Page 15 of Blue Line Lust

“I’ll tell you something about yourself, Reese Dalton,” I continue. “You think that because you have money, you can just treat people how they want? That because you’re some hotshot athlete, you get to just say and do whatever you want and no one will bat an eyelash at you because, well, where would that get them? Well, I’m here, batting every fucking eyelash I have. I don’t want to work for a piece of shit like you. You obviously didn’t read my file, either.”

With that, I turn and leave. The sound behind me is Reese’s office door slamming shut.

The sound in front of me?

That’s just my future crumbling to pieces.

7

REESE

The chair that Olivia shoved at my desk is planted square between my legs. Her words ring in my ears.

And I’ve never been harder.

She gave me a dressing-down that rivaled anything Coach has ever spit in my face out on the ice. Women never do that to me. Women suck up to me; women beg me; women scrap and plead for a moment of my time.

But they’re easy. There’s no challenge in a woman who wouldn’t dare tell you to go fuck yourself to your face.

I search through my cabinet to snatch her file back out and pore over it. It immediately proves everything she said. She actually is an educated woman. Her track record is deep and impressive.

But the most important part is what just happened in here. She had fire. She gave as good as she got.

I need a woman like her watching my daughter.

I need a woman like her in my bed.

My cock presses against the seam of my suit and I groan softly, palming myself over my pants. Just a little. Just enough to ease some of the tension. I think back to those little fantasies I had before she came in, when all I had to go on was a name and a picture. They’re nothing compared to what I can conjure up now. I know her voice now. I’ve seen the flames in her eyes when she’s defiant.

I want to bust just thinking about it.

But as much as I’d like to rub one out—or better yet, sink inside her while she looks at me with that defiant gaze—there’s one pressing issue that I haven’t solved yet.

I gotta find her.

She can’t have gotten that far in the last few minutes, right? I count backwards from ten real fast to talk my dick off the ledge. Then I vault over my desk and straight out of my office, taking the stairs three at a time down to the foyer. I damn near yank the door off its hinges just to get outside.

“Mr. Dalt?—?”

The front door slams shut before Paula can finish her question.

I know Olivia didn’t manage to find decent parking. Not on this street. The rich pricks in this neighborhood take a special, sadistic kind of pride in making sure that no one without a 72505 zip code parks anywhere near these ten-million-dollar houses.

I take a wild guess and head right, still moving at a brisk jog. I scan every car on this side and the other, looking for a set of fiery hazel eyes.

I need to see them again. I need her to look at me with them again. I need to feel that rush of her telling me to fuck off, like I’m the biggest asshole she’s ever met.

But as the minutes tick past, there’s no sign of her. I pick up the pace, knowing in my gut that I went the right way. I just need to?—

There.

But the defiant woman that left me hard and impressed in my office isn’t the one leaning against a shot-to-death blue beater of a sedan.

This one has no fire.

This one just has tears.

Her face is buried in her hands, hiding her expression from me. Her shoulders rise and fall sharply like she’s sighing. No—like she’s sobbing. An unexpected flicker of guilt stabs my chest. I push it down.

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