Page 12 of Billionaire Corruption

“I need to sit down.”

I wanted to move away from him, but he reached out and took my shoulders, then pulled me towards him, kissing me. I felt his mouth on mine, the unexpected softness of his mouth and let myself fall into him, into his embrace. My arms reached up and touched his face, the smooth cheeks, his neck and then I pulled him down towards to me. I could feel something change between us, the energy between us becoming fiercer, more intense. We stumbled onto the couch. He sat down and pulled me onto his lap, cradling my face and kissing me, then laying me down on the couch. I couldn’t believe this was happening. He was kissing my neck, his hands were all over my dress, caressing me.

“Wait!”

I sat up, breathless.

He pulled back.

“We can’t do this here!” I said. “Not like this.”

He stared at me.

“No one will come in, I promise you.”

“She’s right outside… what’s her name?” I had momentarily forgotten his personal assistant’s name.

“Sarah?” he was smiling now.

“You probably do this all the time,” I said, jumping up from the couch, suddenly mad. “But this isn’t me.”

“I don’t do this all the time or at all, actually, Grace.”

He came to stand next to me, taking my hand. I didn’t pull it away.

He drew me closer. “I think we started something we need to finish.”

“Maybe,” I said, quickly, stepping away from him. “Or maybe, not.”

I walked away to the other side of the office, looking at the mirror and smoothing down my hair.

“Thanks for lunch,” I said, keeping my voice as neutral as I could, as I opened the door to leave. I forced myself to walk calmly out of his office, knowing he was watching me leave. I smiled politely at Sarah who was watching me through narrowed eyes.

Then I went to the bathroom and sat in one of the cubicles for a few minutes to compose myself before I went back to my computer. Something was happening between us, I could feel it and I didn’t know how to stop it. I knew I had bought myself a bit of time, but I didn’t think I was strong enough to keep saying no to him. Not when I wanted it too. I thought he was right about us having started something that afternoon in the elevator. Whenever we were together, it was like we were right there again, feeling the heat of our bodies coming together.

As I walked into the room where the accountants were working, I heard raised voices. Something was going on.

“Has something happened?” I asked one of my colleagues.

“They’ve found a number of shell companies in the Cayman Islands,” he said. “An investigator has gone to the addresses registered for them, none of them are real. They’re all fake! Looks like we’ve got something!”

“Who?” I asked, stupidly.

“McKinney!”

It felt like my heart stopped. I didn’t want it to be true. I wanted to make excuses for him, but there was no way a company’s chief executive officer could not have known that a number of businesses in the firm were fake. I thought of the way he’d kissed me, held me and I felt sick to my stomach.

Chapter 6

Paul

I didn’t feel like going to the dinner party at my parents’ house. It was the end of a long week, and I had a lot on my mind. But there was something I wanted to talk to my father about.

I arrived at the same time as my sister, and we walked in together. My mother, Agatha, came over to greet us and introduced us to the other guests, whose names I instantly forgot.

“Your father is in his study,” she said to me.

I walked over to the room on the other end of the house, which had been my father’s study for as long as I could remember. It was a big room, filled with old furniture and lamps, with bookshelves on all the walls. I had always found the room oppressive somehow, dark and stifling.

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