“Rhett,” I interjected.
“And dating in the workplace is just stupid. I don’t want a messy breakup blowing everything I’ve worked so fucking hard for!” She was yelling by the time she finished, and I would have cracked a smile about it if I hadn’t been pissed about something else.
I narrowed my eyes at her in warning. “Watch your language, Charlotte.”
“You can’t—”
“Didn’t you just tell me all about how I was your boss?” I countered before she finished her dispute. “And eventually, I’ll be your man. And neither your boss nor your man want to hear such fucking vulgarity coming out of such a gorgeous, intelligent mouth. Am I being clear?”
“But you—”
“If I hear language like that from your mouth, I’m going to fill it with something else,” I grunted. Her eyes went wide, but I had shit to ponder, so I excused her with an, “I need to get back to work.”
Charlotte’s expression was a little crestfallen until she realized what she was doing and smoothed it over with a blank canvas. I didn’t want her to think I’d given up on us because no matter what she believed in her head, I saw that her heart had been hurt by the possibility. I would rather see fire in her eyes, even if she was spitting mad at me, than the deadpan expression she was currently wearing.
“Charlotte?”
“Yes?” She paused on her way to the door and twisted her neck to look back at me over her shoulder.
“There is one exception to that rule.”
Her lips curled down. “The language thing?”
I nodded solemnly. “You can say all the dirty things you want when you’re in bed with me.”
Her mouth dropped open, and she floundered for a response. Finally, she straightened her shoulders and snapped, “Good to know that if I’m ever killing you while you sleep, I can call you a pompous motherfucker.” Then she turned around and marched out of the office.
I laughed so hard tears leaked from the corners of my eyes. Damn, I loved her. She was so fucking adorable.
And the fact that HR wasn’t breathing down my neck with a sexual harassment lawsuit told me Charlotte felt more for me than she wanted to admit. If I hadn’t believed that with every fiber of my being, I wouldn’t have put my business and reputation on the line for her. The truth was, I’d go to hell and back to make her mine.
2
Rhett
Over the next two weeks, I arranged more stolen moments, sent her flowers, and brought in her favorites for dinner when I asked her to work later. But she was stubbornly refusing to acknowledge what was between us, and it was frustrating the hell out of me.
Case in point, the way I practically snarled at her in my office.
However, I’d hatched a plan and was about to put it into motion. I’d been grooming Charlotte to take on more responsibility in the company, not only something I knew she wanted but also something she deserved. She was damn good at her job. Mentoring her was also a helpful tool in refuting her suspicion that I only hired her to get between her legs. Not that it hadn’t been a factor in the equation.
I intended to help her legitimately make her way up the ladder if that was what she wanted. I wasn’t so old-fashioned that I believed my woman should do nothing except be a wife and a mother. If Charlotte wanted to continue working, I had no problem with that as long as her office was always next to mine, and she spent her lunch hours spread out on my desk as my dessert.
I’d even take a page from K-Corp’s book and construct a daycare in the building so our children were always close. Now, if she wanted to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, I had no complaint about that either. As long as she understood that either plan included filling her belly with a houseful of babies.
And I knew she wanted children because she couldn’t stop talking about her niece and lit up like Times Square on New Year’s Eve every time. She’d even mentioned how she hoped her kids would be close in age to her sister’s. She was rarely talking to me when these things slipped out, but I was always near enough to hear them. And they bolstered my confidence in my plans.
She’d even admitted to wanting a large family. The last time we looked at a prospectus for a building that we would turn into condos, she’d looked over the floor plans and shook her head. “Look at these two lines.” She pointed at the blueprints before she started talking animatedly with her hands.
“One of the problems I’ve seen as I looked for an apartment in this city is that so few are family friendly. All of these designs are for single people or couples. You need ones for a family, and these two are perfect. Just push that wall over here and add a closet over here. It will make a nice size nursery or bedroom for an older child.” Then she pushed that one aside and sketched out the alterations that she thought would work for the other plan. “If I have a family someday, I would be very happy with one of these as a starter home. Of course, it wouldn’t work for long because I want lots of babies, but for small families, if it’s set up right, they’ll stay until their child is grown, and maybe even after that.”
My intercom beeped, drawing me back to the present. “Thirty minutes, Rhett,” Lois reminded me. That was all she said before switching it off. She might seem abrupt to some, but one of the reasons I worked well with Lois was her clear and succinct communication.
I pushed my chair back and collected my cell
