Page 35 of Worth Every Risk

Alec gives an odd laugh. “No. But he is huge, and he can be grumpy as shit. I wouldn’t want you feeling uncomfortable. Just save my number, or wash it off. Up to you.”

“Thanks. I appreciate that. I don’t know anyone in London.”

“No one?”

“Not really. There might be a few of my uni mates who work down here now, but no one I was close to.”

“Where’d you go to uni?”

“St Andrews.”

“Ooh, like Wills and Kate?”

I laugh.That’s what everyone says.“That’s the one. But they were long gone by the time I went.”

“What did you study?”

“Social Anthropology.”

Alec screws his face up. “What do you do with a degree like that?”

“No need to look like that”—I wave at his face—“just because there’s no food involved.” Alec looks abashed for a moment, but I laugh, which seems to put him at ease. “For a while, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I thought about teaching. Or social work. One day, I still might pursue either of those. But I love kids, so for now, I’m happy to be a nanny. I’m not sure I see myself settling down and having my own family, and this lets me experience caring for young kids. They’re so full of joy, don’t you think?” Alec’s staring at me with an odd look on his face.I’ve over-shared.I shrug and direct the conversation back to more practical matters. “Plus, I need to save some money and this role was so much better paid than anything else.”

“Aries.” Mr Hawkston’s voice barks down the staircase, and I jump out of my skin.

“Has that been ten minutes?” I mouth at Alec, who raises his hands in a gesture of helplessness.

I dash upstairs and run towards his study, my heart in my mouth. I have no idea what to expect.

When I get there, the door is closed. I knock and wait.

“Come in,” he says.

I step into the luxurious room. Curtains in red and gold hang either side of a huge sash window, and floor to ceiling wood panels line the walls. Mr Hawkston sits in a wingback chair on the other side of his desk, which is an enormous slab of dark mahogany. I’ve never seen one so large. It’s practically the size of a bed. He could lay me down on that thing and screw me senseless, and my feet wouldn’t even dangle off the edge. It’s that big. A power desk.

He beckons me with two fingers, a gesture which I immediately misconstrue.Does he want to put those inside me?

He must read the confusion on my face because his eyes flare and he says, “Come closer,” in case I haven’t understood what his twitching fingers really meant.

With each step towards him, his dark eyes focused on me, my cells begin to buzz. As if his attention is the thing that completes my inner circuits.

Fuck, this is awkward.My body reacts intensely to this man, and the fact I pleasured myself in the shower this morning while thinking of him feels like a terrible, shameful secret he could unearth at any moment.

I walk up to the desk until I’m about a foot away. He still feels pretty far away, given the width of the mahogany surface.

Tension crackles. No, itsparks. My skin feels like a sheet of aluminium foil that’s been put in the microwave at the highest setting.Is he feeling this?

“Are you settling in well?” His voice is calm, but his eye contact is so deliberate it’s as though he’s forcing himself not to look away from me. As if that might reveal some inherent weakness.

All I can see in my mind’s eye is him in the pool room, outside the sauna. Absolutely butt naked. It was a glorious sight. It wouldn’t matter now how many clothes the man wears… I’ve seen him in the best possible light, and it’s with nothing on. The suits are good. Great, even, but naked, this man tops all the rest.

A strange ache sets up in my chest as another thought occurs to me: I’ll never see him like that again. Instead, I’ll be stuck with this stilted, professional version of him.

“Are you?” he repeats, and to my extreme embarrassment, I realise I’ve completely forgotten to answer his question.What was it? Am I settling in well?

“Oh, yeah. It’s great. The house is really comfortable. My bed is so great. Nice and firm. I love a firm bed. It’s much better for…” I stop talking because he’s staring at me with that puzzled look on his face, as if he’s never met anyone who talks like I do. The silence seems to go on forever.

“For what?” he asks. Am I imagining it, or is there a suggestive look in this man’s eye? It’s hard to tell.

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