Page 11 of Business Temptations

Bailey shifted slightly, her chin tilting at an unconsciously defensive angle. “You don’t know everything about me,” she mumbled, confirming his suspicions.

Bailey mentally sighed as Matteo’s dark eyebrow lifted. “We bought the top floor of this building and created two condos, Bailey. You live on the other side of the building from me. We have breakfast and dinner together nearly every night, and often lunch as well. I know when you get into the office every day because you come to my place to steal my coffee before you start working.”

For a brief moment, Bailey considered arguing, but he was right. Instead, she shrugged dismissively. “Your coffee is better than mine.”

He paused to give her that sardonic expression that Matteo was famous for. “Be that as it may, my point is that I know more about you than anyone else in the world. Including your mother.”

“Yes, and I know the same about you. What’s your point?”

He shrugged and dropped his pen onto his desk, indicating that he was no longer contemplating something that irritated him. “I’m not sure I have a point,” he replied. “I guess I just don’t want to deal with Sherwood.”

Bailey stood up and nodded. “You don’t have to attend the meeting. I can handle him.” She turned and headed towards the door to his office and, with a smile in his direction, added, “And you don’t know everything about me. I have secrets.”

“Name one,” he challenged.

She laughed softly and flipped a blond lock over her shoulder. “Well, if I told you, then they wouldn’t be secrets any longer, right?”

And with that, she walked out of his office.

But not before Matteo got a good glimpse of her perfect derriere in her red sheath dress. A very impressive derriere, he thought and contemplated that part of her anatomy for several minutes after she left him. It wasn’t until he realized that his body was reacting to the images flashing through his mind that he forced himself to concentrate on work issues again.

Bailey hurried down the hallway, rushing to her own office.

“You have a…”

“I know,” Bailey called out to her assistant. “Just give me five minutes and then I’ll head into the meeting with Sherwood.”

Bailey hurried into her office and closed the door. Leaning against the solid wood, she closed her eyes, trying to slow her breathing. When the trick didn’t work the first time, she did it again. And again!

Finally, her racing heart slowed and she opened her eyes. “This is getting out of hand,” she told the silence of her office. “You’re going to have to stop interacting with the man.”

But the thought of not seeing Matteo every day made her whole body hurt. The pain was so intense that she pushed the idea out of her mind. It wasn’t even possible to stop seeing Matteo every day, anyway. They worked together and practically lived together.

Pacing the expanse of her office, Bailey fisted her hands at her sides and tried to concentrate. “Okay, so if one option isn’t viable, you’re gonna have to come up with another idea!” Bailey wasn’t sure what the solution to her “Matteo” dilemma was, but this wasn’t working. “This” being the constant ache in her heart when she couldn’t “be” with him.

Turning, she faced the door, an unconsciously determined expression on her face. “You’ve overcome bigger obstacles! You can figure this out!” And with that in mind, she nodded firmly, shook her shoulders like a boxer before a tough fight, and stepped forward.

Pulling her door open, Bailey walked out, much more composed now.

Several hours later, Bailey pushed into her penthouse suite and froze, inhaling the scent of something delicious cooking.

Immediately, her mood lightened and she smiled, all of her previous admonitions to distance herself vanishing. “I hope that’s not the weird fish you made last week!” she called out, tossing her keys into the porcelain dish that her decorator had set right in the middle of her foyer.

Matteo turned the heat under the chicken off, then leaned back against the countertop as he sipped his scotch. Waiting.

When Bailey walked into the kitchen, he had to smother his amusement when she paused in the doorway to kick her heels towards the sofa. “Rough one?” he asked, as he pulled out the bottle of white wine she’d opened up the previous night and poured her a glass.

“Brutal,” she sighed. Pulling herself up onto the stool at her kitchen’s island, she began pulling the pins out of her hair. “Sherwood’s meeting went well. I got the contract signed and he’s on board, without a discount, by the way.” She paused, piling the pins on the counter beside the plate that Matteo had already set out. “But after I left that meeting, a slew of other issues came at me and I just…” she rubbed her temples, trying to release the tension from the day. “I think we need to head down to Aruba again.”

He chuckled in agreement. “It’s been more than a year since your last vacation.” He slid the glass of wine towards her. “I thought when we started this project several years ago that you swore you’d take a vacation every three months.”

She groaned, thinking back to that memory. “Yeah, well, we weren’t expecting the business to explode quite so quickly.” She took a sip of her wine, closing her eyes to savor the complex flavors, then sighed with relief. A moment later, her eyes popped open. “Oh, and Tim has a new idea. He’s working with his team to figure out the last few issues with a new lubricant formula. It will work extremely well with the brake fluid he created last year.”

Matteo nodded, but he was more focused on watching as Bailey pulled the last few pins out of her hair and shook her head, letting the cascade of blond curls tumble down around her shoulders. He wondered what she would look like with her hair spread out over his pillow.

As soon as he realized where his thoughts were going, he turned toward the stove, flipping the chicken again. Breasts. Chicken breasts. He added more white pepper and forced his thoughts away from Bailey’s breasts as they pushed against the v-neck of her red dress.

Damn, he loved it when she wore red! The red dress and her blond locks were a perfect combination.

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