After the Storm (All I've Ever Needed)(6)

Having had a dip in her honey pot, he knew that it would be nigh impossible to get any serious work done on Monday. All he would be thinking of is her baby-soft skin, her tantalizing perfume and her sweet, wet, near-virginal tightness.

He couldn’t wait to get her into bed, to explore her fully and taste her nectar.

Damn you and your bloody wedding, Harry!

***

Natalie gave herself a good talking to on the weekend. She wouldn’t let a past relationship poison the start of a new one. Although Stephano had previously mentioned a girlfriend in conversation with her and their colleagues, he hadn’t done so in recent months. She’d even overheard the guys teasing him about living with his mother only a few weeks ago. Instead of being embarrassed at the good-natured ribbing, he’d told the guys they were just jealous that he had a mamma who was the best cook in the world, who ensured that his clothes were taken for dry cleaning when needed and that the maid changed his sheets and cleaned his room for him. The guys had tasted the food at his mother’s rustic restaurant and after a few minutes’ consideration, most of them had agreed that there were much worst things than living at home with your parents at the age of twenty-eight.

And in all the months she’d worked with him, nothing in Stephano’s behavior indicated he was a liar. In fact, not long after joining the agency she had been stunned when Paul had wrongly praised Stephano in their monthly meeting for a successful project she had spent weeks working on tirelessly. Stephano had promptly corrected the misconception. Natalie had still been on her six-month probation and though she’d done enough to impress her immediate line manager, Alan Woods, Stephano giving her the credit she was due for the publicly successful project had cemented her position in the agency. Her permanent status was confirmed less than a week later and more than seven weeks before confirmation was due.

Stephano was the hottest looking guy in the office. Morgan Wells, another colleague, was perhaps better looking, but since he was openly and very proudly gay that gave Stephano the crown as far as Natalie was concerned. She had been a little in love with him from the day she’d started, but from the moment Stephano had raised his hand, interrupting the director’s speech to correct his facts, she’d gone from mildly interested to fully-blown infatuated. Most of her other colleagues would have wallowed in the man’s praise and given Natalie a perfunctory apology for stealing her thunder later, or perhaps not at all.

Stephano had probably been honest about going out with his friends, she decided as she took a seat at her desk the next Monday morning.

Except for the fact that her keyboard was pushed too far forward on her desk for her to use it comfortably and the empty tissue dispenser that she hastily refilled, there was nothing to indicate that she and Stephano had had sex on her desk.

I had sex on my desk!

Natalie still couldn’t wrap her mind around it. She didn’t believe in office romances, especially since she loved her job and wouldn’t want to leave when the relationship went sour. Staying in a job and seeing an ex-lover every day would be hard thing to endure—seeing that lover with someone new in the same office would be even harder. Thankfully, she wouldn’t have that problem as she was the only woman in the team of ten.

Unless he starts batting for the same team as Morgan, she thought with a smile.

She sobered as she checked the time on her computer and realized that it was after ten o’clock. Stephano should have been in the office by now.

The agency allowed flexible working and each of them did their required thirty-five hours around the ten-to-four core hours. An early bird by nature she had switched to a later working pattern when she’d realized that Stephano came in later in the morning and was usually the last to leave the office in the evening. But although he was often the last to arrive, he always arrived by ten, unless the Tube experienced severe delays.

Worried, she positioned her monitor so that she had a view of the road and the passengers exiting the Tube station while appearing to be focused on her computer screen. Her desk was in prime position in the office—most of her colleagues would swap desks in a heartbeat. She had inherited it from Mary O’Brien, her successor, a woman who had been the longest-serving member of staff before retiring early to go sailing around the world with her husband. Morgan had complained bitterly when Natalie had been given the best desk in the office, but Alan had insisted that as Mary’s replacement she was entitled to it. Morgan had ranted and raved for weeks, but Alan had remained unbending.

A sporty red car pulled up just outside her window and blocked her view of the station. Wanting to scream abuse at the driver, Natalie glanced angrily at the occupants instead, hoping that a dirty look would send them on their way. With a shock she recognized the back of Stephano’s head as he leaned over to kiss the female driver. It was a brief kiss, but Natalie was certain it had been on the lips. As he unfolded his length from the passenger seat with some difficulty, Natalie caught a glimpse of the beautiful, young black woman who smiled as she waved at him, then gunned the engine and drove off before the loitering parking attendant could issue her a ticket for stopping in the no-parking zone.