Yours Truly(36)

Kat again. He couldn’t get her out of his mind. She would be so pleased to hear her project was on track and that her hard work was paying off. He let himself imagine her shriek of joy when he told her the good news and then realized he was smiling. If just thinking about her brought a smile to his face, who knew what her actual presence could do to him?

He looked down at the sheet of paper in his hands and felt the smile fade. The clock said he had been working on that first page for the past twenty minutes. If this kept up, he doubted he’d get any actual work done for the rest of the day. His mind was too occupied. He needed something to distract him. He needed something that would ease his mind, if only for a little while. He needed… Kat.

He pulled out his cell phone. He went straight to his text messages, where he’d been having an ongoing conversation with Kat for the past week. He scanned through it, smiling at some of the cute things Kat had said to him. He could barely believe the wedding was almost a month ago.

One month since the wedding. He paused, evaluating. The first two weeks didn’t count as them being together since they hadn’t really been together, but he still felt they should count for something, since all he seemed to do those two weeks was think about her. Two weeks of thinking and two weeks of dating. The last two weeks had been two of the happiest of his life.

AJ couldn’t put his finger on it, but there was something about Kat that had him head over heels. Something about her was different than other women. She was beautiful, of course; not the traditional kind of beauty that he had become accustomed to, though. She wasn’t strikingly skinny and her hair wasn’t perfect and straight. She didn’t have porcelain skin or a giant chest, but for some reason, none of that mattered to him.

She had other traits that caused AJ to ache with a desperate need to have her, to claim her. The way she put her hand on her hip while cocking her head to the side when she was thinking made his heart do backflips inside of his chest. And for the first time in his life, he felt butterflies in his stomach when he thought of a woman. Was it love or was it just a crush? AJ couldn’t be sure. All he knew was that there was something very special about Kat and he made it a point that he’d do everything in his power to never lose her.

A grin crossed his face as he thought of a way to see her. He pushed the intercom button in his office. “I need to see Kat Riley right now.” He made sure to put a slight menace into his voice so that his secretary would make the call downstairs right away. “Tell her it’s regarding her proposal and that it is urgent. I want her in my office in five minutes.”

“Of course, sir,” his secretary replied. “Right away, sir.”

It was perfect. To everyone else, this would look like a business thing. It was the perfect excuse to see her.

The leather chair creaked as he leaned back and waited for her to arrive. He could already see the flush on her cheeks and the nervous breathlessness from running upstairs. He smiled, thinking about it. He loved teasing her and thought it would be a playful joke to make her think she was actually in trouble.

Kat didn’t leave him waiting for long. Less than a minute and a half passed before the door to his office opened up and she was standing in the doorway. She must have run the entire way.

“Everything okay?” she asked, nervous and out of breath. Her face was just as flushed as he had imagined it would be. He hoped to have it flushing again, but for an entirely different breathless reason.

“Close the door,” he responded, keeping his voice tight and serious. He wasn’t about to give away the game yet.

She did as he asked and stepped into the room. She was wearing a black skirt, which clung tightly to her hips as she walked gracefully toward AJ’s desk. The matching dark jacket was feminine and soft, accenting her curves. He couldn’t help but give her a once over. The way she wore that outfit caused his mouth to water and his concerns about the company instantly faded away.

“I have news,” he said after a moment. She bit her lip and it took everything he had not to just jump over the desk and take her right there.

“What’s wrong?” Kat asked. “Is there something wrong with the proposal? I knew the second paragraph was worded a little strangely, but it really…”

“Everything is perfectly okay now,” he interrupted, unable to keep it up. He had planned on seeing how long he could make her squirm, but the lip-bite put his brain on standby. All he could think about was touching her. He stood and walked around to the front of his desk. “I just sent you that message to get you in here.”