Page 2 of Forbidden Flames

Forcing her lips to smile, she shook her head. “Hendrix, if there was a problem with the club that I needed help with, I would come to you immediately. You know that. I don’t hide club problems from you. Ever!”

His blue eyes narrowed ever so slightly and he leaned forward, bracing his fists on her desk. “Which tells me that this is a personal issue.”

Wait…what? What had she said? Or…what had she not said? Mentally, she reviewed her comment and cursed at herself for the way she’d phrased her assurance.

Leaning forward slightly, she forced her shoulders to relax. She even managed to offer a genuine smile as she shifted her office chair as if preparing to sit down. “Hendrix, I’m fine. I promise.”

For another long moment, he eyed her suspiciously. Emily waited, crossing her arms over her chest, every muscle in her body tense and nervous. Hendrix was a bulldog, especially when he scented a problem.

But in the end, he nodded sharply and pushed away from her desk, his hard, square jaw clenching as he turned. “When you’re ready for my help, let me know.”

Emily breathed a sigh of relief when he walked out of her office. Her eyes, however, lingered on his backside, only visible when his sports jacket shifted slightly with his shoulders’ movement. Nice, she thought. Very nice!

And then he was gone, disappearing down the long hallway.

Sighing, Emily dropped into her leather chair, almost exhausted after that short battle of wills. Had she won the battle? For some reason, Emily suspected that she’d lost, but she wasn’t exactly sure why or how.

Then the letter caught her attention and she tensed all over again, but for a completely different reason.

She had to open it. Emily knew that the words contained inside that envelope would be bad, but she had to read them, had to analyze each word and phrase. Every letter drew her closer to the person who was sending them to her.

She’d started receiving the letters about a year ago. At first, they’d been just annoying letters talking about how much the writer wanted her, how lovely she was, blah blah blah. The contents had been the equivalent of an eighth grader passing a note to his school crush.

Emily had tossed those letters into the trash and forgotten about them. However, about six months ago, the tone of the letters changed. The text had become much more…graphic. With each new letter, the intensity and language had become more disgusting. She assumed the letter writer was a man because he referred to his “cock” a lot, as well as all of the things he wanted to do to her with that part of his anatomy. She also knew that the letter writer was about average in height for a man – maybe five feet nine inches – after one of the letters described about how he preferred her to wear her black boots because then she could “look him in the eye” as he used her. Ick!

She was five feet, six inches tall in bare feet. Her black boots had a three inch heel. When she wore those boots to work, that would make her height five feet, nine inches tall, which is the average height for men.

Emily had spent the week after that letter eliminating every club member and personal acquaintance who was over or under that height. Unfortunately, there were no clues as to whether the author was a club member or someone in her neighborhood. The only connection, so far, to the club is that the letters arrived here at the club, never to her home.

With trembling fingers, she gritted her teeth, picked up the latest letter, and opened it.

Chapter 2

Hendrix ignored the annoying Christmas decorations scattered around the rooms of the club. He wasn’t in the mood to celebrate the holiday. What he was in the mood for was to figure out what the hell had been bothering Emily for the past several months.

Christmas was in a few days, so TBC, or The Billionaires Club as the members preferred to call it, only had a few visitors. Most of the members were busy finalizing end of year corporate issues or attending galas with their spouses. It would be quiet for the few next weeks until the big New Years Eve event.

Whatever was bothering Emily, he wanted this resolved before that event. He didn’t like the idea of guests and spouses of the members crowding into the club. It was a security issue that, normally, he and his team could easily handle. But whatever was going on with Em added another layer of complexity.

Walking into the security office hub, Hendrix gripped the edge of a desk, trying to stop himself from going right back to Emily’s office and demanding that she tell him what was upsetting her. She’d lied when he’d asked about the problem, even going so far as trying to adjust her body language to try to convince him.

But he wasn’t stupid. He could see the terror in her eyes. What the hell had happened between now and earlier this morning? Emily was the manager of this exclusive club that catered to the billionaire bastards who loved announcing to the world that they were the corporate, financial, and political leaders, that they were the standard by which every other person in the world should measure their success.

But Hendrix knew that, withveryfew exceptions, these men were criminals. And not the nice, neat white-collar criminal that gouged consumers with unjustified price increases, although they were good at those crimes as well. No, he knew all the dirt on these men and would use it when needed to protect the club.

“Boss?” one of his guards prompted.

Hendrix looked up at the woman. She was an ex-marine and damn good at her job. She not only looked tough, but the woman knew moves that would take down a drunken sailor. Plus, she was highly observant and acted on her instincts.

“What’s up?” Hendrix asked, pushing away from the table and trying to focus on her words instead of on the beautiful brunette upstairs. He knew that Emily was hiding something. Something bad. Her gorgeous hazel eyes usually glowed with confidence and happiness. And her soft, peachy skin was the epitome of healthy living. Emily was truly beautiful, inside and out. Emily worked with the club owners to ensure that every staff member earned a living wage. She ensured that the staff’s health benefits were the best money could buy. Emily knew each of the one hundred staff members by name as well as their family members. She went out of her way to make sure that everyone was thriving, nudged the owners to set up a college fund for the employees and their families, provided additional job training so staff members could advance in their jobs. In return, every employee who worked for this establishment went out of their way to work harder, just to earn a smile of recognition from Emily.

Hell, the woman had even rescued a horse, then purchased a donkey as the horse’s companion – apparently, horses needed to be part of a “herd”. A momma cat and her kittens soon followed. And Hendrix was pretty sure that Emilywas feeding a nursery of racoons that had found shelter in the old barn.

With Christmas dinner coming up, she was going around to every staff member, asking about their plans to ensure that they had a place to go for the holiday. Emily’s soft heart couldn’t stand the thought of anyone being left alone for the holiday.

Of course, he also suspected that Emily wanted to find someone to cook for. She was incredibly sad now that her two best friends, Maggie and Ann, had married and were living thousands of miles away in foreign countries. In the past, those three had spent every holiday together, as well as most of their days off.

So far, Emily hadn’t found anyone who didn’t have a family to spend Christmas with.

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