His hand lifts. Just slightly. And his thumb finds my jaw.
Oh God.
This is happening.
This is actually happening.
“You know exactly what I mean,” he murmurs.
I should step back. Should enforce the boundaries we very clearly established. Should remember the contract we both signed that explicitly prohibits this exact scenario.
Instead I whisper, “We shouldn’t.”
“We won’t,” he replies.
And then his mouth is on mine.
Narrator voice: They absolutely did.
The kiss isn’t gentle. Isn’t tentative. It’s desperate and messy and everything I’ve been trying not to think about since he last held me in his arms and fucked the living shit out of me.
His hand slides into my hair. My hands find his chest. The notebook falls to the floor with a thud that neither of us acknowledges.
He tastes like espresso and something darker. Something that makes my brain go offline and my body take over.
I press closer. He backs me against the counter. The edge digs into my lower back but I don’t care because his other hand is at my waist now, fingers pressing through my shirt, and I’m making sounds I should probably be embarrassed about.
His mouth moves to my jaw. My neck. I tilt my head back to give him access and he takes it. Teeth scraping. Tongue soothing. My entire nervous system lighting up like a goddamn Christmas tree.
“Marco,” I breathe.
He groans against my skin. The sound goes straight between my legs.
Fuck if I thought my pussy was wet before...
His hand slides under my shirt. Warm palm against bare skin. I arch into the touch and he makes that sound again. That low, rough sound that makes me want to climb him like a tree and forget every rule we ever made.
I’m tugging at his T-shirt. Trying to get it off. Trying to feel skin on skin. Trying to—
He stops.
Just stops.
Pulls back so fast I nearly stumble.
We’re both breathing hard. Staring at each other. His hair is a mess from my hands. His lips are swollen. His eyes are dark and dilated and full of things I don’t want to name.
“We can’t,” he says. His voice is wrecked. “Jess. We can’t do this.”
Reality crashes back in like cold water.
The contract. Ethan. Ben. Every single reason this is a terrible idea.
But we did it before...
I banish the voice.
“Right.” I’m straightening my shirt. Trying to look like I didn’t just almost violate several different workplace policies. Again. “Yeah. You’re right. Thatwas—”
