“It is urgent. But I have an event tonight, and I’m late to pick up my date.”
I instantly took a step back. “What?”
“For the third time, have a nice evening,” he said, turning away. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
I snatched my phone from his desk. “I’m taking my video with me.”
“That’s fine.” He pulled open the door to what looked like a closet. “I’m finished with it.”
I had no choice but to leave, and I scowled as I did.
CHAPTER 7
Dean cleared his throat, and my head snapped up.
“You’re here early,” he said, glancing at his watch.
“My special project pushed back the rest of my to-do list. Since it’s my last day, I figured I’d better get an early start.”
He raised an eyebrow, pleased. “You really want that dress, don’t you?”
I looked away.
“That’s not it,” he said thoughtfully. “All this for a boy.” He leaned in when my eyes drifted up to his again. “To let you go, this boy must not be very smart. And frankly, I don’t like the idea of you dating someone who’s not very smart.”
A smile tugged at the corners of my lips. “Thank you, Mr. Brittany.”
“On the bright side, you only have to call me that until tonight,” he said.
He walked past me into his office, and my smile fell a little. His cologne lingered for minutes after he’d left. I pulled out my cell phone and swiped through some photos of my short relationship with Trey. I stopped on one of us at Lake Havasu, me in my bikini, waving my beer at the camera. Trey was shirtless, smiling big, his baseball cap backwards. I glanced behind me at Dean’s closed door. They were certainly different. Dean seemed to be twice Trey’s size.That’s because he’s here, now, in front of me.I shook my head and put the phone away.
By noon I was putting the finishing touches on some basic website copy. I checked it for the third time, pleased with the final product. As I went to send it, I paused. It was my last day. My last chance to feel Dean next to me. I reopened Word, chewing on the inside of my bottom lip. If I could get in his office and close the door, I’d feel better. Satisfied. Even if nothing could happen. I deleted a comma. Before I lost my nerve, I reattached the document and mailed it. I let out the breath I’d been holding.
After twenty minutes, he called for me. “Alexandra? Can I see you?”
I stood and entered his office, closing the door behind me.
“I didn’t tell you to shut the door.” He leaned back in his large chair and spoke again before I could make any move. “You seem to have some trouble with comma usage.”
“Oh. I’m sorry, Mr. Brittany.”
“How sorry?”
“Very sorry. It was careless.”
“Indeed it was. I’ve run out of ideas to demonstrate how I feel about mistakes.”
I wrung my fingers together. “You could…do what you did before?”
“Except, it doesn’t seem that was very effective.”
I nodded earnestly. “It was.”
“There’s also the issue of no touching.”
I stepped forward hesitantly. When he didn’t stop me, I continued up to the desk, bending over it with my elbows in position. “You don’t have to touch me to spank me,” I said.
His eyes fell to my cleavage. Without removing them, he reached out to open his top desk drawer. “What a little devil you’ve become,” he murmured as he rummaged through the drawer’s contents. When he found what he was looking for, he stood. There was a slapping noise, and I turned my head. His hand curled around a wooden ruler as he tapped it against his open palm. He came so close, I could only feel his body heat. As he raised the ruler, I said, “Wait.”
