Office Affair (2 page)

The blush never came, but the smile did, and it smacked Ben right in the middle of his stomach. “That’s exactly what I’m offering.”

Ben faltered for just a second before he realized she’d turned the tables on him, and she was the one doing the teasing. He smiled too. “Good one, Sparks. For a minute there I thought you were being serious.”

Her smile faltered. “I am, Ben. I’m deadly serious.”

Ben laughed out loud. “You know, you’re right. I have been too uptight lately. I needed something to break the tension. Thank you for giving me something to laugh about.”

Melissa ran a tongue over her upper lip so it glistened even more. She walked over to the chair on the other side of his desk and laid her jacket upon it. “You should know me better than that, Ben. I never joke when it comes to finding solutions to problems. You have a problem, and I have the solution. You need a woman, and it just so happens…I am one.” To prove her point, she slipped open the first three buttons on her blouse, allowing Ben a healthy glimpse of what lay beneath—a tight, white camisole that covered the full curves of her breasts.

Ben’s jaw dropped.

That was all it took for him to get an erection. With a sudden rush of blood, his cock filled and stiffened, leaving him perplexed.

A stiffy?

For Melissa?

Considering friendship was one thing. Being hit for six by an unexpected dose of lust another altogether.

“Now please don’t mistake this for anything it’s not,” Melissa told him. “It’s not as if I’m going to start bringing food into work for you.” She rolled her eyes, mocking herself. “That’s a good thing, by the way. I’m a terrible cook.” Her smile was small, but it still lit up his office. “And I’m not going to get all soppy and lovey-dovey on you either.” She spoke more seriously now. “This is just one solution. Sex. That’s all, nothing more.”

Ben gaped at her. Sex? Melissa Sparks was offering to have sex with him?

She smiled again. This time with a seductive, sexy expression he’d never dreamed he’d see on her face—not directed at him anyway. The smile was just as enchanting as the previous one. “You look surprised.”

“Er, a little surprised, yeah.” Even more surprising was the fact he could form words. Melissa? Seducing him?

Melissa undid the rest of her buttons and pushed the shirt off her shoulders, so she was now clad from the waist up in just the camisole.

Fuck, she looked sexy. Damn sexy. Sexy in a way Melissa had never looked to Ben. Uh—not just sexy. She was prime female flesh. All woman. And she did crazy things to his insides.

She made breathing difficult. Made him wonder if someone had messed with the air conditioning, because the temperature seemed to have jumped about twenty degrees in the last couple of minutes.

Ben was forced to loosen his tie and undo his top button. Anything to get fresh air on his feverish skin.

“Here’s the deal—assuming you agree, because this would involve both of us.” Melissa pulled the cami up and over her shoulders, leaving her breasts covered by nothing more than a satiny white bra.

Holy shit.
She had a pair on her.

So not what he should be concentrating on. He should be remembering that she was a colleague. An excellent investment banker. A woman who’d given him outstanding advice and support over the years.

“You get to fuck me whenever the stress and tension get to be too much. This won’t be a relationship. Well, not a traditional relationship, anyway. This’ll just be a natural extension of our working association. We work, we fuck, we go home. End of story. I’m not interested in deep and meaningfuls.”

Melissa ducked her head as she said that, but Ben still caught a glimpse of some unidentifiable emotion in her eyes. Sadness? Loneliness? Determination? He couldn’t tell.

She released the clasp and zip on her skirt and stepped out of it gracefully. “I am, however, focused on making partner. Which means my romantic life’s suffered because I work ridiculous hours. But, see, I’m just as human as you are.” She blushed, telling him that as focused as she was on making her little speech, her actions still embarrassed her a little.

Shy? Melissa? Well, there was a fascinating new insight into her.

He liked that shyness. A lot. Liked her uncertainty. Melissa never seemed uncertain.

“I have needs,” Melissa said, still with the delightful pink stain on her cheeks. “You have needs. Let’s meet those needs together and not get involved any deeper than that. What do you say?”

Ben wanted to respond. Christ, he wanted to badly, but first off, he wasn’t sure what he’d say, and secondly he couldn’t find his voice. His mouth was suddenly parched.

Garters?

His straight-laced colleague wore thigh-highs and garters under those practical skirts? Garters that matched her bra and knickers and made her legs look a mile long, by the way.

How could he not have known that?

A bead of perspiration slid down his spine.

Don’t go there, Cowley. Don’t make Melissa into another faceless woman you can fuck and walk away from.
She deserved more than that.

She arched an eyebrow. The direct look combined with the light flush of her cheeks was most becoming on his colleague. “You’re very quiet.”

“Uh, lost for words.” Ben shook his head. “Either that, or I’m having my first hallucination.”

Melissa tilted her head to the side, looking uncertain. “A bad hallucination?”

Oh, yeah. He liked this shy Melissa a lot. “Hell, no. More like a wet dream.”

Shy Melissa vanished. “I can deal with wet dreams. But I’d prefer to make this real.” She lost the bra.

Ben stared helplessly. She was not making it easy for him to keep his distance.

Fuck me.

In his life, he’d never seen breasts like that. Full. Round. Firm. With nipples that just begged to be sucked on. Sienna had beautiful breasts too, but her body was so very different from Melissa’s. Sienna was all soft, lush curves. Melissa was tall and slender, lean and toned. Her body had been sculpted from hours of running every morning—Ben knew this because sometimes Melissa arrived at work in her jogging clothes. There was not a drop of fat anywhere to be seen.

He’d always loved Sienna’s curves, loved how womanly they were. Melissa’s body was way more athletic, less giving, but no less appealing. Fact of the matter was, Ben’s mouth was watering. For the first time in a year, hell in more—eight or nine years—he didn’t want soft, lush curves. He wanted long, lean, toned thighs wrapped around his waist, and he wanted full, firm breasts in his mouth. Melissa’s thighs and breasts.

He hadn’t had that reaction to a single other woman he’d slept with in Sydney.

“Jesus, Melissa.” He rasped out her name. “You’re not fucking around here, are you?” He half expected her to break into laughter and yell out,
“You’ve just been Punk’d.”

She stared drolly at him. “Have you ever known me to fuck around?”

“Good point.” Even the shy Melissa had gotten straight down to business. Er, pleasure.

He swiped his hand through his hair. Hell, he wanted to put that hand on his cock, rub it, pump it, do anything to relieve the pressure that grew with every passing second. Maybe if he relieved the pressure, he wouldn’t feel so compelled to take Melissa up on her offer. “You’re dead serious about this, then?”

She regarded him in silence before skirting around his desk, nudging his chair back a little and squeezing in between him and the desk. Then she pushed his laptop out of the way and hoisted herself up, sitting right where the computer had been a second ago. “Does this answer your question?” She placed a foot on each arm of his chair.

Her long, toned legs were covered in sheer, silky thigh-highs, making her skin glow golden beneath them.

Ben began to sweat in earnest. Beads of perspiration lined his upper lip and forehead.

This wasn’t right. He shouldn’t objectify her like this, like he’d been doing with every other woman since Sienna.

But he couldn’t remember the last time he’d wanted someone this badly. Mind you, yeah, he could. What he couldn’t believe was wanting another woman as much as he wanted Sienna. And the fact that the other woman was Melissa Sparks…

That just blew his mind.

There was no denying the low-grade ache in his cock or the straining in his balls. And there was no denying the sweet scent of arousal that drifted through the air. After working with Melissa this long, he’d become familiar with the cinnamony-vanilla fragrance of her perfume. He’d always found it pleasant. But he’d never known her to smell quite so…tempting.

It did his head in. Made his mouth water.

Never mind her breasts, he wanted to pull her white, satin knickers aside and sweep his tongue over the folds of her pussy.

“Sparks…er, Melissa, you know if we make this…deal, we can’t go back? We can never be just work colleagues again. If I fuck you now…” He had to let the sentence drift off, had to catch his breath, because the thought of fucking her had pretty much paralyzed his lungs. He wanted her so badly, his chest burned. “If we sleep together, everything will change.”

She bit her lower lip as she looked at him, considering his words. “Sleeping together implies sharing a bed and getting some shuteye. Look, Ben, I’m not interested in a nap. Or a full night’s rest, for that matter.” The blush that had stained her cheeks now spread enticingly over her neck. “I want a quick, hard fuck. I want as much pleasure as you can give me over the next half an hour or so, and then I want to go home, alone. Believe me, nothing will change at work. I won’t let it. I’ll be just the same person I was this afternoon, and yesterday afternoon and every afternoon before that. The only difference will be at night. When everyone’s gone home—like they have now. Then we can act differently.” She trailed her fingers over her breast, making the nipple harden. “And then, Ben, feel free to act however you like.”

“Damn it, woman,” he growled. “You have no idea how I want to act.” Flashes of the life he’d led since coming to Sydney assailed him. Pictures of the debauchery he’d indulged in.

“Tell me,” she purred.

“You’re treading on dangerous ground.” Ben’s cock ached like blazes. He was more aroused then he had been in a year. Add to that the fact his already eccentric tastes and desires had become even more kinky since his last encounter with Sienna, and Melissa had very little clue what ground she trod on.

“Far as I can see, I’m not treading ground at all. I’m sitting in front of you, in your office, with my feet on your chair.”

“And your legs spread temptingly before me.” He was losing control. Letting lust get the better of his sensible judgment.

“You think that’s tempting?” She raised an eyebrow and smiled another quick little smile.

Christ, he loved her smiles.

He nodded once. Very tempting. Made even more so by the fact that they were at work, and there was a good possibility someone could walk in on them. More than once Ben had left an important document at the office, forcing him to return once he’d already arrived home. If he could do it, anyone could. “You’re like a little package asking to be unwrapped.”

“Unwrap me,” she urged.

“Melissa—”

“Mel.”

He dragged his gaze away from the tempting package to look into her eyes. “Mel?”

“You’re about to fuck me. I think we can drop the formalities.”

“Mel…” That might take a little getting used to. “You took a chance coming here like this.” Hell, just the thought that she had taken such a risk turned him on more. “What if I’d said no?”

“If I’d thought for a moment you’d say no, I’d have gone no further than letting my hair down.”

“You knew I wouldn’t turn you away?”

She leaned forward. “You should know by now I never jump into any deal without doing a background check first. I watched you, observed your reactions. Carefully. The second I pulled the clips from my hair, your eyes turned a shade darker and your cheeks reddened.” Her hand hovered in the air between them and then landed on his shirt. “Your breathing has been uneven ever since. And now?” She smiled that sexy smile again. “Now it’s just plain ragged. And that, Cowley, is a huge turn-on.”

Christ, that speech just made him hornier. She’d observed him, summed up the situation and only then acted. Exactly what he’d do. “Course my breathing is a little ragged. Every time I inhale, I smell your pussy.”

“Touch it,” she whispered.

“Touch what?”

“My pussy.”

Ben set his jaw in a firm line and curled his fingers into two fists, making sure he did not respond to the invitation. Not yet anyway. “Melis…Mel, you need to be sure.” No fucking way in hell was he taking the deal if the woman wasn’t one hundred percent certain. She may believe everything would go back to normal in the morning, everything would just be work as usual, but Ben knew better. Sex changed everything. And his and Melissa’s relationship would be changed.

Melissa didn’t answer. She pushed off his shoulders and lay back on his desk, leaving herself exposed to Ben’s gaze.

A bead of sweat trailed down his spine. “Jesus, fuck. Okay, Sparks. You’ve got it. You have a deal.”