Page 35 of Driven By Desire
Knowing she’d only see it in the morning, he hit send and turned the lights off. Closing his eyes, he let the chill of the air conditioner and the blessed dark soothe his exhausted body and frayed nerves. The polite beep his phone emitted a second later had him jackknifing to alertness.
Grabbing it, he scrolled to the Whatsapp alert he’d received and opened Max’s reply. It took him a minute to comprehend what he was looking at. Titled Day 3 - A picture of a bottle of Hershey’s dark chocolate syrup sat in the middle of a bed. Desire slammedthrough him and had a strangled groan escaping him even as his fingers flew to dial her number.
“Hey.” The husky greeting scraped across his nerve endings and had him cursing the distance that separated them. Lying in the dark in a strange hotel room, he would have sold his soul to have been able to reach across and slide his hands over the satin of her skin. To bring her soft, luscious mouth to his. To kiss her breathy moans from her lips.
“Krish? Are you there?”
“I miss you.” The words slipped out before he realized what he’d said. What he’d revealed.
The soft sigh that drifted through the phone soothed the feral edges of his need even while it made him ache to have her in his arms.
“It’s going to be a long week.”
“I know.” Settling back more comfortably against the pillows, he asked, “Why aren’t you asleep?”
“I tried. I wasn’t able to.”
Frowning, he asked, “Bad day?”
“Yes.”
Alert again, he asked, “Is everything okay? Are you okay?”
“I am now.” The whisper had something shifting inside him. After a humming moment, she added, “You didn’t message or call.”
“It wasn’t because I didn’t want to.”
The gruff admission had Max instinctively clenching her legs together. The whispered conversation in the dark brought with it an intimacy that had every cell in her body aching for him.
“Bad day?” she echoed his previous question.
“Yes.”
“Tell me about it.” The invitation to share startled him.
Clearing his throat, he mumbled, “I don’t want to bore you.”
“You won’t.” When he didn’t reply immediately, she prompted, “Chirag said something about a strike?”
“Not yet, but negotiations are still skating on thin ice.” Tension seeped back into his body as he thought about the meetings he’d attended that day. “Something’s wrong. I can’t put my finger on it. We take good care of our employees. We’re willing to bear all the medical expenses for the worker who was injured and even pay him his full salary until he recuperates fully and is able to join work again.”
“But?” The soft query reinforced the strangeness of the moment. He was lying naked in a dark, hotel room and talking to Max about his work. About his doubts. His worries. What the hell was he doing? Unable to leave her question hanging, he answered, “But the mood is still antagonistic. There is something more going on here that I don’t quite understand.”
“Have you asked them what the problem is?”
“Obviously I’ve asked.” Irritable now, he snapped, “I’ve been in meetings the whole damn day. What did you think I was doing? Twiddling my thumbs?”
“Right. Of course.” Stiff words that hinted at the temper sparking behind them. “Has it ever occurred to you though, His Royal Highness All Knowing CEO that everyone isn’t comfortable talking to the big boss. That they may hesitate to tell you about issues? How often do they get to interact directly with you anyway?”
“You’re-“
Right. She was right. They didn’t feel any connect with the big boss who flew in from another city for a scant few days every now and then. Why would they tell him the actual story? Mishra wouldn’t have the tact to handle this and from everything he’d seen, his local guy in charge only made the situation worse every time he opened his mouth.
He was going to have to find another way around the whole situation. If he knew what the core issue was he had a better chance of solving it and getting back to Hyderabad. And Max.
“Hello? You there?”
Attention snapping back to the husky rasp that was her voice, he said, “I am and you’re a genius.”
