious glance of loathing. I pretended not to notice because if I did, it would be like a war between one slut and another and I was no slut – even though my body had been begging to differ from the moment Constantijin started his visual seduction.

          Nodding a polite goodbye to him, I kept my head down as I tried to sidestep him and leave. But he was suddenly in front of me, blocking my way again. This time, I couldn’t help looking up with a mixture of suspicion and exasperation. I felt just a bit of sexual frustration, too, but that was neither here nor there.

          Constantijin only grinned at the look I gave him, throwing up his hands in the air as the door slammed shut behind Bottle Blonde’s exaggeratedly swaying hips. “I mean no harm, Ms. Everleigh,” he said with exaggerated wide-eyed innocence.

          It took everything in me
not
to smile back and keep frowning, even though he looked even more irresistible when he was so obviously flirting – with me. The thought was such a huge turn-on I didn’t know what to do with my body anymore. Should I throw myself at him? Should I run out of the room and never look back? My virginity was under threat, after all.

          “I look forward to interviewing you later.” The way he said the words made it obvious he had something entirely different in mind.

          I physically tried planting the slim heels of my shoes into the ground, knowing if I didn’t, my body would automatically lean towards him, an instinctive response to the seductive spell he was so expertly weaving around me.

          Looking at his proffered hand suspiciously, I slowly took it for a shake.

          And not a second later, I knew I was right to distrust him. Constantijin’s hand immediately locked around mine and he used it to haul me towards him. I stumbled onto him, and the tips of my nipples brushed against his chest.

          Constantijin inhaled sharply. “You are so fucking sexy.”

          I tried to struggle out of his hold. “Please stop this,” I managed to say. “I’m not interested.”

          One hand still imprisoning mine, he used his other hand to cup my chin and make me look up.

          His smile was breathtaking, and it made my nipples harden even more. “Of course you are,” he whispered.

          He had already released me by the time I managed to get all my wits back. Constantijin was opening the door, his tone business-like and perfectly at odds with the sensual heat in his gaze. “Till later, Ms. Everleigh.”

          When the door closed behind me and a voice on the PA system announced the name of the first interviewee, I practically ran to the restroom so I could call Alyx privately.

          “You won’t believe what just happened,” I half-shrieked when she answered.

          Alyx answered promptly, “You were fired,” and made some weird guzzling sound afterwards. She was thirty floors down, bribed into waiting for me with a drink-all-you-can treat at Starbucks. Daria – our other best friend and who completed our decades-old-threesome – would have been with her, too, if she wasn’t currently sailing the Mediterranean on her honeymoon with her Greek tycoon.

          I glared at my iPhone, wishing I had just FaceTimed Alyx so she would see exactly what I thought of her verbal show of support.

          “Very funny.” Not waiting for her to answer since Alyx was unbeatable when it came to smartass comebacks, I said right after, “Constantijin Kastein is flirting with me.”

          I waited for her reaction with a madly beating heart. Alyx was a journalist and she knew everything about anyone who mattered. One look at Constantijin and you knew he absolutely mattered, more so than a billion people’s lives probably.

          Alyx didn’t disappoint, and when she actually stopped slurping down her frappe to exclaim, ‘
Whoa’
, the pace of my heartbeat shot up dramatically.

          “Constantijin Kastein – the VP of your company? The guy BBC dubbed as the King of European Media and Netherland’s #1 Playboy? The one
Hello
magazine had on its cover last month and a spread of his twenty-three properties all over the world and his forty-something collection of sports cars and classics? That Constantijin?”

          Of all the things she said, just one thing stood out in my mind. He was the #1 Playboy in his whole country? No wonder my nipples were still hard as pebbles. How many women did he have to bed to get that kind of title? The thought of that beautiful body next to another woman’s created a twinge of pain in my heart, but I told myself it was out of disgust. I was looking for true love, not sex. I had to remember that.

          “Yes,” I finally said glumly. “That’s the one.”