“All right,” I said. Mitch Whitfield had worked for Williams Tech for fifteen years as the onsite foreman. He was one of my dad’s most trusted employees.
“Great, I’ll leave you to it.” Dad nodded, turning and heading back out to the shop. The heavy metal door fell shut behind him, and the room instantly felt void of oxygen.
“You seemed surprised, should I be worried?” Alaric joked, reaching into his back pocket. I tried not to watch the tendons in his forearms working as he pulled out his wallet, but it was fruitless. I was hypnotized by him.
Clearing my throat, I raised my eyes to look at him, my lips tugging up in a slight smile. “I guess I am, a little. We’ve had a few incidents in the past with employees not representing the company to my dad’s liking, so he’s really picky about who he chooses to send to job sites. It usually takes peoplemonthsto earn his trust.”
“I get it. I was a little surprised too.” Alaric chuckled lightly. He opened his wallet and removed a stack of cards—his welding tickets and certifications for all of the job safety courses, and held them out to me.
I reached out to take them, the tips of my fingers brushing against his calloused palm, and tried to hide the effect he had on me; the way touching him so briefly had sent me straight back to the night we spent together. Memories of his calloused hands on my skin taunted me, and I knew my cheeks were heating up—along with some of my other parts.
I wanted more than anything to feel those hands on my body again.
Turning, I walked toward the photocopier. I scanned each card, conscious of his heavy gaze on me. I licked my lips, stealing a glance at him over my shoulder.
Alaric’s eyes smoldered as he looked at me. He lingered on my bare legs and the pleated floral skirt I wore. It made me want to press my thighs together, to try and contain the ache.
I shouldn’t want him. There was a lot about him I didn’t know. Like what his relationship with his daughter’s mother was. Maybe he was an adulterous dickhead, but still—my body craved him, and a part of me knew that wasn’t true. It couldn’t be.
Looking into his blue eyes, all I could see was his desire for me. Contained, but burning beneath the surface. It was…all-consuming. I’d never had someone look at me that way before, and it thrilled me while simultaneously terrifying me.
Clearing my throat, I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “How’s Tig?” I asked, deciding to go casual instead of asking the questions that blistered on the tip of my tongue.
“Great. He really took to Sawyer,” he replied, shaking his head as he leaned against my desk. He folded his muscular arms across his chest. “Slept against her door the first night, then beside her bed the second. If I’d have let him, he’d probably have slept in her bed with her. He wasn’t happy last night.”
“Why not?” I tilted my head, pressing the copy button. Although we were separated by two desks and ten feet, Alaric’s presence smashed into me like a monsoon. Every molecule between us was charged.
“Sawyer went back to her mother’s. Guess the dog missed her.” Alaric responded.
I wanted to grin, pleased that I hadn’t had to dig the answer out of him at all. He’d been honest, and I think it threw him off guard. He shifted, seeming a little uncomfortable with his admission.
He wasn’t with his daughter’s mother, and Alaric’s statement about how he wasn’t in a good place for a relationship made complete sense. He was just as bruised by love as I was, if not more. No wonder he hesitated.
Instead, I dialed it back a lot, giving him a slight smile. “Sounds like someone’s wagging his tail into your heart,” I teased, my blood thrumming in response to the way he looked at me.
“Maybe,” he responded, his gaze still fixated on me. I went back to my task, concentrating on keeping my hands from shaking.
I wanted to ask him more questions, peek inside him a little, but I bit them back, knowing they were far outside the scope of casual.
“So,” I said, returning his cards to him once I’d finished scanning and photocopying them. “How was it?”
“How was what?” he asked, his deep-rooted gaze still on my lips.
“The pizza? From the pizzeria?” I clarified, giving him a tiny half smile.
“Oh, yeah. It was good,” Alaric replied, his concentration on my lips never wavering. I burned beneath their intensity in the most euphoric of ways. It was baffling and enslaving.
“Just good?” I asked weakly, my thighs trembling through the suspended moment.
He leaned forward, just a little. “It was the best pizza I’ve ever eaten,” he clarified, his blue eyes—which I’d just realized had flecks of green within them—were locked on my face, and the innuendo wasn’t lost on me.
“Oh,” I breathed. Alaric was looking at me like he wanted to claim me. I’d seen that look before—several times during the night we spent together, but to my great disappointment…nothing happened. He remained three feet away; close enough to reach out and touch but far enough away that it couldn’t be mistaken as an accidental brush.
His lips twitched; he was fighting the sexual tension snapping between us, too. The realization made me giddy. “Mitch is probably waiting for me.”
“Yeah, probably. Good luck on the job site!” I said, backing away from him.
Alaric held my gaze for one lingering moment before leaving the office, and I sank heavily into my computer chair, my breathing labored.
