Chapter 03

Lena:

The phone rings, taking me out of the freaking out state I was in, and I answer on the second ring.

“Bring a double espresso to my office.”

Without a please or a thank you, he hangs up after dictating his order.

I get up and walk towards a small room that works as a break room, there’s a coffee machine, a freezer and an electric oven and microwave. While I’m making the coffee just like he asked, in my head I’m trying to figure out what the hell am I going to do.

Am I willing to let Ryan destroy the little pride I have left?

As much as it hurts, the truth is that without the opportunity he gave me, right now I would have been sleeping on the streets and covering myself with old and muddy newspapers sheets. So all I have left to do is to put up with everything he asks me to. I’m not revealing the fact that I remember him, I feel like the minute he knows, it will be so much worst for me.

My resolution thaws the moment I walk back inside his office. My hands begin to shake and my breathing becomes irregular. I feel a cold sweatdrop slide down my back which makes me too conscious of it instead of the task ahead of me. I walk in a straight line with my eyes staring directly at the spot where I have to deposit the coffee. Just when I think I accomplished the task perfectly, my trembling fingers get stuck in the handle of the mug, and the hot liquid spills all over his paperwork and some of it on his white Armani shirt.

“Fucking hell!” He says all pissed off while leaning back as a reaction of having hot coffee on his skin.

“I’m so sorry!” I’m undone in apologies without believing how clumsy I've been.

“Clean up the mess you just made.” Ryan demands and gets up pushing his chair with so much force it hits the glass panel on his back.

I take some papers from the disposable tray and try to fix the mess. The only piece of luck I have is that the messed up papers were not contracts or important papers. The table looks clean, although is a little sticky and the smell of coffee impregnates the whole space. I organize the rest of his things even though it wasn’t what he asked, but I go the extra mile just to show him how sorry I am, when I look up and my mouth hangs open with the view.

Ryan is naked from the waist up and is giving me the spectacular view of his muscled back, which contracts with every move he makes as he’s looking through a closet behind his door that has some pieces of clothing. He finds a shirt and puts his arms through the sleeves, cutting my view of perfection, but just when I thought everything was lost, he turns around and I can see his chest out in the open.

Let me tell you something. You don’t know how hot a torso can be until you’ve seen Ryan’s. He has every single muscle chiseled out, his nipples are pointy and dark, tempting you to bite them. The path of hair running from his navel to the edge of the waist of his pants makes you wonder where it ends, and it gives you a feeling of knowing how hard and throbbing that end is. That’s what looking at Ryan Blake’s chest is.

I can’t take my eyes off him. I swear my mouth filled with saliva and my heart threw itself into a race of desperate heartbeats.

And to think I could have enjoyed all of that.

I banish the thought from my head and make a titanic effort to unglue my eyes from his body so I can direct them to his face, the one that is fully concentrated on me. I want to die buried six feet under because of my embarrassment, I can feel my cheeks burning with heat, not because it was wrong, but because I was caught in the act, no one should regret admiring the work of art that Ryan Blake is.

“Are you done” he asks with mockery, clearly meaning my ogling, but I don’t fall for his provoking question.

“Yes, everything is clean. And, again, I’m sorry for my clumsiness, it won’t happen again.” I’m amazed at how firm I answer.

“It better not.” He suggests with demand in his tone.

Nodding, I walk towards the door and as I pass him, I catch his sandalwood and oak scent mixed with a pinch of coffee and it makes my senses heighten. It was just for half a second, but walking past him and smell him felt like hours and hours. I have to control myself around him.

I sit on my desk and bury my fingers in my hair while I bang my head against the table over and over again. I didn’t even need to wait for him to humiliate me, I did it all on my own.

However, I’m not ashamed to admit that if I get such view of his body again, I’d admire it again without thinking it twice.