Dirty Little Secret(12)

She splashed more cold water on her face, knowing her makeup could be repaired but the red, puffy eyes would give her away immediately. And the worst part of it all? She wanted to hate him. She needed to hate him, but a small kernel of feeling hidden deep down inside just wouldn’t go away. Was this how women ended up in affairs? She’d never understood it…until now. She had betrayed herself as much as she had Alex’s wife—her instincts, her emotions, her desires, even her integrity were all called into question now. She felt stripped bare, exposed, waiting only for the fall of the whip to flay her soul in punishment for her sins—not by some judgmental outsider, but by the honor she’d thought she possessed.

“I didn’t know,” she whispered, the agony almost more than she could bear.

The door to the bathroom opened. Cailin kept her head down, splashing more water, until the other woman entered the nearest stall. Then she hastily dried her face and hands and repaired her makeup as best she could. Before the woman reappeared, she was walking down the hall toward her office.

Lord help her; what the heck should she do now?

James Allen opened the door to Alex’s inner sanctum as she reentered the outer office. “You too, Brannigan,” he called over his shoulder. “See you next week.” Turning, he closed the door and headed toward her. A quick survey of her body and a slightly lascivious grin were all the acknowledgment Cailin received as the man passed. Not surprising; there were some men for whom women were nothing more than placeholders in the business world. They only truly existed at home, barefoot and pregnant, and the woman who dared step outside that arena could be explained away if the man ignored her or simply viewed her as a sex object. A decidedly old-fashioned belief but one Cailin had encountered much too often in the South. She simply nodded at the man and held the outer door for his departure.

It didn’t take long for Alex to descend. The sound of his door opening three minutes later pushed steel into her cooked-noodle spine.

“Cailin.” Alex turned back into his office, leaving the door ajar, a clear command to follow. Setting down the file she’d instinctively picked up—and giving herself time to take a deep breath—she slowly crossed the office and went inside.

The wall-to-wall windows dominating the back of the room caught her in their spell immediately. Thank God for vertigo. She’d never been thankful for her fear of heights until today. In this moment it became the perfect excuse to stop near the door, swallow hard, and struggle to get her bearings. Oh, and avoid looking at the man seated comfortably behind the monstrosity of a desk just in front of those windows. She’d never liked modern decor anyway.

Alex’s voice snapped her out of her thoughts.

“Shut the door.”

She jerked her gaze to him. Alex hadn’t looked up from his notes, and the dark fall of his hair obscured his eyes. Turning, she did as he asked before facing him once more.

“Come in, Cailin.”

The tone was firm. Commanding. The sound triggered the memory of him demanding her to climax Saturday night, turning her inside out. She couldn’t afford to think about that now. Emotion would drown her if she let it; she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

When she moved across the room to position herself behind one of the two deep chairs standing sentry before his desk, Alex finally glanced up, dark eyes inscrutable. “Sit.” Impatience was creeping into his tone. “It’s not like I’m going to eat you.”

For one horrified moment, Cailin thought she might burst into hysterical laughter. The pain radiating from her palms as she dug her nails in as deep as they would go staved off the reaction—barely. The chair underneath her was a welcome support.

She hadn’t realized she was looking down at her abused hands until Alex’s sigh drew her attention back to him. “We need to talk.”

Mentally girding her loins, she peeked up from under her lashes and asked, “About?”

“Us.”

“There is no us.”

She could bring herself to talk, but not to look him in the eye. It didn’t matter. His gaze bored a hole into the top of her lowered head anyway. “Semantics,” he growled. “You know what I mean. And would you look at me, for God’s sake?”

She raised her head and stared over his shoulder, trying to blur out both his captivating features and the windows behind him. Was this her punishment? She’d walked out on her marriage, and now she was destroying someone else’s. Sara Beth had seemed sweet, nice—fragile. What would happen if she found out her husband had slept with his executive assistant? Or was Cailin even the first? Maybe she was just one in a long line of women he’d fucked around with. Would that make it better or worse?