“Knew?” he asked as he began to kiss my neck.
“Who my father was.”
He pulled back and braced himself against the wall, his hands on either side of my head. “I swear to you, I found out today. I think Donna assumed there was a connection but she didn’t mention it to me until I got the phone call.” He paused and his eyes flickered over my face, as if he were trying to figure out whether I believed him. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
I dipped under his arms and walked across the entry. “I don’t speak to my father. I don’t have anything to do with him.” I fiddled with my thumbnail.
“Okay. Well you don’t have to work on the pitch. I just thought . . . JD Stanley is the only investment bank on Wall Street I’ve never done business with.”
“So,” I replied, and I glanced up.
“Well I can’t turn down the opportunity.”
“I don’t want you to turn it down.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“I want you to win that fucking account—and I’m going to help you.”
“What changed your mind?”
My eyes hit the floor. “It doesn’t matter. You got what you want.”
He took a step forward. “Tell me, Harper.” I knew I shouldn’t say anything more, but there was something in his tone that made it impossible not to comply.
I huffed out a breath. “He has a lot of kids, right?”
His eyes drifted over my face.
“I’m the only girl . . . and the only one he didn’t offer a job right out of college.”
“Because you’re a girl? Or because you don’t speak to each other?”
I let his questions drip into my brain. Did he have good relationships with his other children?
Max held out his hand. “Come with me.”
All too easily, I slipped my palm into his, his fingers holding me tightly as he led me further down the corridor, deeper into his apartment. What was I doing? I didn’t like this man. I should go downstairs to my own apartment. “I’m sorry. It’s late. I shouldn’t be here.”
“Shhh. Let’s get you hydrated.”
He guided me to a barstool opposite a kitchen island in a huge room I hadn’t seen before. The other night I’d only caught the dusky outline of his bedroom and the entryway. I hadn’t appreciated the size of the place or how glamorous it was. Max either had incredible taste or he’d hired a great interior designer.
“Drink,” he said, setting a glass of water on the white marble counter in front of me.
I took a sip, suddenly much more sober than I’d been when I knocked on his door.
“More,” he growled. Jesus, he was so bossy. But I complied and gulped down a couple mouthfuls of water.
He rounded the counter and stood beside me, leaning on the marble. “Tell me about your dad. You think he didn’t hire you because—”
“Because I have boobs.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Really?”
“He offered me a big chunk of money.” I set my glass down. “It’s not that he denies my existence—he periodically asks me to dinner.”
“So you do speak to him?”
I really needed to leave. “Not since my youngest half brother started his job at JD Stanley the day of his twenty-second birthday. Three weeks after I graduated business school. But not really much before that either.”
Max pursed his lips.
“I thought maybe he was waiting for me to finish grad school, and of course I would have said no, but . . .”
Max’s fingers stroking my arm scattered my thoughts. “He gave us money, me and my mom, but what I wanted was a family.”
Max withdrew his hand.
“Sorry, I should stop talking.”
“I like to listen. You have a lot to say.” His voice was quiet and even, as if he were being sincere, as if he wasn’t talking to a drunk woman who thought he was an asshole.
I raised my eyebrows. “I’ve been drinking. I have more to say in the office, but you’re not so interested there.”
He cupped my face. “How wrong you are.”
His kisses were soft at first, and I closed my eyes, savoring each one.
“We can’t do this.” My mouth protested, but my hands slipped up his naked back, his warm muscles bunching under my touch. “I can’t—”
“I know,” he said. “If I’m going to go for the JD Stanley account, I can’t exactly be fucking the boss’s daughter.” As if his body hadn’t caught up with his brain, he pulled up my skirt. “But this ass, these legs. They’ve got me under some kind of spell.” He smoothed his hands over my hips and under my ass, slipping inside my panties, then pulled me off the stool and tight to his body.