Firmly…

James's fingers convulsed around his phone, the screen still glowing with our exchange. His throat worked silently, Adam's apple bobbing against his collar. The desk lamp haloed the sweat beading along his hairline, the strained tendons in his neck. When he finally spoke, his voice was shredded velvet. "You." Just that—raw and wrecked.

I stepped inside, letting the door click shut behind me. The scent of his cologne—spice and something darker—wrapped around me, thick as the silence between us. His gaze tracked the sway of my hips as I approached, the deliberate roll of each step. "Problem?" I purred, stopping just beyond arm's reach. His pen holder trembled when my hip brushed the desk edge.

James's knuckles whitened around his phone. A vein pulsed in his temple. "You little—" The words dissolved into a groan as I leaned forward, bracing my palms on the polished wood. My cleavage pressed together, the lace scraping my nipples raw. His exhale hitched when I whispered, "Say it."

The office chair creaked violently as he surged forward, standing directly behind me, his hands clamping around my waist. His thumbs dug into the indentations left by the thong—proof he'd memorized every pixel of those photos. "Minx," he growled against my jawline, stubble burning. "Fucking menace." His teeth grazed my earlobe, sending shocks through my pelvis.

Clarity dissolved when his knee nudged my legs apart—the edge of the desk biting into my thighs as his palm slid up my stomach, fingers splaying over my ribs. His other hand yanked my hair back, forcing my spine into a dangerous arch. "Look at yourself," he rasped, nodding toward the window's reflection where our bodies pressed together, my flushed face framed between his clenched jaw and shoulders.

His grip wasn't cruel—just unshakable, like he'd spent months imagining this exact pressure-point. Every exhale hit the nape of my neck in ragged bursts. "All those fucking games," he murmured, dragging his nose along my pulse. The accusation held no heat—just awe, as if he couldn't decide whether to worship or throttle me. His hips canted forward once, deliberately, imprinting the proof of his restraint against the small of my back. The groan it tore from him sounded excavated from his sternum.

The window's reflection warped our bodies into something mythic—his broad shoulders eclipsing mine, my lace-clad form arching against him like a drawn bow. His fingers flexed around my ribs, possessive and reverent. "You knew," he said—not a question. His thumb found the underwire's edge, tracing the faint red line it left. "Every time you bent over that fucking counter. Every bloody lip bite."