Ryan wasn't asking; he was ordering, and I could tell the blonde understood because the room's temperature seemed to drop a few degrees.
"You are ordering me out of your office, Ryan?"
Even though Melissa asked in a calm voice, I could hear the anger in her words, sensing it was the calm before the storm.
Our first meeting already told me that the blonde isn't the type to give up easily, especially if she wants something. Her possessiveness over Ryan already shows how she feels about him.
"Yes," Ryan replies flatly, his voice devoid of any affection. He speaks to the blonde as if she were a stranger, not someone he was once engaged to.
"I know you are not thinking clearly, and I will give you today to come to your senses. Otherwise, I will take this to your parents. And you know they won't be pleased with your recent insanity. You do want to be president, right?"
I hear the excitement in her voice as she speaks, but it's not good excitement. It's the kind of excitement from someone who knows they have the upper hand and is being arrogant about it.
And the president thing. What is that all about?
Ryan doesn't respond as if the blonde has hit a sore spot. From my position, I see Melissa smile at him, more like a gloating smirk, like she has won something and turned to leave.
Halfway to the door, she turns with a sly expression on her face. "And lose the trash before you come crawling back."
The trash wouldn't be me, right?
As soon as she leaves, Ryan moves away from me, and I immediately feel cold. I wrapped my hands against my chest, trying to infuse some warmth into my body.
What an intense interaction.
I turn around to find Ryan back in his seat, and his head bent over the files he had open earlier. I take a deep breath and open my mouth to speak, but his words cut me off.
Without raising his head, he says. "You can go back to work." His cold dismissal made me feel like a kid being sent off to the corner, and it is not a good feeling.
Irritation at his frosty attitude boils up inside me, and I curl my fingers into a fist to avoid lashing out. I try to see the good in this new distance he created between us.
At least with this boundary, I can go back to thinking clearly and focus on the reason why I am here.
But then why does it hurt inside? Why does my heart feel like someone is stabbing it with a blunt knife?
Stop being ridiculous, Lyra, I scold myself sharply before addressing my boss.
"Am I fired?"
"No."
That is it! And he doesn't even bother looking up to answer. Arg! The temptation to smack the back of his head feels so strong that I had to step back from his desk so as not to give in.
"Arsehole," I mumbled under my breath and headed to the door. I felt him stare as I walked away, but I ignored him.
For the rest of the day, I couldn't get what happened in Ryan's office out of my head, and the thing that kept recurring was his standoffish attitude after his fiancée left.
I guess I should keep thinking of the blonde in that term because I don't think it is over between those two.
At the end of the day, as I am packing up to leave, Ryan's door opens, and he appears, holding his usual briefcase in his hand.
My heart immediately jumps at the sight of him, before I quickly look away, pretending as if I didn't see him. I am still mad at him.
He walks up to my cubicle and says. "I am taking you home."
I snorted sarcastically in my mind. If he thinks I am sitting with him in the same car after what he did, he'd better think again.
"No, thank you," I say to him. My voice, though polite, was reserved and distant.
"I am not asking."
At his arrogant reply, I lost it. I flew to my feet and glared at him. "What sorts of games are you playing?!" I demanded, my voice raised. I don't care if we're heard. I am tired of him toying with me, messing with my emotions, and leaving me raw and hurting.
"Games?!" Those blue eyes that make me lose my train of thought stare at me with confusion in their depths, like he truly has no idea what I am talking about.
I intensified my glare. If he thinks the dumb innocent act is going to work with me, he has another thing coming. "I am talking about what happened in your office."
"One moment you are about to kiss me, and the next you are sending me away like I have got the leprosy!"
Without speaking, he closes the distance between us, and when he stands before me, he says. "If you wanted me to kiss you, all you had to do was ask."
The arrogance! The impetus! The audacity! I was boiling with rage. How could one man be so fuckingly annoying and so frustratingly irresistible!
Even as I am stabbing him with my eyes at his words, my heart is racing with the thoughts of hopping up on him and kissing the daylight out of him.
Chest puffing with outrage, and my lower abdomen burning with desire, I raise my hand to slap him, but he catches my hand before it could land on him and pulls me harshly into his body.
A soft gasp escapes my lips as my body comes in contact with his hard frame, and the feel of his hard chest stimulates my nipples, making them harden.
"No woman has ever struck me, and you are not going to be the first," he purrs, searing my flesh with the intensity of his stare. The heat pouring off those blue eyes is hot enough to start a fire.
I stare at him breathless, begging for him to do what his eyes promise, and as if he could read my desires in my eyes, his head bends, and he captures my lips in a deep, passionate kiss that sucked the rest of the air from my lungs, and my body burns for more.
"Mmm!" I moan, returning his kiss with the same intensity, with my hand wrapped tightly against his nape. Inside, I feel like a live wire ready to combust any minute.
Between my legs is a heated feeling, an ache waiting to be satisfied. And what it craves most, I could feel against my stomach, and I want it desperately.
Every thought deserts my brain as we kiss in my tiny cubicle, like we are trying to eat each other.
He moves me backwards until my ass hits my desk, and he lifts me over it, before moving in between my legs, causing my skirt to ride up on my thighs.
I could feel the warmth pouring off my panties, and I craved his finger to touch me there. But he doesn't, he stops kissing me.
My eyes snap open, and I look at him with deep confusion, even as my body craves to have more of him.
"Why did you stop?" I could hear the whining in my voice, and I didn't care. It feels so good. It's been a while since my body has been stimulated this strongly, and I want to experience it more.
And no, the irony is not lost on me that the same man responsible for my situation is the one making me feel again.
The heat in his eyes is enough to incinerate a bush, and the lust—it takes my breath away, which is why I am surprised and a little annoyed that he stopped.
We both want this, so what is the problem?
Once again, he bends his head, and my heart leaps with joy, believing we are back in business, but instead of making his way back to my lips, which crave him like a man dying of thirst, he moves past them to my ear and whispers.
"As much as I want to fuck you right now, I am not going to take you on this table like some whore, not when it is our first time. When it happens, it is going to be in a place where I can enjoy this gorgeous body of yours to the fullest, and it is not going to be a thirty-minute affair."
He bites the soft lobe of my ear when he finishes speaking, leaving me quivering in the pool of my own desire.
Fuck! His words left me not only breathless, but so wet I could feel it soaking my panties.