Page 71 of The Reading

“And if we do feel something?” he asked.

“Then we live happily ever after?” I said, my voice questioning.

Hudson tilted his head a bit. “And what if onlyoneof us feels something? What then?”

“Oh,” I whispered. “I hadn’t thought about that.”

“I know that I can be…demanding a lot of the time, Zara,” he said. “But I still think that we have a great thing going here. Do you really want to risk that?”

“Well…well, we’re both adults. I don’t see any reason why we can’t handle that…difference of opinion maturely.”

Hudson eyed me like I was a coiled snake, and he didn’t know which way led to safety. “Are you sure that you want to do this, Zara?” he asked. “Good, bad, or indifferent, this isn’t something that should be taken lightly.”

“I’m sure,” I blurted. “I’m so sure.”

“This is such a bad idea,” he muttered, and if that wasn’t a bad sign, then I didn’t know what was. It was becoming more and more obvious that Hudson Royal wasn’t my soulmate.

As he made his way over towards me, I wondered if I was destined to get into a fender-bender after work, and the man that I crashed into would be my soulmate. He’d be like…my mailman or…or Walt, the cable customer service guy that I always seemed to connect with, and they would count as men already in my life, right?

When Hudson was standing in front of me, my heart went back to racing a mile a minute, and I never noticed how much warmth his body gave off when he was this close to me. I couldn’t count how many times that we’d worked closely together, but…whew,was it getting hot in here?

“Are you sure, Zara?” he asked again. “This is the last time that I’m asking.”

I nodded. “I’m sure,” I insisted. “I’m absolutely sure.”

Hudson’s eyes never left mine as his hands came up to cradle my face, and I could feel the warmth from his hands race down my body and hit my clit dead center. How could this man go from being my boss tothisin less than half an hour?

Yeah, maybe this was a bad idea after all.

*****

Hudson~

This was the worst idea in the history of ideas, but I was done playing by the rules. Sure, she didn’t know how I felt about her, and she was only doing this because of a psychic palm reader from Las Vegas, but this was my chance to finally put my hands and lips on Zara Domingo, and I was not going to ruin itwith logic or common sense. I’d already given her plenty of chances to change her mind, so as far as I was concerned, I’d done my part.

With her face in my hands, I lowered my lips to hers, and when she opened for me, my tongue wasted no time tasting her.

Fuck.

Zara was not a shy wallflower, so when her hands grabbed onto my shirt and she deepened the kiss, I fucking lost it. My left hand moved to squeeze her jaw while my right hand slid back to fist in her hair, and I held her captive as my lips and tongue explored hers.

When she let out a low moan, that was it for me. My feet started moving, walking us back towards my desk, and with each step, our kiss got hotter and more demanding. Zara Domingo was everything that I knew she’d be, and I knew that this wasn’t the end of it. The woman was moaning in my arms, so that was proof enough that we were both feeling this shit right down to our toes.

As soon as her ass hit the edge of my desk, I reached down with both hands, lifted her off the floor, then dropped her on top of the oak wood. Stepping between her spread legs, I went back to grabbing a fistful of her hair, and the woman arched her back in an invitation if I ever saw one.

Breaking off the kiss, I asked, “What’s the verdict?”

“I think I want to work every Christmas Eve,” she panted.

I choked out a laugh. “Baby, you’re killing me.”

Her hands tightened in the fabric of my dress shirt because I had taken my suit jacket off a long time ago. “Don’t stop,” she begged. “I…I had no idea that you’d feel this way.”

I eyed her. “Be sure, Zara,” I told her. “I need you to be sure. We can’t…I can’t go back after this.”

“I’m sure,” she insisted. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.”

“Then let’s get the fuck out of here-”

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