Illicit Affairs by Holly Dixon

Five

Nate wasn’tsure how long jet lag usually lasted but tonight he had a killer headache. His fingers pinched the bridge of his nose as he sighed, staring at his computer screen. He had spent the last three hours replying to emails and had barely put a dent in the mountain of unread messages sitting in his inbox.

This week had been killer.

Keeping two firms running was proving to be a challenge, especially when one of those firms was on the other side of the world. If not for the time difference, the fact that Nate wasn’t there and couldn’t be hands-on was starting to grind his gears. However, the branch back in Manhattan was ticking over relatively well, but here in London…that was a different story.

It was no wonder that Tom fell ill with the amount of work he took on at his age.

For the first time in hours, Nate finally looked up from his desk when he heard one of the cleaning staff roaming past his door with a vacuum. It was then that he realised the time as darkness sprawled in through the windows behind him, a red glow filling his office from the aircraft warning lights on the building opposite him.

He stood up and peered out at the London skyline, the city unapologetically urban. It spread across once luscious green lands like a vulgarly enlarged microchip. There wasn’t much greenery or planted blooms, just monoliths of concrete and glass soaring out of the sidewalks in its uniform grid formation. At night, it was a glittering jungle with so many lights that as Nate looked to the sky, it was illuminated in a violet and blue haze that hid the twinkle of stars.

London was similar to his home, the monochrome buildings dominating the skyline, but the difference here was that a silver crack ran through the landscape—the River Thames.

After shutting down his computer for the evening, Nate loosened his crimson tie, hanging it over the corner of his desk, and popped the first couple of buttons on his shirt to allow him to rub at the back of his tense neck with a sigh.

As Nate switched off the lights to his office and locked it up for the evening, he turned around to the empty department and stopped short. Golden light lit up one corner of the office but it wasn’t from a lamp, it was the transcendent glow of Ms. Archer’s hair, the long, luscious waves of silk tumbling over each of her petite shoulders. The young woman was curled over at her desk, a highlighter in hand as she marked up several documents that were scattered across her workspace.

This woman clearly doesn’t know the meaning of law and order, he thought to himself with a smirk on his face.

For a moment, Nate could only stand and observe her, his feet unwilling to move as he held his suitcase at his side. Ms. Archer was undoubtedly beautiful sat there in a burgundy formal dress that clung to every sumptuous dip and curve of her sinful body. He had a feeling that the young woman was more than aware of her sexual prowess for no woman could carry themselves in such a refined and assertive manner as she without using their looks to their advantage.

However, Nate was starting to see that there was more than what met the eye with Ms. Archer. It was closing in past eight at night and here was his assistant meticulously reviewing the documents that he had asked for with such unreasonably tight timelines. Truthfully, he didn’t need the documentation until Monday, but he thought it best to set an example after her atrocious behaviour in front of his department. Her outburst hadn’t gone unnoticed by his personnel or his clients. And all over coffee.

At this, a small smirk twitched at his lips as he recalled the way Ms. Archer ran her wild mouth and huffed like a bratty adolescent. If she were behaving this way out of work he could think of several salacious ways to make this untamed woman fall back in line, but no, such tempting and disreputable thoughts had no place at work, nor did he have room in his settled life. Those days were long behind him.

Making his way over to her desk, he stood in front of her and had to bite back his smile as she continued to stare down at her files, highlighting down the page as though doing a word search. Her lack of awareness never failed to amaze him.

“Late night, Ms. Archer?” he asked politely but furrowed his brows when the blonde didn’t respond or even react to him. “Ava?”

When the small tinny noise tickled his ears, Nate soon noticed the white cable running down the front of her body, his eyes lingering upon her supple cleavage before looking at the cell phone her headphones were plugged into. He carefully set his suitcase on the desk in front of her.

“Fuck me!” Ava screamed out, jumping upright into her seat as though an electrical charge had bolted through her body. With her hand against her jackhammering heart, she gawked up at Mr. Brooks, sweeping a curl of hair that had flown across her long lashes. “Nath—Mr. Brooks,” she corrected herself, much to Nate’s delight. “You’re still here.”

Nate had to muster up all his self-control to not chuckle or even smile at the flustered expression on the young Ava’s face—she looked like a bunny caught in headlights.

“I’m here,” Nate confirmed, raising his eyebrow at the confused look Ava was giving him. Where else did she expect to see her boss if not at work? “I was working the Forbes case,” he explained, unsure why he felt the need to, but when he saw Ava’s shoulders slump, he wondered if his punishment had been too much for her, even if he was somewhat impressed by her staying back and seeing out her sentence.

“Me too.” Ava sighed, sitting back in her chair, tossing her hair over one shoulder as she rubbed her tense neck. “I’m almost done with the files for the Forbes negotiation. I’ve nearly finished drafting the subpoenas, however, there is just one problem…”

“And that is?” Nate frowned, looking down at the pages Ava was flicking through.

“I think there’s perhaps a mistake with the filing of evidence; these signatures don’t match, see?” Ava explained, holding up two pieces of paper.

Nate sighed, having thought that the young and cunning Mrs. Forbes would pull such a thing as one of the executors to her late husband’s estate and trust. He walked around the desk, standing behind Ava, and peered over her shoulder down at the mismatched signatures of Holden Forbes. Ms. Archer’s innocence on the matter was admirable but an inexperienced error in judgement. Nate could sniff a gold digger a mile off but he didn’t fight for justice, he fought to win the case and bring in revenue to his firm.

The proximity of Mr. Brooks disrupting her personal space made Ava’s spine straighten, the blood wakening her brain and tickling her senses as she became as still as mouse right before a cat pounced on its prey. Besides the heat radiating from his mass, it was the top notes of his cologne—mint, lavender, and cinnamon—that coiled around her emotions, slowing her heartbeat to the kind of rhythm usually reserved for the deepest of dreams. However, the spicier notes of his scent hit the back of her throat, the cedar, amber, and sandalwood making her heart flutter like the wings of a hummingbird. His scent was equal parts freshness and softness as it was strength and sensuality.

“I might have known she’d try to pull a stunt like this,” Nate grumbled, his warm breath brushing past Ava’s shoulder and painting goosebumps down her arms.

“What do you want me to do?” she answered, her voice barely above a whisper. No need to raise voices in an empty office where her boss was leaning over her shoulder and reaching for the documents, flicking the pages casually as though he were unaware of how his closeness affected Ava.

“Remove them from the case; we fight her corner clean. If she wants to retain ownership of the estate from his kids, she’s gonna do it my way,” Nate answered simply, pulling back and pausing for a brief second in the intimate space so close to the nape of Ms. Archer’s neck that had taken his senses prisoner.

It would be fitting that she would smell as enticing as every natural bloom, as alluring as a red rose, as free as springtime blossom rain, with just a hint of debauchery. She was an aromatic song, her essence the floral orchestra of the soul, and it was something that Nate knew he would forever crave.

Ava was somewhat impressed at Mr. Brooks’s moral compass as she timidly turned her chin over her shoulder, her bluebells peering up at him from beneath the canopy of her luscious dark lashes. Her oceans met the expanse of his rich forests, his eyes like the soft moss that clothed hazel trees, and in that moment she saw that familiar look of desire in his dilating pupils.

It had been years since Nate had felt the familiar feeling stirring deep within his core—the flames, the itching at his fingertips, the tingling upon his tongue…the ache. Attraction was a fickle thing to Nate, as the concept of love was to a cynic. A semi-euphoric, temporary chemical reaction that fades over time—that was something that Nate had first-hand experience with.

“Was that all…Ava?” he asked, saying the young woman’s name as though testing its softness upon his palate.

The way he said her name brought chills down the nape of her neck, and if it hadn’t been for the past few days with this imperious man, she’d have maybe stuck around and played with fire.

Perhaps a part of Nate had hoped their business was not finished here as his glance fell upon her two delicate petals that parted ever so slowly, but he could tell it was over when the young woman let go of a small breath and faced forward in a composed manner.

“Yes, sir.”