Page 4 of Accidental Vegas Vows

“You know my name?” I breathed, reality crashing back in like a screeching banshee.

He blinked at me once before tapping the front of the binder. Olivia Martin, it said in big, bold letters. “You’re also wearing your name tag.”

I gulped. “Right. Yes, they’re considering selling the tech.”

The elevator shifted as the lights flickered back to life, replacing the bright white emergency ones. For a fleeting, ill-timed second, I almost resented them, resented what it meant.

“I’d like to take a closer look at this, if you don’t mind,” he said, shutting the binder with one hand and tucking it under his arm. The box we stood in moved again, shifting, until it slowly resumed its rise one inch at a time.

“Uh, yeah, sure,” I mumbled.

Two seconds later a ding rang out through the small space, announcing our arrival at the closest floor. So it had registered my button pressing. The doors opened and he took a single step, his cologne swarming me from the proximity, but quicker than I could register, his eyes met mine in a flash of blue as he paused.

God, he was too damn tall.

“I didn’t choose who got picked,” he said.

I was right.

“I would have chosen you.”

Words failed me as he stepped across the threshold of the elevator and exited on floor fourteen — Human Resources and Bookkeeping. The doors shut behind him, leaving me alone in the small reflective box with my racing, debaucherous mind and pounding pulse.

But faced with my reflection in the doors and no binder to cover myself, I couldn’t keep my eyes from wandering to my chest where more buttons than I’d intended had been left open.

Three, to be exact.

Enough to see the entirety of my cleavage and the edges of my bra.

Holy fuck!

My cheeks heated as I realized it must have popped open when his fingers had caught on it.

Oh my fucking God.

He saw everything.

Chapter 2

Damien

The view overlooking San Francisco from my office on the top floor of Blackwood Energy Solutions was barely enough to keep my thoughts from wandering back to the elevator and back to that encounter with her.

From up here, the cars crossing the Bay Bridge looked miniature, and the people on the streets looked like ants — but that wasn’t what I focused on. I took in Alcatraz, Treasure Island, and even the Golden Gate Bridge from the floor-to-ceiling windows that wrapped around two-thirds of my office. I stared, imagining the lives of every single person in each location, wondering if any of them were locals or simply passing through. Were they going home after a long day at the office? Were they heading back to their suburban two-story to take out their garbage and mow their lawns?

But even that, even placing myself into the shoes of the people who were literally beneath me, didn’t distract me enough from her.

From the moment she’d stepped into the elevator, I’d found her attractive. That wasn’t unusual — she was young, beautiful, timid but defiant. It tracked. But the green of her eyes kept haunting me, the way her thick lashes had batted when she was confused, the curve of her plump, pink lips when she’d folded her teeth over them… Her clear skin save for a smattering of freckles, the way her thick hair had fallen over one shoulder as if the chestnut waves had a mind of their own, how the top of her head only reached my shoulder at absolute best.

And her fucking brain.

The proposal she’d had was brilliant. I couldn't understand why it hadn't been chosen, and every word of it I read only proved to me that at the very least, her proposal trumped each one that had been picked to present today. I’d poured over it the moment I’d returned to my office, taking in every possible use she’d thought of, every business strategy she’d outlined for it. It was far beyond what I’d expected, and she easily deserved a full-time job here, if not something better. I wondered if she was chastising herself for how it went down, wondered if there was something I could do to make it better.

That fucking blouse, though.

The way the sides of it parted when I’d grabbed for her binder.

The peek at what she hid beneath it.

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