Page 47 of Frozen Flames

She stops singing, her cheeks red with embarrassment. “Oh…of course, it’s late.”

“I’m not trying to be a dick…” I look away, unable to stare at her, knowing I wiped the smile off of her face as easily as I do with Gemma.

Maybe I really am the problem.

“No, you’re right. I don’t know what I’m even doing. You have a girlfriend.”

“Claire…Gemma and I… It’s complicated.”

She laughs. “I’m sure it is.”

I wheel forward, grabbing her hand in mine, while my other one pushes through my hair. “I like hanging out with you.”

I stop my chair right in front of her, my legs touching hers. I’m so hard right now, I will combust in my pants if she doesn’t leave in the next five minutes.

“I like spending time with you too. Perhaps a little too much. Maybe your brother’s right, and I’m—”

“My brother? What the hell did he say to you?”

“Nothing. He warned me, to protect you.” She looks like a deer in the headlights, as if she didn’t plan to share that with me.Fucking Hen, butting into my life, as if he doesn’t have his own issues.

“Maybe I should quit, Harv…”

“No—” I interrupt her, feeling my panic rise.

“I really should. I know that you know it. I’m starting tofeelthings for you, and you’re my patient. We have a code of ethics—”

“Claire…you can’t leave me.”

I wheel even closer and hug her around the waist. Hersmellwill drive me mad. It’ll drive me to the brink of sexual collapse, I swear to God.

Don’t leave.

She smells of apricot and vanilla and just so…fruity.

Pre-accident, we’d have gotten along so well together. But now? Now she’s twice the woman for a man I’ll never be again.

I let go of her, seeing the conflict in her eyes.

“I’m not leaving now, but we need to think about this, think about Gemma.”

Right…Gemma.

Where is she, even? It’s seven o’clock in the evening, and she’s still not home! Not many assistants work this much overtime.

She’s lying to me.

But Claire’s a fresh breath of truth.

She’s real with me and honest, and she makes me smile, and she woke me up from my own sexual coma.

“Claire?”

“Hmm?” She’s pondering her next move, her next job. I can see it in her eyes.

“Kneel.”

Her eyes pop at my order, like she’s not sure she heard me correctly. “Excuse me?”

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